The Weeden House was built in 1819 and was the home of several distinguished early Huntsvillians.  It was build by Henry C. Bradford, a merchant from Nashville, and was meant to be a showplace on what was then the frontier.  

Mr. Bradford's mercantile business went bankrupt after the Panic of 1819 and he moved to Texas.  Subsequent owners prior to the Weedens included John McKinley, who later became an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, and the banker-planter Barley M. Lowe.

Dr. William Weeden bought the residence for his family in 1845.

Except for the Civil War years when it was requisitioned for the use of Federal Officers, the home was occupied by Weeden's descendants until it was sold in 1956.

The elegant Federal period house is where Howard Weeden (1846-1905) was born and died. 

Many of its design features, including elaborate interior and exterior carvings, attest to Bradford's desire to have only the best.  The entry hall, with Adamesque curves in its fanlight, stairway, and rear wall, is one of the most beautiful in the area.  The home is magnificently painted and has all of the finest detail work including, a glass entry fanlight, gabled roof, columns, and elegantly hand carved mantels.  Above all of the other design features, the spiral staircase remains the focal point of the house.  It's flowing design and beautifully crafted handrails look as if they descend from heaven, itself.  The museum is surrounded by beautiful oak and cottonwood trees, as if to frame this masterpiece of antebellum artwork.

Now owned by the City of Huntsville and leased by the Twickenham Historic Preservation District Association, the house underwent  painstaking restoration during the late 1970's, under the auspices of Huntsville architect Harvie P. Jones.  Operated as a nineteenth-century house museum, the building is interpreted in its 1840-50 period.  Some of the furnishings displayed, were originally owned by the Weedens.