Tarver Plantation
a.k.a. Tarva Plantation
Tarva Rd./Co. Rt. 122, N of Newton, Newton, GATarver Plantation is significant as a historic working plantation with a Greek Revival plantation house constructed about 1850. The plantation consists of approximately 1,300 acres that have historically been part of this large land holding. Tarver Plantation is significant in the areas of agriculture and architecture.
In terms of agriculture, the property is significant as an example of a large and extensive working plantation from the 1850s to the 1870s. It was the home of Henry Andrew Tarver and his wife Elizabeth Solomon Tarver until the Tarvers moved to Atlanta in the 1870s. In 1850, the plantation consisted of 3,700 acres and produced a variety of crops, including corn, oats, cotton, peas and beans, and sweet potatoes. In 1860, the plantation operation had been scaled down to 2,200 acres, with corn, cotton, and sweet potatoes as the main crops. During the Civil War, the plantation was a source of food and other supplies for the Confederate government. The plantation was operated by slavery through the Civil War and then changed to a system of sharecropping in the late nineteenth century. In the 1940s, the property became a hunting preserve under the ownership of Russell A. Alger, Jr. of Chicago, Illinois, as did many other Albany and Thomasville area plantations. Tarver Plantation continues to be a seasonal home to the present.
In terms of architecture, the property is significant for its very intact Greek Revival plantation house built about 1850. The classically designed house has very fine details that make the house an excellent example of the interpretation of the Greek Revival style in southwest Georgia domestic architecture in the mid-nineteenth century. These details include a symmetrical main block with front and side porticoes, entrances with transoms and sidelights, interior moldings and mantels, and an unusual cross-hallway floor plan with wide central hallways in the form of a Greek cross. The area with full-length verandah and the original kitchen wing are also significant features. A 1940s restoration made minor alterations and additions but left the mid-nineteenth-century, Greek Revival character of the house very intact.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1989.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.