If Morven’s walls could talk, they’d have a lot to say.

“Morven was really on the national, and sometimes international, scene for over 200 years. There were always people who were working on the national stage having these conversations within these walls,” said Elizabeth Allan, curator of collections and exhibits at Morven Museum and Garden.

Built in the 1750s by Richard Stockton, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, it eventually became the first New Jersey governor’s residence. Now it’s called Morven Museum and Garden. For about 200 years though, the sprawling three-story house was a home to four generations of one family — starting with Richard and his wife Annis, who named the house.

“Morven is actually a word in Gallic that means ‘big mountain,'” Allan said.

Annis created the garden behind the house.

“She kept great records about what she planted in the garden. In fact, as her husband was going back and forth to England she would say bring me back some of this,” Peter Ham, owner of Ham Landscape Gardens, said.

It’s now maintained by museum staff and volunteers.

“People I think enjoy history. I visited several gardens where there would be gardens of different eras, but the garden that is oldest and most faithfully produced is often the one of greatest interest to the public. I think it’s a sense of what our heritage is, what our culture is and it’s manifested through the garden,” Ham said.

There’s a pool house in the garden that was built by Robert Wood Johnson, Jr. He rented the home until the early 1940s. At the time it was owned by Helen Stockton.

“She was approached by then Gov. Walter Edge, who had been a visitor to the house,” Allan said. “New Jersey had no Governor’s Mansion at the time and he thought this could be the perfect place. He purchased the home from Helen with the caveat that it always be either a Governor’s Mansion or a historic site.”

Edge eventually sold it to the state under the same conditions, says Allan. The price tag? $1.

The pieces on display throughout the museum were once owned by the people who lived there, including a couch which dates to the 1960s. That means it was there for many of the governors who once called the mansion home. Now, visitors can sit on it, too.

It was the governor’s residence until the early 1980s and then opened as a museum in 2004. Over the years it’s been restored. The nonprofit just unveiled their new Stockton Education Center for larger classes and programs.

“The conversations happened over and over in time — big issues about relationships with the country, with the state, with the community, looking at national issues on a local level, things that continue to matter today. We want to keep addressing and keep moving that conversation forward,” said executive director Jill Barry.

A walk through the halls may inspire a future New Jersey governor.