The Newdigate-Reed House is a two story log house built by the Newdigate family at the top of the hill near the Lexington-Maysville Turnpike

Toll road

A toll road is a privately or publicly built road for which a driver pays a toll for use. Structures for which tolls are charged include toll bridges and toll tunnels. Non-toll roads are financed using other sources of revenue, most typically fuel tax or general tax funds...

. John Newdigate, a farmer, is listed as the landowner in 1854. Situated at the top of a steep hill leading out of Maysville, the house served as a convenient rest stop for merchants and wagon masters hauling goods from the docks at Maysville to points south.

Siding was applied to the log structure in the 1930s. The structure is asymmetrical with four windows on the upper story left side, one on the right side, and one to the right of the first floor entrance. The doorway with a one-story portico

Portico

A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls...

 is slightly off-center. Stone chimneys on either end of the house are original.

The building was purchased by the Bierbower family in the late 19th century and sold to Stanley Forman Reed

Stanley Forman Reed

Stanley Forman Reed was a noted American attorney who served as United States Solicitor General from 1935 to 1938 and as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1938 to 1957. He was the last Supreme Court Justice who did not graduate from law school Stanley Forman Reed (December 31,...

 in 1910, Reed having just completed his law studies at at a number of Universities including Yale University

Yale University

Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

, the University of Virginia

University of Virginia

The University of Virginia is a public research university located in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States, founded by Thomas Jefferson...

, Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 and the University of Paris

University of Paris

The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...

.

The future supreme court justice began the practice of law in Maysville in 1910 with the law firm of Worthington, Browning and Reed. Reed served as a Kentucky state representative between 1912 and 1916, sponsoring child labor

Child labor

Child labour refers to the employment of children at regular and sustained labour. This practice is considered exploitative by many international organizations and is illegal in many countries...

 and workman's compensation bills that were enacted in the face of significant opposition.

Although a Democrat, Reed was appointed by President Herbert Hoover

Herbert Hoover

Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...

 to serve as general counsel of the Federal Farm Board

Federal Farm Board

The Federal Farm Board was actually created in 1929, before the stock market crash on Black Tuesday, 1929, but its powers were later enlarged to meet the economic crisis farmers faced during the Great Depression. It was established by the Agricultural Marketing Act to stabilize prices and to...

 in 1929. In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

 appointed Reed Solicitor General of the United States to defend the New Deal

New Deal

The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...

 laws whose constitutionality had been challenged. Reed was successful in doing so. In 1938, Reed was nominated to fill the U.S. Supreme Court vacancy caused by the retirement of Justice George Sutherland

George Sutherland

Alexander George Sutherland was an English-born U.S. jurist and political figure. One of four appointments to the Supreme Court by President Warren G. Harding, he served as an Associate Justice of the U.S...

. Reed was widely considered the best lawyer in government service and his nomination was unanimously confirmed by the Senate.