Telfair Academy
The Telfair Academy began as an English Regency mansion at 121 Barnard Street, designed by architect William Jay and completed in 1818 for the prominent Telfair family of Savannah. Mary Telfair, the last of the line, bequeathed the house with its furnishings and collections to the Georgia Historical Society in 1875, and in 1886 it opened as one of the first art museums in the country, the oldest public art museum in the South.
Yet locals say the place still answers to Mary. Her will is remembered for forbidding food, drink, and parties on the premises, and staff swear she enforces it to this day, glasses shattering during catered events and piano music drifting from empty galleries after dark.
Beneath the Regency calm, the old house keeps her rules.
📍 121 Barnard St, Savannah, GA · Get directions