This homestead is one of the earliest homes in the Camden–Rockport area of Maine. Originally built inland from the harbors, the house was a one room cabin with an open sleeping loft above. Allegedly built in 1769 by Robert Thorndike (1734-1834) one of the earliest settlers of Rockport the house has served as a significant piece of the town’s history ever since. There were two additions to the house in 1806 and 1826. The first addition in 1806 consisted of the front door entry and the front parlor, a birthing room and a chamber and loft above. The 1826 addition in the back of the home provided a kitchen area that was later divided to provide a small parlor. In 1826, Frederic Conway bought the property from Robert Thorndike Jr., which remained in the family until 1916. The property is now owned by the Camden-Rockport Historical Society as a house museum and the organization is further documenting the history of this house and the two towns.
Located in Pigeon Cove, the northern section of Rockport, Massachusetts, the “Old Castle” is an iconic landmark in the charming coastal town. The exact year it was built is not known, but it is believed to have been built in 1712 by Jethro Wheeler (1692-1755), a shoemaker who settled here from nearby Rowley. In 1724, Jethro deeded the property to his son Benjamin, and he moved out of town. Benjamin, is turn sold the property to his son Benjamin in 1769. Benjamin Jr.’s son, John D. Wheeler in 1792 inherited the property and added the lean-to/kitchen room to the rear to create the present saltbox roof form. Various Wheelers continued to own the Old Castle for another hundred years. The property was gifted in 1929 to the Pigeon Cove Village Improvement Society, and is presently under ownership of the Sandy Bay Historical Society, who manage the property as a house museum. The house with its overhanging second story reads like a garrison, a common element in First Period houses in Essex County.
Jonathan Fisher (1768-1847) was born in New Braintree, Massachusetts, and educated at Harvard College Divinity School. In the record of Plantation No. 5, (now Blue Hill), the selectmen voted to invite the Rev. Mr. Fisher to preach for four months in the summer of 1795. After his four month stint, the committee approached him, asking if he would stay and make the town his home, he accepted. He first built a primitive house which was outgrown by the time he had three children growing up in it! He had the current home built in 1814, attaching the original home as a rear ell (addition). Reverend Fisher died in 1847. His wife Dolly, died in 1853. At the end of the nineteenth century, Jonathan Fisher’s grandchildren decided to renovate the house. In 1896, they tore down the original house of 1796 and replaced it with a two-story addition to their grandfather’s 1814, giving it the current configuration. When the Fisher grandchildren who had been living there left Blue Hill, a number of local citizens concerned for the future of the building made arrangements that eventually led to the transfer of ownership of the house to a local non-profit foundation, the Jonathan Fisher Memorial, and made it possible for the house to be opened to the public. The Fisher House is open for tours in the summer.
One of my favorite things to do each holiday season is to explore Newport and the mansions all gussied up with lights, ornaments and holiday cheer. This year, I visited The Elms, one of my absolute favorite buildings in Newport, which is a house museum! Stay tuned for some room features, similar to my series last year on The Breakers mansion.
The Elms was commissioned in 1898 by coal baron Edward Julius Berwind (1848–1936) and his wife Sarah Torrey Berwind (1856-1922) as a summer cottage where the couple could escape the woes of city life for a few weeks of every year. Edward was “new money” (his parents were middle-class German immigrants); and by the 1890s, he was hailed as “one of the 58 men who rule America”, making him one of Newport’s most important summer residents. To live up to his new status, he hired Philadelphia architect Horace Trumbauer, who took inspiration from the 18th century Château d’Asnières in France. The site on the iconic Bellevue Avenue is not directly on the water, so Trumbauer sought to enhance the siting of the mansion by elaborate landscaping (more on that later). The house was built to be fireproof, after the complete loss of the original Breakers mansion in 1892 and is clad with Indiana limestone. The couple held many lavish parties in the Elms until 1922, when Mrs. Berwind died. Mr. Berwind invited his youngest sister, Julia, to become his hostess at his New York and Newport houses. Mr. Berwind died in 1936 and Julia continued to summer at The Elms until her death in 1961. Childless, Julia Berwind willed the estate to a nephew, who did not want it and fruitlessly tried to pass The Elms to someone else in the family. Finally the family auctioned off the contents of the estate and sold the property to a developer who wanted to tear it down. In 1962, just weeks before its date with the wrecking ball, The Elms was purchased by the Preservation Society of Newport County for $116,000. It remains one of the most visited house museums in the nation to this day.
Buildings of New England 