Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site, National Park Service
Hankinson M. 2004. Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site: Cultural Landscape Inventory, Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site, National Park Service. Cultural Landscapes Inventory Report. 725018. NPS Pacific West Regional Office. Pacific West Regional Office/CLI Database
Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site consists of 13.19-acres of land and is situated within Las Trampas Hills at 700’ elevation. The historic site is located on the western edge of the city of Danville, California, but is characterized by the wooded areas and open fields that surround the site to the north, south, and west. Within the historic site, buildings, roads, several small orchards, and ornamental vegetation were developed between the years 1880 and 1944, and characterize the property as a small working ranch. Many of the buildings at the historic site were built by the O’Neills (with exception of the old barn) in a vernacular style resembling typical late 19th-century California ranch structures with gable roofs and white painted shiplap or clapboard siding. The Tao House, trunk room, and garage were built in a Spanish Colonial Style and have hipped, black terra cotta roofs. The entry road is narrow, curvilinear, and rural in character. The orchards include walnut trees to the south, almond trees to the east and various stone fruit trees to the north of the Tao House. Ornamental vegetation surrounds the Tao House. The period of significance at Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site is 1937-1944, which reflects the years when the playwright composed some of his most important works and when the Tao House landscape was planned, designed, and constructed under the direction of Eugene and Carlotta O’Neill. This site was first recognized as significant when the Tao House was designated as a Registered National Historic Landmark in 1971. The site was given further significance in 1976 by an Act of the second session of the 94th Congress and President Gerald Ford’s signature, which established Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site. The historic site is significant for its association with events in American literature (criterion A) and for its association with a nationally and internationally recognized playwright, winner of four Pulitzer Prizes and the Nobel Prize in Literature (criterion B). The historic site retains integrity as the residence of Eugene and Carlotta O’Neill between the years 1937 and 1944 and today remains in good condition. The historic site displays the seven aspects that determine integrity as defined by the National Register of Historic Places: location, design, materials, workmanship, setting, feeling, and association through the retention of the majority of the following landscape characteristics that contribute to its historic integrity as one cultural landscape. These landscape characteristics are Views and Vistas, Vegetation, Buildings and Structures, Small Scale Features, Circulation, Natural Systems and Features, and Spatial Organization.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Hankinson, Mike
- Date of Issue
- 2004-04-15
- Publisher
- NPS Pacific West Regional Office
- Units
- EUON , PWR
- Keywords
- Carlotta O'Neill, Corduroy Hills Ranch, Danville, Drama, Eugene Gladstone O'Neill, Historic Designed Landscape, Landscape architecture, Las Trampas Ridge, Literature, Modern Landscape Design and Site Planning, Nobel Prize in Literature, outbuildings, Playwright, Pulitzer Prize, ranches, Spanish Colonial Style, The Tao House
- Subjects
- CRIS-CL: 725018: Eugene O'Neill National Historic Site