Montgomery History – Beall-Dawson House Museum and Dr. Stonestreet Museum of Nineteenth Century Medicine

 

The front door of the Beall-Dawson House

For the third portion of my internship this past summer with Montgomery History, I worked as a docent in the Beall-Dawson and Dr. Stonestreet museums. The museums are open Wednesday through Sunday, 12:00 to 4:00. Wednesday through Friday they use volunteers and on the weekends they have two paid Weekend Coordinators that alternate every other weekend.

The tour consists of the Dr. Stonestreet Museum of Nineteenth Century Medicine, which takes place in the small building that was his office. Inside the building are his actual examination table and a number of instruments and tools doctors of the time would have used. Some were Dr. Stonestreet’s, though most come from other doctors that practiced at the time. Every second Sunday of the month Clarence Hickey from the Speakers Bureau comes to volunteer and act as the Dr. Stonestreet interpreter. He has also written a book about the man, one that is sold in the gift shop.

Dr. Stonestreet’s office

The other portion of the tour is larger and the main focus of Montgomery History. The Beall-Dawson House is a historic home on the National Register of Historic Properties. It is in excellent condition despite having been inhabited continuously from 1817 or so to the mid-1970s. This year is the house’s 200^th birthday as construction began in 1815. The Beall family was a wealthy family in Rockville – they had the only mansion listed on the 1820 census records, for example – and their relatives lived in the house until the 1940s. It is the family that took over the house in the 1940s that is to thank for the quality and structural integrity of the house. Mr. and Mrs. Davis were looking to restore a home and did a great deal of repair work to restore the house to its early nineteenth century look, going so far as to rip the 20 year old porch off the front of the house.

The 1940s addition where the gift shop is located

The gift shop is located in one half of the frame construction addition built in the 1940s when the Davis family moved in. Part of my job as docent is helping out with the gift shop and keeping track of anything a visitor shows an interest in. If they mention a book or item that they’re interested in but we don’t have, I let the shop manager know.