White Horse Tavern, Newport

White Horse Tavern

26 Marlborough Street, Newport, RI 02840

Grade B · Building datedTrading · checked Sept 2026

White Horse Tavern claims 1673. The records say 1687.

Claimed

1673

First record

1687

Building

no single date

The building. Probably built before 1673 and enlarged to its present size in the mid 18th century, according to the National Register nomination; restored 1952-57 — we give it no single date because No year is printed here on purpose. The two National Park Service documents for this house give two different answers and neither names a year: the 1971 nomination says probably built before 1673, and the 1990 National Historic Landmark documentation for the Newport district says before 1693.

Colonial

Fireplaces

Food

The claim

A clapboard colonial tavern with a gambrel roof on a quiet Newport corner, widely described as the oldest tavern building in the United States. Its core house dates to 1652 and William Mayes turned it into a tavern in the 1670s. Restored in the 1950s, it now serves refined New England dining beside fireplaces and centuries-old timbers.

What the records show

The National Register nomination, written by Antoinette Downing of the Rhode Island Historical Preservation Commission on 25 July 1971 and entered on 3 February 1972, puts it plainly: probably built before 1673, the house was acquired that year by William Mayes, served first as a private residence and soon became an inn, and Mayes had been granted a liquor licence as early as 1687. The sign of the White Horse was first hung by Jonathan Nichols, who owned the tavern in 1730. So the fabric is of the claimed age and the earliest record of drink sold is 1687. Use has not been continuous: the Preservation Society of Newport County rescued and restored the building in the 1950s and owned it at the time of listing. The nomination cites Downing and Scully's Architectural Heritage of Newport, Rhode Island, and calls the tavern the oldest still in operation in America.

Dated evidence for White Horse Tavern, earliest first
Year	What	Source
1673	Claimed founding	The pub
1687	First record of a drinking house here	National Register of Historic Places

What to look for inside

Often called the oldest tavern building in the USA
Quartered British troops during the Revolution
Named The White Horse by Jonathan Nichols in 1730
The National Historic Landmark district documentation of 1990 dates the house before 1693, twenty years later than the 1971 nomination

Visiting

White Horse Tavern is in Newport, United States, at 26 Marlborough Street, Newport, RI 02840. We do not list opening times, because they change; the pub’s own site is the place to check before you set out.

whitehorsenewport.com Directions in your maps app

Sources

Know something we don’t?Suggest a correctionLast checked Sept 2026

Run this pub? There is a badge for it

Free to put on your own site, no permission needed. It shows what the pub claims and what the records support, and it changes when the data does.

How to use it, and how to change what it says — if you have a document we have not seen, we would like to read it.