The Shirley-Eustis House is an extraordinary Georgian mansion built in Roxbury as the countryseat of Royal Governor William Shirley of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1747. The House was later the home of William Eustis, Secretary of War under President James Madison during the War of 1812, and the first Democratic Governor of Massachusetts from 1823-25. During the nineteenth century, the city grew out around the house’s neighborhood, and it was all but forgotten until 1913, when the Shirley-Eustis House Association was incorporated as a non-profit organization to save the house from the wrecker’s ball. The House was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1960, and opened in its restored splendor as a museum in 1991, at which time it won a Boston Preservation Alliance award as the best-restored small-scale structure in the City of Boston. Since then, the Association has facilitated many significant updates, including the addition of several Shirley and Eustis pieces to the furniture collection, moving and restoring the 1806 Post and Beam Carriage House of Isabel Stewart Gardner's home to the site (which originally included a similar Carriage House), and restoring the grounds to include an orchard of heritage fruit trees, period perennial beds, parterre gardens and a large lawn space. The house and its grounds currently serve as a museum, park and community center that the public may use to explore the history and heritage of the local community. Historical experts say that Shirley Place is presently the most important restoration site in the City of Boston. Let’s help them maintain it, so visitors may continue to enjoy and learn from this treasure.