St. Augustine's Meldrim Cottage Now at the Florida Agricultural Museum

The Florida Agricultural Museum is proud to announce that the Meldrim House in St Augustine is now ready to join the growing village on the Museum’s property on US 1 and Old Kings Rd in Palm Coast. It will be moved on Tuesday November 12 at 9am and will join several other buildings that have been moved to the Museum from areas across the state.

The Meldrim Cottage is a one story wood frame house that is 960 square feet.and features two covered porches with a parlor, kitchen and three bedrooms. There are interesting details throughout the house including shiplap siding, wooden windows and horizontal wood paneled doors and pecky cypress and pine and groove interior paneling. The house was built by James S Meldrim in the very early 1950s. The Meldrim family operated a turpentine and timber farm in St Johns County dating back to 1934.

The City of St. Augustine recently purchased the property to build a new park and make flooding improvements. The City asked for proposals from any interested parties, offering the house at no charge and adding $5,000 to help with the cost of the move. After reviewing the proposals, the St. Augustine City Commissioners voted unanimously to award the home to the Florida Agricultural Museum.

The house will be moved from its location at 91 Coquina Avenue to the Florida Agricultural Museum by way of Hastings. LaRue House Movers & Sons chose this 44 mile route as it avoids intersecting with I-95, heavy traffic, low hanging cross-road wires, and red lights. The move should take approximately five hours.

Once the Meldrim Cottage is set up on a new lot in the Village of the Museum, it will be renovated, repaired, and dressed in its original style of the early 1950s allowing visitors to experience the Florida way of life from way back then!

The museum is open to the general public for walk-in tours as well as educational field trips. Please call for more information. 386-446-7630.