Old Farm Estate: Origins 1868 to 1928 Cultural Landscape Inventory and Assessment Oldfarm Property Acadia National Park FRENCHMAN BAY Bar Harbor, Maine 1868 Site Context Map Sols Cliff Newport / (Champlain) Mountain Birch point (Dorr Point) Ogden's Point East Knob SOURCES (Beer Brook Hill) 1. ACAD GIS Files 2. 1850 Map of Hancock County Village of Eden Dean Higgins Cove 3. 1875 USGS Map of Mount Desert Island Early Farmstard (Compass Harbor) fear Bront Sites BEAVER 4. 1938 Map of Property of George B. Dorr 5. Partial Abstract of Title of Oldfarm Douglas B. Creek Chapman, Esq. Archives 6. George B. Dorn Personal Papers. Bar Harbor Historical Society DRAWN BY Cromwells Erick Duym, 2016 AutoCAD Map 3D. Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator C56 Arc GIS 10.2 LEGEND 1868 roads Existing roads West Knob (Bear Brook Hill) 1868 buildings Existing buildings Historic Oldfarm property line 1668-1875 property lines Oldfarm property Brook 5 Feet contaur Spring Strawberry Wetland or Meadow Big Meatdox (Great Meadow}4 NOTES 1. All features shown in approximate scale and location 2. Contemporary place names in parenthesis. DEN 3. Features depict information from 1860 and 1875 maps. Harbor) 4. Illustration of approximate 100-acre parcel purchased by the Dorn family in 1868 5001 10001 2000 DRAWING 1.1 20. Lowther Lodge, Kensington, by Richard Norman Shaw. 1875. (Buildi 21.C. F. Dorr House, Mount Desert, Maine, by 22. Alexander F. Oakey. 1876-77. (American Architect, 1877) an live foot interior square, about 2,000 Leet, leaving 8,000 reet built upon, at a cost of $89,000. The land would cost another and M. F. Kuhl $10,000, making $90,000 in all. For a tenement of one room There are ma fourteen by ten, and a dark closet eight feet square, the poor pay of Europe, whic HOW about eight dollars a month. For the saine price, if we gave der technischen, theur two light rooms and a water-closet with the little hall, we Literatur," a p should, getting some fifteen tonements on a floor, bring in thus the A.L.A. ough $1.450 annually. The three-room tenements would in this pro- istry also treat o portion rent at eleven dollars a month. For five stories we should have been publi get a return of $7,250, and from the stores $2,000 more, - making aid Co., New 3 $9,250, or more than ten per cent gross, which is ample to provide may also be fou for a seven per cent not return. This computation assumes the as a preservativ selection of a corner plat. THE ILLUSTTRATIONS. TO MA DESIGN FOR RESIDENCE AT SYRACUSE, N.Y. MR. C. W. ROMEYN, ARCHITECT. Sir, - noti (No. 124 West Thirteenth Street, N. V.) process which V THIS house is built of brick, faced with red Croton brick laid in Sylvester's met red mortar, with a course of tooth-work under lintels, and bands gate-house of t of black brick above and below course and sills. Cost, $8,000. .Y., the wall thirty-six feet, PROVIDENCE HIGH SCHOOL, PROVIDENCE, R.I. MESSRS. WALKER years after the ND GOULD, ARCHITECTS. A year or tw (No. 37 WeyDosset Street, Providence, R.I.) a stone cottage trial of the ust This is to be built of brick, with Amherst stone wrought work, He told me a on an underpinning of Westerly granite land rubble, with split that it was suc faces. The interior is arranged, on the first floor, for two girls' tion of the stor and two boys' schools with recitation rooms and wardrobes, a philosophical lecture-room with a small library and cabinet ad- SYLVESTER'S joining, and offices for the principals of the school. The philo- sophical lecture-room is connected by a small stairway to the Dissolve Cas chemical lecture-room which is in the basement. The remainder gallon; dissoli of basement, after providing for the boilers and coal-rooms, is both to be com used for play-rooms. The second floor is much the same as the The walls sh first; the difference being an additional school-room in place of the air not below lecture-room below, and a large recitation-room over the principals' with a flat bru rooms. The school-rooms are calculated to seat about seventy to form a frot scholars each. The third floor will have an assembly hall 63x108 hours, to becor feet, a draughting room, and two spare school-rooms. The build- may be at a tél ing will be finished throughout in ash, in a very plain and substan- twenty-four h tial manner, and special attention will be given to the heating and washes alterna ventilation. I am not qiii HOUSE AT MOUNT DESERT, ME. MR. A. F. OAKEY, ARCHITECT. was in the Ma In my own e (No. 44 West Seventeenth Street, New York.) effectual that The first story is to be built of brick and stone, excepting the frames and els 0.20 Architect and Building News. 21 oston I have columns of the veranda, which will be of hard wood turned. west classes; The parapet of veranda is to be of brick with stone coping, and the osed of only panels filled with moulded brick so laid as to form open-work pat- des, and the terns, as shown, only three simple forms being employed. The roof 1 cemented, e for drying 7 interstices ne. One or ate with the ding, which Id be in