Cedarcroft, home of Bayard Taylor, 1861, Kennett Square, Pennsylvania

Daily Local News, West Chester, P Thursday, May 31, 1979

                                                       Cedarcroft

Kennett Square             

    Over a century ago, this mansion, mid-Victorian in flavor and clasical in feeling, was builty by Bayard TAylor.....novelist, poet, lecturer, correspondent for the New York Tribune, teacher , traveler and diplomat.

    Born in Kennett Square in 1825 of Quaker parentage, Bayard's early studies included Latin, French and Spanish.  At 12 he began writing and at 14 his first poem appeared in the Saturday Evening Post.  With a hundred and forty dollars from his contributions to this magazine and from other sources, he was only 19 when he began his incredible career as a world traveler....England, Scotland, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Iceland, France and Syria.

    He was in California writing about the Gold Rusn in 1849, he joined Commodore Perry's expedition to Japan in 1853 and, in 1862, was sent as secretary of legation to St. Petersburg, Russia.  Having studied Gereman, he translated Goethe's "Faust" and later became US minister to BErlin.

    In 1857 Bayard married Marie Hansen, who collaborated with him and zealously promoted his literary career.  It was for her and thier infant daughter that he build Cedarcroft, in the center of a magnificent estate where he found peace after his world wanderings.  Although he died in Berlin in 1878, he now rests in Longwood Cemetery, close by his beloved Cedarcroft.