Area less than one acre Architectural style Colonial Added to NRHP August 1, 1979 | Built c. 1762 NRHP Reference # 79002164 | |
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Location 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Bedford at the junction of U.S. Route 30 and Pennsylvania Route 31, Napier Township, Pennsylvania | ||
The Jean Bonnet Tavern, also known as Old Forks Inn and Bonnet's Tavern, is an historic inn and restaurant located just outside Bedford, Pennsylvania on U.S. Highway 30, at the junction with Pennsylvania Route 31.
The building was erected by Robert Callender, a trader with the Native American tribes of Pennsylvania.
Callender acquired the land in 1762. The land and the building were purchased by Jean Bonnet in 1779 and opened as an inn, which was used as a gathering place by protesting local farmers during the 1794 Whiskey Rebellion, suppressed months later by forces under President George Washington.
Although the building has changed hands many times through the years, the Bonnett Family of West Virginia are the direct descendants of Jean Bonnet and trace their family history back nearly 400 years.
It is a 2 1/2 to 3 1/2-story, building measuring 40 feet by 51 feet and constructed of cut fieldstone. The walls are over two feet thick. The four interior levels have nearly 8,000 square feet. It features two levels of porches that extend the entire length of the front and the rear elevations. It is operated as a bed and breakfast tavern and gift shop.
It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.
Bonnet's will can be found on ancestry.com. He left $21,000 to his daughter Rosina Bonnet Ankeny, wife of Captain Peter Ankeny. They used the funds to develop Somerset PA, on 250 acres left by Peter's father Theobald "DeWalt" Ankeny. They are buried at Ankeny Square in Somerset.