The property has been known at various times as the Heights, Woodburne, Woodbourne,
The Scott Estate, Little Flower, and Villa St Theresa.
The land on which the mansion stands was originally the a family farm which ran all the way
to the Creek and there are indications that the Great Minquas Path, a fur
trading route between the Susquahannock region and the Dutch fur trading posts, passed through the
property.
It is said there were encampments on the "Heights of Darby" during the British occupation of
Philadelphia (1777-1778)
Before the Civil War, the property was owned by George McHenry, President of the
Philadelphia Board of Trade, and a Southern sympathiser who went to England and arranged for
shipments to go through the Union blockade. The land was sold at Sheriff's sale in April 1862
and the property then came under the ownership of Thomas A. Scott who served in
Abraham Lincoln's Cabinet as Assistant Secretary of War for Transportation and later as
President of the Pennsylvania Railroad..
His son, Edgar Scott, commissioned noted architect Horace Trumbauer to build the present mansion
in 1906 with the possible participation of Julian Abele.
Both Edgar Scott Senior and Edgar Scott Junior served with the Norton-Harjes American Volunteer
Motorized Ambulance Service during the First World War. Edgar Scott Senior died in France on
October 20, 1918, 22 days before the Armistice. Edgar Junior married Helen Hope Montgomery
who had been the inspiration for Tracy Lord in "The Philadelphia Story."
The property was purchased by the Sisters of the Divine Redeemer in the 1930's. It is believed the
postcard dates to the time the property was used as an orphanage. It later was a nursing home
and closed in 2005
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