Rugby
Newbury House at Historic Rugby
Built in 1880 as the first boarding house of Thomas Hughes's Rugby colony for the younger sons of English gentry, and rented today by Historic Rugby.
- Built
- 1880Constructed 1880 as the first boarding house in the Rugby colony; an inn again today.
- Style
- Victorian
- Type
- Inn
- Credentials
- Inside a National Register historic district
The story
British author Thomas Hughes founded Rugby in 1880 as a cooperative, class-free colony on the Cumberland Plateau for the younger sons of English gentry, named for his old school. Newbury House, the colony’s first boarding house, was built that same year on Newbury Road. By 1884 some 65-70 Victorian buildings stood and more than 300 people lived there, but a typhoid epidemic in 1881 and inn fires in 1884 and 1889 hurt the colony, and most colonists had left by 1900. Historic Rugby, Inc., founded in 1966, now rents Newbury House alongside Pioneer Cottage, the first building in Rugby, where Hughes stayed in 1880.
Good to know
- Address: 1331 Rugby Parkway, Rugby, TN 37733
Sources (4)
Last verified October 2026. Details change; confirm with the inn before you book.