President Lincoln referred to Harriet Beecher Stowe as “The little lady that started this big war.” Indicating that he and many other believed that the uproar caused by the publication of her novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” was in part responsible for the ultimate disaffection between the slave and free states and lit the fuse that ended up as the American Civil War.

One of the character in her book was John Van Tromp, modeled after the real John Van Zandt. In the novel, Van Tromp offered refuge to Eliza and her child in his house. And so, the Van Zandt house was associated with the novel and became known, locally, as the Eliza House.