the em. These is shingled, and the rest of the building is timber and of simple con- has shown, struction. In execution, moulded brick will be introduced in the chimneys if economy does not forbid it; but the general form of eated on the the stacks will remain as shown. Id swell the arious inner 3, card, and WATER-GLASS NEW YORK. *probably EDITOR AMERICAN ARCHITECT AND BUILDING NEWS East River IN answer to the inquiries of your correspondent (1/1) in regard and is com- to water-glass, it may be said that it was applied thirty years ago ill be better to the woodwork of the Royal Theatre in Munich to make it fire- rks about a proof. While engaged in studies upon theatre construction about ts might be ten years ago, I addressed a letter to one of the professors of the ints, or even Polytechnicum at Munich, inquiring of him as to the efficiency of l prove very water-glass, and whether it had proved to be n success at the Royal room for the Theatre. His answer was affirmative as to its success at the thea- itually drive tre, and strongly 111 favor of its use. re tract such In Paris, water-glass has been used on the Louvre and other gov- and further evnment buildings, to protect the store against injurious effects of the weather. I cannot give my authority at present, but I have mately by a read it somewhere that Rauson's success in the manufacture of st greatly re- artificial stone is mainly attributable to the use of water-glass. In ment houses Germany it is also used to make thätched roofs fire-proof. It seems square foot to me it could be used with success to make railroad passenger S be safe to cars fire-proof, and prevent such calamities as happened at Ashta- we took four bula. for a forty- The most eminent authors upon the subject are its inventor, the 8.000 feet late DF J. M. Von Fuchs, professor of mineralogy at Munich; cost another and M. F. Kuhlman, professor of chemistry at Lillo. of one room There are many good articles written in the technical periodicals the poor pay of Europe, which may be found by referring to the Repertorium if we gave der technischen, mathematischen, and naturiissensclafilichien Journal- ttle hall, we Literatur, a publication, by the way, which every Chapter of ring IN thus the A.L. A. ought to possess. Muspratt's and other works on chem- in this pro- istry also treat of water-glass. Several pamphlets upon the subject les we should have been published, and may be obtained of Messrs. Westermann, CO. - making and Co. New York. In the London Builder of 1857 page 709, 22 Jan. 19, 1878 The American Architect and Building News, VOL. III.-No. 103. for confessional alcoves. opening into the aisles beneath each aisle- In what I have quoted. has not Sir Joshua said enough in cover window. five on each side the church. How many millions will be the whole field of art? and yet we continue to this day to waste spent on the structure before its completion. it is almost impossible our clients' money in tessellated towers and the like conceits, as if to say: nor would it be at all safe to fix the date of completion. we expected to be undermined by our neighbors and to be coll- An arch-episcopal residence and a number of other buildings are to sistent with which scenic representations. We should go masquer- be built in contrection with it; but on these no work has yet been ading in shapes with chain-armor under our doublets. done. Since 1853, when the first sketches for the structure were To offset these archmologicab reversions we have the provincial made, the work has gone on faster or slower, as the funds in hand builder with his (jig-say) and his balloon frame: and we find our- permitted. selves admiring the progress of the engineer as the only worker in the field who has thought for himse accepted the limitations HOUSE FOR CHARLES II. BRADSHAW, ESQ., SPRING HILL, MASS. of his problems, and met them with ingenuity: only his lack of MR. W. G. PRESTON, ARCHITUCT. artistic training enables us to find a living in our practice. unless we are content only to be called upon tn minister to the unneces- PROPOSED RESIDENCE OF MESSRS. A: AND M. J. ALLEN; AKRON, 0. sary and luxurious evidences of civilizations and to take 110 part in MR. F. 0. WEARY, ARCHITECT. the development that will go on. whether 11. move with it or not. It seems to me that Mr. Garbett is neurer the truth with his PERSPECTIVE STUDY. - NO. I. development of the Tensile than Mr. Fergusson with his For explanation of this cut, see the preceding article, Papers. Oil Italian Renaissance: for this principle already shows its influence Perspective." strongly in all our utilitarian work. - i.e., work in which the requirements must be met without regard to "Infression: and TIEE POSSIBILITY OF A NEW STYLE IN ARCHI- does not the expression follow inevitably TECTURE W by should we discard the "Inpressile" and "impressive" simply because there is little room for invention in the ir applica- (A paper hs Mr. F. Oakey, t. A, read at the Eleventh ;Lunual Convention of tion? Ought We not rather be glad that the earth's surface