Falwell’s family preserving his office at Carter Glass mansion

By Justin Faulconer

Published: May 14, 2008

A year ago today, the Rev. Jerry Falwell stepped into his office at Liberty University following a breakfast meeting and soon drew his last breath.

His death shocked the campus and sent many into days of mourning. Crowds swarmed the sanctuary of Falwell’s Thomas Road Baptist Church immediately as the news spread, many crying and consoling each other.

“A giant has fallen,” declared Ron Godwin, the university’s executive vice president, during the impromptu service.

Now Falwell’s family wants to make sure his office in the Carter Glass Mansion, where he spent the last 16 years of his life, stays just as it was when he died.

Tours of his office and the mansion itself began in April.

Chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr. said his father was always proud that the mansion, which the university purchased in the late 1970s, was the home of Carter Glass — a newspaper publisher and politician from Lynchburg who served as U.S. Secretary of the Treasury under President Woodrow Wilson.

The mansion was built in 1923 and never really lent itself as a school administration building, said Falwell. For years it served as the office of President A. Pierre Guillerman before Falwell and Falwell Jr. moved offices there.

Restoring the elder Falwell’s office, which mansion host Nancy Stanley said was most likely a parlor, is a worthwhile effort, Falwell Jr. said.

“All of the family agreed it was the best thing to do,” he said.

Falwell’s ancestors were dairy farmers and competitors with Glass, who also ran a dairy farm — which Falwell said the campus now sits on. He said he has many good memories of the land and of spending the night in a barn while in the sixth grade.

“The whole time I was growing up we’d come out and ride horses,” said Falwell.

The mansion, also known as Lynchburg’s Montview, is on the National Register of Historic Places and is a state landmark. The elder Falwell often used a Franklin Roosevelt quote when giving tours, calling Glass the “last unreconstructed rebel.”

“Dad got a kick out of telling people that,” he said.

After Falwell Jr. moved his own office to North Campus over the summer, the mansion has become solely a tourist site. Upper-level rooms have been converted to become a bed and breakfast for special guests of the university. Other rooms are under restoration to look as they did when Glass lived there during the 1920s.

Falwell Jr.’s wife, Becki, said the first guests, friends of hers, stayed there this past weekend — Liberty’s 35th commencement. The old Carter kitchen is where guests are served a continental breakfast, with Falwell and Glass pictures and memorabilia mixed in together throughout the house.

Stanley said the mansion had five bathrooms in a time when most people didn’t have indoor plumbing, and cost $60,000 to build.

To honor Falwell’s life, the lights in his office are never turned off.

His office and a conference room next door are covered with books, award plaques, pictures of family and friends and of sports shrines — including the New York Yankees.

Stanley said she often gets boos when she gives tours based on his taste in sports.

“He was a Dallas Cowboys fan,” she said. “You could stay in here for an hour and absorb many things about him.”

The home also has a recently attached garage, called the “bat cave,” where Falwell could park his truck. Students often would swarm him and the family eventually decided he needed isolated parking.

Becki Falwell said the office is where her oldest son, Trey, now an LU student, spent many hours in between classes. The family doesn’t charge for the tours and believes it is a good way to keep memories of Falwell alive, she said.

“He liked history,” she said. “Just like my Jerry — they were always proud of their roots. He always had a deep, deep love for the mountains and the land.”

Falwell Jr. said the family plans to mark the one-year anniversary of his passing quietly, with a visit to the gravesite, in the mansion’s front lawn.Thomas Road Baptist Church has no services planned today; the church had a special viewing this past Sunday evening of a sermon Falwell recorded a few days before he died.

Tours are available at the Carter Glass Mansion from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays and by appointments on weekends.

Stanley said she is up to the task of giving as many as she can.

“This is an interesting way to spend my retirement,” she said. “I’m enjoying it.”

The Falwell family has kept Jerry Falwell’s office the way it looked when he died to honor his memory.
JUSTIN FAULCONER/THE NEWS & ADVANCE