The Fate of the Weeden Home (Sweetwater)? - Part I

 

Recently we've seen several ask where or what is Sweetwater Mansion. Why don't they know? For years, everyone referred to the old manse as the Weeden Home. Did calling it a real mansion help save it? It would seem that it has not.

First a little about the edifice from Ripples:

Part I - Genesis

Where does the history of Sweetwater Mansion begin? Certainly the land on which the venerable home sits has a much longer history, but for the purposes of this account we'll begin with the foundations of the building itself. John Brahan, who served as a major general in the War of 1812, owned the land the Indians had called Sweetwater and began construction of the two story, eight room house in 1828. When Brahan died of pneumonia six years later, the house had risen only to the sills of the first floor windows.

Despite a historical marker adjacent to Florence Boulevard, and despite what publicists for the current owner Susan Leigh Smithson have reported, John Brahan never lived in the home before his death. Brahan willed the property to his son Maj. Robert Brahan. The younger Brahan chose not to reside on the plantation and traded the estate to his sister's husband, Robert Miller Patton. Robert and Jane Patton finished the home in 1835 and became the first family to reside there.


Part II - The Pattons & Weedens

Gov. Robert Miller Patton and his wife Jane Locke Brahan Patton lived in the plantation house at Sweetwater for many years. After their deaths, the mansion passed to their daughter Martha Hayes Patton and her husband Col. John David Weeden.

John David Weeden and Martha Patton Weeden resided in the home until their demise, at which time their son John Dowling Weeden and his wife Jessie Ora Earthman Weeden took possession of the mansion, now almost universally known as the Weeden Home. John, who died in 1960, and Jessie, who followed in 1972, had one child. Their daughter Elizabeth married James Minton and chose not to live on the family plantation.

Now the home that had sheltered the Patton-Weeden families for 138 years became part of what was known as the John D. Weeden Estate. In 1976, the Patton-Weeden home was added to the National Register of Historic Places, a distinctly different designation than that of a Federal Landmark.


In today's world, the eight room home with no kitchen and only the smallest of bathrooms is hardly a mansion. That hasn't stopped many from calling the Weeden Home such a grandiose structure.

In 2009, several interests collided. The caretaker had died, the Florence Historical Board was looking into ways of saving the home, and several rushed in to provide their brand of salvation to an owner who was mainly interested in money. The asking price had risen to nine million dollars.

A board was formed, with several of the members being high school students. In fact one of these former students is reclining in a jail cell as you read this. Others on the board soon saw how little was being accomplished and left. Only one attempted to inform the public.

The entire circus devolved into art lessons for children with a convicted rapist assisting. That rapist is currently doing his third stretch in the state prison system. Does anyone see a trend here? The engine that pushed the renovations was quickly running out of fuel and produced only sputters.

Then the sputtering stopped. Nothing was happening. In 2019, there was a new realtor and new ghost hunters. The Ghost Girls from Cullman briefly entered the picture, but to no avail:

With no buyer on the horizon, things remained quiet for several more years until last Spring. By then, magician Robert Simone was calling himself the caretaker, but what did the old home look like after four more years of decay? Snaps from April 2023:

Then the property sold.

To be continued...