Was The Addams Family Mansion Inspired By Central New York?

Could The Addams Family’s creepy, kooky mansion really have Central New York roots?

For decades, people have whispered that Syracuse University’s Hall of Languages might have inspired the Gothic home of Gomez, Morticia, Wednesday, and Pugsley Addams. Designed in 1873 by Horatio Nelson White, the building’s Second Empire style definitely fits the bill: spooky towers, ornate windows, and just the right touch of “altogether ooky.”

The Syracuse University Connection

As reported by syracuse.com, there’s actually a local connection that keeps this legend alive. Screenwriter Seaman Jacobs, who wrote for The Addams Family and other classic sitcoms, graduated from Syracuse University in 1932 and once contributed to the campus humor magazine, The Orange Peel. One of his scripts for the show, from 1964, even sits in the university’s special collections.

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Author Victor Bockris added more fuel to the rumor in his 1994 biography Transformer: The Lou Reed Story. He wrote that the Hall of Languages looked like something “straight out of a horror movie about college life,” and claimed that one of the show’s writers, who attended SU around the same time as Reed, used it as inspiration for the Addams’ home. Bockris didn’t name the writer, though, and it’s never been proven. Even Syracuse University’s own website keeps it mysterious, saying only that the Hall of Languages “was said to have inspired” the mansion.

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Other Cities Claim the Addams Legacy

But Syracuse isn’t the only place laying claim to this spooky piece of pop culture. A house in Westfield, New Jersey, where cartoonist Charles Addams was born, has an official plaque naming it the inspiration. Addams grew up across the street and loved the eerie home so much that Westfield still honors him every October with AddamsFest, a town-wide celebration of all things creepy and kooky.

Meanwhile, the University of Pennsylvania says the Addams mansion may have been modeled after its College Hall, where Addams studied architecture before introducing his iconic characters in The New Yorker in 1938. And up in Hamilton, New York, near Colgate University (another of Addams’ alma maters), fans point to a Victorian home on Maple Avenue as a potential muse, too.

The Real Inspiration? Still a Mystery

So was the Addams’ mansion born in Syracuse, New Jersey, Philly, Hamilton? No one knows for sure.