Saving the Mansion

There is really only one reason why the 120-year old McHenry Mansion isn't the site of a parking lot or a modern structure - the Julio Gallo Foundation.

By 1976, the stately old building had been an apartment house for approximately 50 years, and was up for sale. Several ideas were broached, including buying it and turning it into a restaurant. The spectre of tearing it down also raised its ugly head. Most of Modesto's early buildings, by the 1970s, had been condemned and ripped out in an effort to "revitalize" a dying downtown. As buildings were razed, very few new structures replaced them - but Modesto had plenty of parking.

Julio Gallo and his wife, Aileen, had watched the old town disappear, and feared that fate would also befall the lovely old Victorian structure at the corner of 15th and I Streets. For $150,000, they purchased the home and presented it to the City of Modesto for community use.

Over the past 25 years, the city has lovingly restored the building with period furnishings and made it into a showplace. The McHenry Mansion is a museum and a vibrant place for weddings, receptions and other activities. It is a graceful remembrance of things past, and a lovely place to visit.

Across the street, on the site of a former tire shop and the Modesto Bee's service center, the city has built a park that blends with the Mansion. That park is dedicated to the late Julio and Aileen Gallo for their exquisite gift to the city.

 Julio Gallo, at right, with his wife, Aileen, and Mayor Lee Davis in a 1976 photograph taken after the purchase of the McHenry Mansion by the Julio Gallo Foundation.

The mansion had "long been a favorite landmark of my wife and myself," Julio is quoted as saying in the biography, "Our Story." After watching many original structures "slowly disappear in the name of progress in the more than fifty years that we have both lived here, we were unwilling to see the house put to commercial use or fall under the wrecker's hammer." Julio and Aileen bought the old home and donated it to the city.

Photo at top is by Jeff Broome.
Photo at left, above, is from Modesto Bee archives.
Some information on this and previous page
is from "100 Years," and "Modesto: Then and Now."

To visit the McHenry Mansion and McHenry Museum websites click here.

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