The Shunned House of the title is based on an actual house in Providence, Rhode Island, built around 1763 and still standing at 135 Benefit Street; Lovecraft was familiar with the house because his aunt, Lillian Clark, lived there in 1919-20 as a companion to Mrs. H. C. Babbit. But it was another house in Elizabeth, New Jersey that actually provoked Lovecraft to write the story. As he wrote in a letter: This location is at present the site of a plaza named in honor of Winfield Scott, who was the namesake of Lovecraft's father.