the American Institute of Architecta.] abounds with the truest examples to guide us in our work It is So many eminent authors have written on this subject, that it no argument against it composite system of construction. that we would seem littl remains to be said; and yet 1. think that a care- have no precedents we are in no sense bound to adh re to the ful comparison of the views of the best authors naturally suggests peculiarities of any age. a conclusion that I find. whether intentionally or not, omitted, or The question must always be one of the best means to an end: rather not developed, in any of them. and if the end is reached ilie means excuse themselves. especially Mr. Fergusson says that a new style is to be found in it develop- as they are so bound up in it as to make it impossible to achi 'TP ment of the Italian Renaissance, that no progress is possible in a satisfactory result with insufficient means. Why have we not Gothic or Greek, and further, that archalogy is not architecture : the courage to think for ourselves. and. when we are asked in what while Mr. Garbett. condemning the servile copyist, as strongly style have we expressed our thoughts. to answer that we do not points to the possibility of a new style in the one constructive think it necessary to classify and ticket every thing. to name in principle that has never yet controlled a style, i. c. the Tensile." one word an over-varying systein that cludes such an attempt IIc believes that the Depressile and the Compressile have been ex- The Eastlake style. forsooth. is even now a recognized 'mm: and hausted, aud that a system embodying the Tensile." together yet it would puzzle the quil-drivers or any one ulse. (i) say in with it generalized imitation' of nature, is the goal we seek. what it consists. I like the old English finitien of auditee- Guillaume agrees with Fergusson in the main, but looks for no ture: the art of well Building:" and what is not well and truly change till architects are guided by sci: nce more than tradition. built does not deserve the name. This it seems to m. is all with Much has been written by other distinguished professors, but in which we have to concern ourselves to study each problem by these three we have the sense of the discussion in its lat 'st stage. itself: and. having met the requirements in plan. as Be build I have looked in vain in the works of these authors. and in those up upon it, who shall hold UN responsible for our style. if every of many others, for a statement or suggestion of a theory whose purpose that was intended is served by ingenious, constructive apparently unconscious corroboration has been, in Mr. Forgusson's economy? case at least, the work of his life. I'caunot read his history with- I (ii) not wish to inveigh against suitable and necessary decora- out being struck with the completeness of the evotution its tion, ---- necessary as regards the phonetic expression of a design record there io. but I can for the medinal OT these three we have the sense of the discussion in its lat st stage. 115011 LIII; 111 as W! 1,011.1 I have looked in vain in the works of these authors, and in those up upon it, who shall hold us responsible for our style. if every of many others, for a statement or suggestion of a theory whose purpose that was intended is served by ingenious, constructive apparently unconscious corroboration has been, in Mr. Forgusson's economy ? case at least. the work of his life. I cannot read his history with- I do not wish to inveigh against suitable and necessary decora- out being struck with the completeness of the evolution its pages tion. - necessary as regards the phonetic expression of a design ; record: there is no missing link in this work of nature; far I but I cun see no reason for reviving the médiaval. grotesque. or must believe architecture, as an expression of the longings and shutting fair daylight out of a building where light is a desiders. aspirations p.physical and intellectual man, the work of nature tum, because we have precedents for these dispositions. And as actually as any thing Mr. Iluxley venlighten us upon. there's the rub: Have we precedents for any such thing? 10 Until the fifteenth century, neither the whins of this or that more than we have precedents for stone spires made of wood. architect or client, nor the accumulat traditional pedantry of If there is one fact connected with the examples we blindly imi- itlier or both could avail against the natural growth of forms tated it is that they here-built for purposes which they fulfilled born of bodily needs or religious superstition. The changes that and there is ample internal evilence that th ir designers would were made from time to time. owing to climatical influences, or have treated our problems in an entirely different way. as the result of political or religious revolution, were as naturally Because our ancestors wore&fortunate enough to unearth the consequent as the changes in the structure and exuberance of a classic poets, and unfortunate enough to consider it necessary to vegetable when transplanted. or by treatment brought to a high revert in every thing to tlie classic type, we have been obliged to state of cultivation. The cultivation must be in the right direc- go all over that old ground ;and it is not our fault if we have not tion. the inherent and essential qualities of the plaut must be cul- repeated every vagary of every decline until we find ourselves tivated. or the species dies out; and we have nothing left but the where we started. Now that it has taken all these centuries to chromo in the book to record how beautiful a flower it once bore. find the road we have strayed from, are We going to wander Why do we need now what the world never desired before? 