Thomas McDowell House

The Thomas McDowell House is located on Lake Road in the Little Britain section of the Town of New Windsor in Orange County, New York, United States. It was built c. 1770 by McDowell, an early settler of the area, and was later rented out by his descendants to prominent local weaver James Alexander. In 2004 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.It is one of the last surviving homes built by the original Little Britain settlers, a mostly Irish group that had survived a difficult sea voyage to the New World, and the only one that remains mostly in its original form. Some later residents left behind reminders of the tastes of later eras.PropertyThe main house is a -story three-bay main block with a one-story, three-bay kitchen wing on the west and a smaller, newer bedroom wing to the north. Both are built of heavy-hewn post and beam framing and sided in clapboard with a fieldstone foundation. Both the main block and the kitchen wing have medium-pitched gabled roofs, with the latter's flaring out to the rear, producing a saltbox effect. Cedar shakes cover both roofs.