Sugg House
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
California Historical Landmark No. N1307
Location	37 Theall Street, Sonora, California, U.S.
Coordinates	37°59′02″N 120°22′49″W / 37.983889°N 120.380278°W / 37.983889; -120.380278
Area	0.1 acres (0.040 ha)
Built	1857 (1857)
Architect	William Sugg
Architectural style	Classical Revival
NRHP reference No.	84001210[1]
CHISL No.	N1307
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	September 13, 1984
Designated CHISL	September 13, 1984

Sugg House, also known as Sugg House Antiques, and the Sugg/McDonald House, is a historic building and former residence in Sonora, California.^[2][3] It was built in 1857 during the California gold rush by William Sugg, a freed Black slave.^[4] Several changes have been made to the structure in the 19th century.^[4] For 125 years the Sugg–McDonald family lived in the same house.^[4]

It has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since September 13, 1984, for its architecture and contributions to Black history;^[2] has been a California Historical Landmark since September 13, 1984;^[5] and it contains a historical marker which was erected 2003 by E Clampus Vitus.^[6]

The architecture and style of the Sugg House is similar to other homes of this region and era, and contains rambling porches, a balcony, a gable roof, and a paint job of red with white for window trim.^[4] The original structure was built in 1857 by William Sugg out of adobe brick.^[3] The adobe bricks had been made on-site.^[7] Some of the walls are 18 inches (460 mm) thick.^[7] The original building was modified within a year after the Sugg family moved in, as the family continued to increase in size, so did their home.^[4]

In the 1880s, the building added on the second floor consisting of a balcony, four bedrooms and an attic overhead, as well as two more bedrooms, and a framed kitchen was adjoined to the rear of the building.^[4]

In the late 19th-century until 1921, the building was used as a guest house for when the local hotels were too full.^[4] The building had an outhouse until 1940, when the first indoor toilet was installed.^[4]

William Sugg (sometimes Suggs; February 15, 1828 – November 7, 1899) was from Raleigh, North Carolina, and had arrived in California enslaved.^[3][8] He filed his manumission papers on June 21, 1854, in Tuolumne County, and the fee was paid to Francis Tate of Texas.^[3]

In 1855, he married Mary Elizabeth Snelling (February 4, 1839 – November 19, 1915) from Missouri, who had settled in Merced County.^[3] Together they had 11 children.^[3]

Their daughter Rosa Adelle Sugg married Donald William McDonald in 1876, and they lived in San Francisco.^[3] Donald William McDonald had been an active musician in the Third Baptist Church in San Francisco.^[3] Two of Rosa and Donald's children: Vernon Sugg McDonald and Earl Sugg McDonald were sent to the Sugg House in Sonora, California to live with their grandmother.^[4][9] Vernon Sugg McDonald died on the house in May 1982, and was the last of the family members to live there over the span of 125 years.^[4][10]

The Sugg and McDonald Family Papers are held at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University.^[11] The National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. holds some of the family memorabilia.^[12]

The East Bay Negro Historical Society (predecessor of the African American Museum and Library at Oakland) had an section of exhibition in 1979 dedicated to the Sugg family history.^[13]

In 2008, there was attempts to create a museum about the site by local historian Sylvia Alden Roberts, author of Mining for Freedom: a Black History Meets the California Gold Rush (2008).^[8]

• African Americans in California
• National Register of Historic Places listings in Tuolumne County, California

 This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Park Service.

• Sugg and McDonald Family Papers, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library