MUSEUM HISTORY
The Meux Home Museum is a tribute to the beauty of Victorian architecture. This magnificent two-story edifice has artfully composed roofs that thrust skyward from the second story, as do the numerous chimneys.
The exterior walls are covered with a variety of textures and decorations including clapboards, shingles, and ornamental floral-like relief work. The large porch is held up by beautifully turned spindles accented with 'gingerbread', and designed to provide protection from the hot valley sun.
The architecture blends all these beautiful features resulting in an intriguing historic home that invites visitors of all ages to enjoy its beauty and charm. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 14, 1975.
Dr. Meux was born in Tennessee in 1838. During the Civil War, he served in the Confederate Army as an assistant surgeon for four years. He brought his wife, Mary Esther (Molly) and their three children to Fresno and purchased the property for his home in 1888.
Dr. Meux practiced medicine until he retired in his late 70's and lived to be 91 years old. His daughter, Anne, lived in the family home all her life, thus preserving the original architectural features that visitors still enjoy today.
FAMILY HISTORY
THOMAS RICHARD MEUX
Thomas Richard Meux was born in 1838 in Wesley, Haywood County, Tennessee, the son of John Oliver Meux and Anne Tuggle Meux. Thomas Meux attended the University of Virginia and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School in 1860 at the age of twenty-two.
In 1861, Dr. Meux enlisted as a private in the Ninth Tennessee Volunteer Regiment, Co. C, Maney's Co. Cheatham Division of the Confederate Army during the Civil War. He was at the battles of Shiloh, Murfeesborough and Atlanta. After four years as an assistant surgeon, he left the service as an assistant surgeon with the rank of Captain in 1865.
On June 3, 1874 he married Mary Ester Davis in Brownsville, Haywood County, Tennessee. They became the parents of John W., Mary D., and Anne Prenetta. Mrs. Meux was in poor health and on the advice of a brother, John P. Meux, who had moved to San Francisco in 1879, Dr. Meux decided to move his family to the Central Valley. In December, 1887, the Meux family registered at the Southern Pacific Hotel in Fresno. Property in a prime residential area of the city, at the corner of Tulare and R Streets, was purchased by the doctor from the County of Fresno as a homesite in March, 1888, and the family moved into the house January, 1889. Dr. Meux established his medical practice in 1889 and served the community as a physician until his retirement. He served as president of the Fresno County Medical Society in 1896 and was described as a staunch member of the Fresno County democratic Club and the Methodist Episcopal Church South. Thomas Meux and his brother, John, owned vineyards in the county and he maintained an active interest in agricultural affairs.
The Meux house was continuously occupied by the Meux family for a total of 81 years. Dr. Meux died at the age of 91 in 1929 and his daughter, Anne Prenetta Meux, died in 1970, having lived in the house since she was four years old.The Fresno Bee (daily newspaper) heralded this occupancy as establishing the longest individual residence of one of Fresno's oldest wellings.
MARY ESTHER DAVIS MEUX
The Daughter of John and Martha Core Davis, Mary Esther (Molly) was born in 1855 in Haywood County Tennessee. In 1874, she married Dr. Richard Meux, who served in the Confederate Army. Upon his return, he continued his practice of medicine and engaged in farming. They had three children: John, Mary, and Anne. She died in 1922.
ANNE PRENETTE MEUX
In a 1960 interview with Fresno Bee reporter George Popovich, Anne recalled: "We had phaetons and two-horse teams to go calling and surreys for family trips. Father had a one-horse buggy for his medical calls and trips to his ranch." Anne saw the arrival of the telephone, electricity, radio, television and rockets to the moon in her lifetime. She reminisced that when she was "just a kid", the Tulare and R streets were on the outskirts of Fresno. The trolley which passed the Meux home was their transportation downtown. It would stop for them, but they never bothered paying fare. Father paid up at the end of the month.Thanks to Anne’s occupying the old mansion in its original form, we have the history-steeped mansion built in 1889 today.
EDNA COOPER MEUX
Edna was born in Fresno in 1886, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. John Cooper. He was one of the signers of the original Fresno City Chapter. Edna graduated from Fresno High and Miss Head's School for Girls in Berkeley. Edna Cooper Meux was the wife of John Meux. She had two children, William C. Meux, Fresno attorney and daughter Anne Siegfried. Mrs. Meux died in May 1974 and was buried in Belmont Memorial Park.
ROOMS
THE PARLOR
The parlor was a formal room kept always in readiness for special occasions--to receive visitors making calls, for weddings, funerals, perhaps Sunday afternoons by the family for viewing stereoscope slides or other decorous activities, and for formal entertaining. Parlors were often closed off by sliding doors except for these special occasions.
DINING ROOM
The dining room was used for all family meals, while the help ate in the kitchen. The most unique feature of the room is the original wallpaper still in use. It has an overall floral pattern of peonies, and the pattern conveys the same impression as the hall paper. It was no doubt much lighter to begin with, but years of coal fires and gas and kerosene lamps have darkened it. It has held up very well. The only thing that will ruin it is the oil from people’s hands that can't resist touching it.
MASTER BEDROOM
The house was built out on the edge of town and beyond it lay open land - a desert- but in late winter it was covered with a haze of green and a carpet of wild flowers. In the absence of trees and air pollution the family could look out of these windows and see the majestic Sierras almost every day. It was this magnificent winter view that had so captivated Joseph Meux, Dr. Meux's brother, as he made a train trip through the valley, which he wrote back to the family in Tennessee urging them to come to this heavenly spot. The sweep of windows facing south and east give this room an incomparable quality of light. Even on the gloomiest of days the room is cheerful and elicits "ohs" and "ahs" from visitors. Mrs. Meux was not in good health when the family moved here and no doubt spent a great deal of time in this room. In her later years she was both deaf and blind. The family communicated with 'her by means of a glove she wore on which was embroidered the alphabet.
MARY'S BEDROOM
The middle child, Mary Meux was 8 years old when the family moved into the house. After graduating from high school in Fresno she attended Anna Head School in Berkeley. As a young woman she was active in the Fresno social scene and at the anne001age of 25 married a young attorney, Henry Barbour, who had come to Fresno from Ogdensburg, New York. Mary and Henry were married in the parlor in a lovely ceremony extensively covered in the local newspaper. Dr. Meux arranged to build them a house on T Street as a wedding gift. It had not been completed when their first child was due so Mary gave birth to her son Jack in her pink and green bedroom at the family home. A second son Richard was born to the couple six years later. Henry Barbour was elected as a Republican to the House of Representatives and served seven terms from 1919 to 1933. Mary's social life travels abroad and fourteen years as a Congressional wife in Washington, D.C, made her life a contrast to that of her sister Anne, who stayed at home caring for her parents and never moved away from the family home.