The Kearneysville area includes Traveller's Rest, a pre-Revolutionary War 1½-story limestone dwelling with log, wood frame, and masonry outbuildings, and Aspendale, later used as the West Virginia University Experimental Farm. Traveller's Rest was the home of General Horatio Gates, born in England in 1727, who served in the British Army during the French and Indian War before purchasing 659 acres in present-day Jefferson County in 1773. The eastern half of the house was likely built for previous owner John Hyatt before 1753, and Gates added the western wing and renovated the older section in 1773 under the direction of Virginia architect John Ariss. At the start of the Revolutionary War, Gates joined the American cause, was appointed Adjutant General of the Continental Army in 1775, drafted the first army regulations, and in 1777 as commander of the northern department led campaigns including the capture of nearly 6,000 men at Saratoga, the first great American victory of the war. After his defeat at Camden in 1780 he lost his command, returned to active service in 1782, served in New York for the rest of the war, and in 1790 sold Traveller's Rest and moved to New York, where he lived for the rest of his life. In 1868 the northern portion of the Traveller's Rest property was sold to Daniel and Edward Getzendanner, and several years later Daniel Getzendanner built the present 2-story brick farmhouse called Aspendale. In 1930 the West Virginia State Board of Control bought 158 acres of Aspendale for use by West Virginia University as an experimental farm, and it has continued in that role, with the farmhouse as the farm manager's residence. Stone outbuildings around the house were built in the 1940s and 1950s by the Jones family, and the farm supported research and education in pesticides, disease control for the orchard industry, and the development of new cultural varieties including an improved York-type apple.