The Mountain House was built in Chillicothe, Ohio in 1850 by a German family named Meggenhofen who operated a winery here for many years, tending the terraced vineyards below the house. The property was purchased by Dard Hunter in 1919.

Dard Hunter's remarkable career as an artist, designer, illustrator and craftsman in stained glass and wood had already been well established through his work with the Roycrofters and later in London and Vienna. But it would be here at the Mountain House that he was to pursue a study that would eventually establish him as the world's foremost authority on the history and craft of papermaking.

In 1923 Dard Hunter announced the publication of Old Papermaking, written, set and printed entirely by hand at the Mountain House Press. Publication of this extrordinary volume brought instant acclaim and recognition from artists, collectors, papermakers and scholars around the world.
Dard Hunter printing Old Papermaking at the Mountain House.

Over the next five decades, eight masterful publications would be printed at the Mountain House Press by Dard Hunter and his son, Dard Hunter, Jr., who carried on the legacy in many ways, including the publication of his magnum opus, The Life Work of Dard Hunter. Today, over 30 years after his death, Dard Hunter is still recognized as the world's foremost authority on paper and papermaking. He considered the most significant contribution of his life to be the establishment of the Dard Hunter Paper Museum, now on the campus of Georgia Tech. Dard Hunter died at the Mountain House in 1966.