1849, January, March, and May – Adelicia Franklin purchases three parcels of land that will become the Belmont estate.
1849, May 8 – Adelicia Franklin marries Joseph A. S. Acklen at her home in downtown Nashville. Construction on Belmont begins soon after.
1853 – During the last week of August or the first week of September, Adelicia, her husband Joseph, and their new son Joseph move into Belmont as a summer home.
About 1857 – The east and west wings are added onto the house, which is given stucco treatment and scored to resemble cut stone. It is at this point that the house is painted the shade of pink it is now.
1859-1860 – The Acklens hire the Prussian born architect Adolphus Heiman to enclose part of the back gallery and create the Grand Salon.
1861 – Adelicia begins living at Belmont for most of the year.
1884, Dec. 22 – Adelicia and three of her five surviving adult children leave Belmont to winter in Orlando, Florida. This would be the last known time that she was at Belmont.
1885 – By August, Adelicia and three of her children are living in a rented house on Iowa Circle [today Logan Circle].
1886 – By this year, Adelicia’s oldest son Joseph, a bachelor, is living at Belmont.
1887, Jan. 11 – Adelicia sells Belmont to Lewis T. Baxter. Baxter is part of a land development company that plans to develop the estate into a subdivision.
1889 – The house and 13 acres are sold to Miss Hereon and Miss Hood, who plan to turn the house into a women’s school. They begin by adding a building to the back of the mansion facing the new street called Wedgewood.
1890 – In the fall, the new school opens. The upstairs and most of the downstairs bedrooms have been divided into dormitory rooms. The formal dining room and the billiards room have also been divided into dormitory rooms. The winter parlor has been turned into the school library.
1905 – The building to the west called Fidelity Hall was added onto the mansion.
1909 – The building to the east called Founders’ Hall was added onto the mansion.
1913 – The auditorium on the first floor of the north building was enlarged and twenty feet of the back two wings of the house were removed. The school merges with Ward Seminary and changes its name to Ward-Belmont.
1951 – Ward-Belmont closes and the school reopens in the fall as a coeducational four-year college called Belmont College. The mansion is used as a student center for the new school.
1972 – A group of people on campus and a group of people of Nashville form the Historic Belmont Association, a private, not-for-profit 501(c)(3), to preserve and restore the mansion. Today this group is known as Belmont Mansion Association. Belmont College removes the dormitory walls from two rooms upstairs and renovates them as a guest room and setting room. Belmont Mansion Association furnishes them with period furniture.
1973 – All of the furniture that did not date from the period that Adelicia and her family lived in the house is removed. Seventy pieces of furniture and statuary are left in the house. Some of these items are original to the house.
1976, July 2 – The mansion opens to the public for regular tours with eight rooms on view.
1981 – The library, small study, and family dining room open for tours.
1982 – The first group of original artwork and furniture return to the house.
1986 – The dish pantry is restored and opened.
1987 – The service pantry is restored and opened.
1988 – The middle bedroom upstairs is restored and opened.
1989 – The exterior is returned to its original color.
1991 – The collection reaches five hundred items.
1996 – After returning it to its original size, the west bedroom becomes home to the gift shop, which is moved here to clear part of the space for the restoration for the formal dining room.
2000 – The formal dining room opens.
2005 – The collection reaches 1000 items.
2006 – Major exterior restoration of stucco on the mansion is conducted.
2010 – Current project focuses upon the restoration of the master bedroom which has never been open to the public for viewing.