About The Field House Museum

The Field House Museum is a dynamic museum and historic site focused on the Field Family. Once the home of Roswell Field, noted St. Louis attorney, it is also the birthplace of his son, Eugene Field, the “Children’s Poet.” The Field House Museum opened as the first historic house museum within St. Louis in 1936 and has since been designated a National Historic Landmark.

Built in 1845, the home was once part of twelve rowhouses along Walsh’s Row, an upper middle-class area of St. Louis. While living in the home, Roswell Field became the key attorney in the Dred & Harriet Scott Freedom Suit when he formulated the legal strategy that propelled the case to federal court. As an adult, Eugene Field made a name for himself in the literary world, first as a newspaper columnist and later as a children’s poet. “Wynken, Blynken, and Nod” and “The Gingham Dog and Calico Cat” became some of his most well-known works. Today, the house is the last of the row left standing and has been lovingly restored both inside and out to appear much as it did in the late 19th century.

Decorated in period furnishings, including many that belonged to the Field family, a guided tour of the historic house will take through the first-floor double parlor entertaining space and up to the second-floor master bedroom and study. One will also be able to explore rotating exhibits on the house’s third-floor and the attached museum featuring the many collections of the Field House Museum along with traveling exhibits.