The historical echoes of Cecil County are slowly fading into a new landscape, where development and farmland hide the stories of the past. It’s the goal of Jeffrey Ricketts to preserve those moments through the restoration and artifact cataloguing of Mullen’s Folly— a 17th century farmhouse located next to Rosebank Cemetery. The house and the property have a rich history from the purchase by William Penn, to a 1700s store front, and finally a family home housing 8 children at a time. Mullen’s Folly has held secrets and treasures that Jeffrey is now piecing together, board by board and piece by piece.

At only 22 years old, Jeffrey’s project is 263 years his senior. Ricketts family members are historic restoration curators for a property down the street that was purchased by William Penn at the same time as Mullen’s Folly. Jeffrey and his brother grew up digging and sifting through yard dirt, finding archeological treasures, creating a fascination with historical items. Jeffrey’s elementary school years were spent at Culvert Elementary school next door to the old, decrepit farmhouse, sparking his interest in the property. While in high school, Jeffrey wrote to the then-owner Frank Fitzgerald expressing his interest in the property, and the two corresponded through letters for the next three years. The property had been in Mr. Fitzgerald’s family since 1859 and was unoccupied at the time. The last familial resident was Fitzgerald’s grandmother, who lived in the house from her birth to death (1870 to 1963). When Mr. Fitzgerald put the property on the market, four identical bids were made, leaving him to decide what he wanted to see happen to the old farmhouse. One of those four bids was from Jeffrey, and his dream to restore the farmhouse to its 1790s state was the deciding factor in the sale of Mullen’s Folly.

Jeffrey officially owned the house in July 2022 at the ripe age of 20. He grew up watching his parents restore the McMillan property and thought he knew what he was getting into, despite the warnings from his father. It was February of 2022 when Jeffrey first gained permission to enter the house to assess the project that would be needed. Old drywall and patchwork shiplap boards covered the walls and dirty abandoned carpet hid dangerous conditions underneath. The entire roof was pulling the house crooked from its foundation, and a leaking dormer created a giant hole through the upstairs flooring. Jeffrey soon discovered the house wasn’t completely abandoned—at least not by local wildlife. Squirrels and raccoons found shelter in the ceilings, walls and chimneys. Foxes and groundhogs claimed the crawl spaces, and a pair of buzzards made a roost in the second floor.

“We have a barn so I know the smell of animals roosting, and I knew there were birds before I even got up the stairs,” Jeffrey remembered.

Upon entry, two buzzards were just as shocked to see him and stood their ground for their claimed home.

“I was chasing them around the upstairs trying to get them to fly out of the opened window, all without knowing the condition of the floor which I could have fallen right through,” he said. Once the buzzards finally accepted their eviction, they continued to ominously watch Jeffrey from a tombstone in the nearby cemetery.

Jeffrey began work on the house, removing 3.5 tons of debris during the gutting process. Floors and ceilings were removed exposing foundational beams and rafters made from entire tree trunks. Layered wallpaper was meticulously peeled and preserved for historical archiving, and relics from the past started to appear for the first time in centuries. Mullen’s Folly’s first floor once operated as a store front in the 1800s, and Jeffrey began to find evidence of this when he began digging underneath the closet. Bottles, broken pottery and dishware, utensils and various trash items became unearthed—these are now catalogued and pieced back together for view in Jeffrey’s business down the road, East Nottingham Antiques. His barn is filled with stunning antiques curated by Jeffrey himself, and his business takes him around the country for buying and selling.

Prior to modern trash removal processes it was common for household waste to be buried on property or in crawl spaces, creating a literal artifact mine for Jeffrey.

The artifacts from Mullen’s Folly sit on display, and an entire backroom in the barn holds even more archeological finds including animal bones, a button collection, historical documents and pictures gifted by Mr. Fitzgerald, and pieces of pottery and dish wear he has yet to puzzle together. Over 7,000 artifact pieces have been discovered on property, ranging from 1710 to 1980, with about 85 percent of them dating back to before 1850.

“I’ve sifted by hand through 1,000 cubic feet of dirt and there’s a lot more to find. Trash can be fun,” Jeffrey said.

Mullen’s Folly earned its name from the demise of the store front, though it had been and remained a residence since its construction, proving only the store had been a folly. William Penn originally purchased the land extending through Cecil County in 1710. The lots known as the Nottingham lots totaled 37 at 500 acres each. Even though 95 percent of the land was located in Maryland and owned by Lord Baltimore, Penn claimed the land and gave it to Quakers to strengthen Pennsylvania’s southern border. Mullen’s Folly sits on lot 31, originally 500 acres purchased by Robert Dutton and Samuel Littler. They would eventually sell off a large portion to John Day. Day opened a tanning yard on his plot, naming his property “Hebron.” The thought is that the first storefront at the house was by Day for his tanning goods. Day willed the property to his son, George Day, who would eventually sell about 10 acres to William Mullen. “Mullen’s Delight” was then created—a general store that is estimated to have been open for 30 years, until it’s closing in 1823.

The property then known as “Mullen’s Reserve” was then sold for $145 to Elizabeth Underhill, who lived there until her death in 1836. The property at this time has been reduced to about 8 acres as it passed hands and pieces were sold off due to financial hardships. It passed through more family hands and more houses were built on the property—some remain, others do not. While in the Pierson family ownership in 1846, the house and property was sold to James Tremble to create Rosebank Cemetery and Rosebank Hall, a community building next to the farmhouse that was used for Sunday School, public meetings and local events.

The farmhouse was almost knocked down in 1859, until it was purchased by Jason Berricker, who purchased it for $200 and raised 8 children in it. The small house would have had one shared bathroom and maybe one or two upstairs bedrooms on either side of the stairs, making quite tight quarters for a family of 10.

“When you think about it, they were really just in the house to eat meals and sleep,” Jeffrey said. “The work that was done was outside of the house so they weren’t in it all day.”

The Berricker-Fitzgerald family would raise generations in the house until 1963 when Louise Fitzgerald passed, leaving the property to her son Malven Fitzgerald before it was passed to his own son, Frank Fitzgerald. Louise’s memories perhaps hold the most for Mullen’s Folly, as she saw her sister and husband pass, both in 1939, and their tombstones were within view from the side window.

“She saw the addition of electric and plumbing,” Jeffrey explained. He noted that he even has the original receipt as proof.

Two years have passed since Jeffrey purchased the property and began his restoration. There is no timeline for completion of the project, which is good because it was originally supposed to take about two years to finish.

Now that most of the archeological work has been completed inside of the house, Jeffrey can begin the restoration work. He’s completed almost everything by hand himself to this point—with a little help from his father. He plans for Mullen’s Folly to be returned to its 1790s farmhouse state as a residence, and he wants to have a small museum to teach community members about the area’s history. The front porch remains the focal point of Mullen’s Folly, a porch so beloved by the community that people often gathered to sit there, enjoying the cool breeze flowing across its historic wooden chairs. A rocking chair at least 100 years old holds the initials of its former owners, and perhaps some of their memories, too.

You can follow Jeffrey Ricketts’ journey of restoring this important part of local history on Facebook by searching Mullen’s Folly Restoration or by visiting his business website at www.eastnottinghamantiques.com.