A late-Georgian home built for Thomas Wentworth in the mid 1700s by his father, Mark Hunking Wentworth, as a wedding present. The original owner was the brother of New Hampshire?s last royal governor, making it quite distinct.

After Wentworth?s death in 1768 and his wife remarried and moved back to England, the Wentworth-Gardner House was acquired by Major William Gardner in 1793. He renovated the property, primarily including gardens, office, and additional buildings. He died in 1834 and his widow sold the property in 1854, which was the start of its series of re-selling and numerous renovations.

The house was acquired later on by Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, which planned to strip and dismantle the house and move it to the Big Apple. A local group formed to prevent this and procured the house in 1940. It is now operated by the Wentworth-Gardner and Tobias Lear Houses Association.