The Guest House, sometimes called the Caretaker’s Cottage, was built by Lois Pattillo Bannister, as well as the Wash House that sits just behind this building.
Lois Bannister employed two people to be live-in service workers and they lived in this structure while working to keep up the farm, the gardens, and help with the housework. The Ogden family also had maids that would make use of this building. Over the years this building took on a variety of different purposes. Sometimes it was used as extra storage, a guest house, an extra kitchen, and Linda Chesnut used it as an office. She worked as an interior decorator and kept her drafting table in an area that used to be a screened-in porch, while her office was in one of the bedrooms inside. The fireplace inside the house was a coal-burning fireplace, which was commonplace during the early 20th century. While the Chesnuts lived here, an ice storm one winter caused a large oak tree to fall onto the guest house. Thankfully no one was injured. The Guest House was eventually renovated and now acts as the main office for the Dunwoody Preservation Trust.
The Wash House’s purpose was simple and self-evident. It was used to wash clothes. There was a fire ring and a large iron pot just outside the wash house, where clothes were washed. There used to be muscadine vines and pear trees around the area of the washhouse.