By Abbey Nutter, Main Street Media. Published September 10, 2026.
The Friends of the Latimer House at the William and Martha Brown Park announced on Aug. 27 that a quitclaim deed had been recorded, officially transferring ownership of the historic home from Sumner County to the nonprofit.
Now, Friends of the Latimer House at the William and Martha Brown Park are looking to begin preservation efforts.
Built in the 1790s, the Latimer House has ties to colonial history, Tennessee history and the Revolutionary War. The property was purchased in the 1790s by Colonel Johnathan Latimer, who served in the Connecticut Militia during the Revolution. The Latimer House was built in the late 1790s on property gifted by Latimer to his son.
“The house was built sometime in the late 1700s out of logs that were sourced from the land there,” said Jim Latimer, a descendant who is part of the Friends of the Latimer House.
An addition to the back of the home was added in the mid- to early-1800s. The home then passed out of the Latimer family around 1910.
The home’s last owner, William Brown, left $500,000 to Sumner County in his will to be kept in a restricted fund to be used for the “establishment, promotion, ongoing support, and maintenance of the William and Martha Brown Park at 212 Hunters Lane, Hendersonville.” The historic home was intended to be “permanently maintained by the County as the park’s centerpiece.”
“When he passed away, that’s coming up on 10 years ago, the house has basically sat there this whole time untouched,” Latimer said. “The doors have been kicked in. The windows have been broken out. People have been in the house. We finally started onto the county about getting the house secured. They got the house secured, but they allowed the weeds to grow unchecked. Trees were falling down, and we’re lucky that the house is still there to be preserved.”
Latimer said community members have been fighting for the county to honor the agreement with William Brown for four to five years. The quitclaim deed and the transfer of funds left by Brown were approved by the County Commission on Aug. 17. The quitclaim deed was then approved by the Sumner County Board of Education on Aug. 18.
“It is a tremendous relief to make some kind of progress,” Latimer said. “We have just been sitting there like a car in the winter in the snow, just spinning our wheels for years and we just kept hitting roadblocks. Nothing was getting done. Nothing was getting addressed. If the house continues to sit there, you never know what could happen to it, so we are very happy that this has been done so that we could have the chance to get the house preserved.”
The first step for the Friends of the Latimer House will be to create an entrance to the property and home. The nonprofit has already opened bank accounts specifically for the property and needs to secure insurance for the house, a process they’ve already started.
“We always want to acknowledge the tremendous gift that Mr. Brown gave the county,” Latimer said. “It’s still the largest gift of monetary value that anybody has ever given the county. He made one simple request. He just wanted the house preserved as the center of a park bearing his wife’s and his name.”
The full record of how the house came to us, with the documents behind it, is on The Story.
Source: Abbey Nutter, “Friends of the Latimer House ready to start preservation work,”, opens in a new tab Main Street Media, September 10, 2026.