Buena Vista, Home of Senator John Clayton of Delaware

Buena Vista, c. 1846, a mansion and conference center owned by the State of Delaware, is located south of the City of New Castle. It is notable not only for its distinctive original Southern-Style architecture but for a 1929 addition designed by R. Brognard Okie of nearby Pennsylvania.

The original occupant, John M. Clayton ((1796-1856) is notable for being a State Representative, Delaware Secretary of State, U. S. Senator, Delaware Chief Justice, and U.S. Secretary of State for President Zachary Taylor (1849-50). The bust of Clayton to the right is a copy of one in Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capitol.

 The State has recently hired an interpreter who will be able to give tours of the property, which still is surrounded by hundreds of acres of farmland and reached down a long driveway from the DuPont Parkway, Route 13. This highway was paid for by T. Coleman DuPont, who bought Buena Vista in 1914. His daughter married Clayton Douglas Buck, who was a highway engineer and who later became Governor of Delaware and later a U.S. Senator. 

The pictures above and the last picture are of the oldest part of the mansion, almost all of whose rooms are available for events, conferences, and meetings. The large, panelled library is in the 1929 section, and is also available. See http://buenavista.delaware.gov/