Once considered “America’s Most Magnificent Mansion” and now perhaps the nation’s most magnificent colonial-era ruins, Gloucester’s Rosewell will be the topic of an upcoming course offered by the Rappahannock Institute for Lifelong Learning.

The one-session course will be held from 2-4:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 13, at the Rosewell Visitor Center.

Rosewell Foundation President Clayton James will take students on a chronological tour through history and the ruins during the course.

Built in 1725 along the banks of the York River, Rosewell was home to one of the first families in Virginia, the Page family, for more than 100 years. Over the years the structure withstood changes in ownership, economic hardship and the weather. However, tragedy struck in 1916 as a fire swept through the mansion leaving just a magnificent shell. With its 300-year history, Rosewell’s ruins exist today as a relic of America’s fabled past.

Advance registration, wit...