'round the monuments of past ages rhapsodizing this or that Why are we divided to-day between the revivalists and the nov- detail that has lost its significane: in our day. ignoring the great celty-hunters and this last occupation the lowest incentive to principles that could lead us on and mumbling about a new architectural - I might say all - diffort. On the one hand, are style? Nonnan or whole professional brotherhood can saddle the we tn accent the conclusions of the fifteenth century.as final in world with what it does not need to satisfy its utilitarian ends architecture more than in astronomy'? and on the other. is there or its religious thought; and it is wors? than idle to grumble not an inherent fitness in things in form, consistency. and expres- at the sway of the mighty dollar, to give as an excuse for con- sion. that absolves from any responsibility as to their age or structive lies. the reason that the money was not forthcoming to novelty? pay for a real stone vault or flying-buttress. Ii the stone vault The answers to these questions are not in favor of tin gargoyles, had been necessary, the money would have been forthcoming. or in fact constructive lies of any kind. As Sir Joshua Reynolds The mighty dollar is the power of our age and a power that says The natural appetite of the human mind is for truth, places every process and every material within our reach if we whether that truth results from the real agreement or equality of would only avail ourselves of our opportunities. original ideas (among themselves, OF of the representation of any The underlying principles that enabled the mediasal architects object with the thing represented. or from the correspondence of to command our admiration and respect are as true to-day as they the several parts of any arrangement with each other. It is the were then, and it is only by their application to our needs that we very same taste which-relishe S a demonstration in geometry, that can achieve as grand results s.ever expressed by the political or is pleased with the resemblance of a picture to an original, and religious civilization of any people; while we have the incentive touched with the harmony of music." And again, what he savs of making our achievements forever stopping-stones for future of other arts could well include architecture On the whole it generations in scarch - of a new style, but of truth. seems to me that there is but one presiding principle which regu- lates and gives Stability to any art. The works, whether of poets, painters, nioralists. or historians, which are built upon general CAST-IRON GLAZED TILES - The Drulsche Zeitung nature. live forever; while those which depend for existence on says, At the iron-works of Groeditz that Riesa Germany, gazed particular customs and habits, a partial view of nature. or the cast-iron tiles for roofing are now Mille. They are not heavier than fluctuation of fashion, can only be coeval with that which first ordinary tiles, and are very strong. The trailror depots of Lieban and of Reichenbach, aut many private houses of Hamburg and raised theni from subscurity." Dresden, are routed with them. Price an c Appletons' Home Books. BUILDING A HOME. BY A. F. OAKEY. COLLEGE UNIVERSITY HEIGHTS H DUNPHY COLLECTION RECEIVED JUN 1922 NEW YORK: D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 1, 8, AND 5 BOND STREET. 1881. 56 BUILDING A HOME. EXTERIORS, ETC. 57 and no practical objections can be urged against this durable cessary work of holding up the veranda roof, and bracing method, while it is very effective if not overdone. Usually the framing of the gable-ends, SO that the same quantity of this treatment should only be adopted for the upper stories material would have to be substituted ; this is a small in- of a building in which the first story is built of stone, or of stance of decorating the construction, and, though the whole brick, with stone quoins, lintels, and sills. When a house Bungalow is not very decorative, it could be less so. On the is built of stone, brick, or tiles, no amount of clambering FIG. 23 vines can injure it, and the effect of growing things on such a background is SO charming that one would almost be tempted to throw a few clods of earth upon the roof, in FIG. 24. order to have ferns and partridge-berry vines taking root among the tiles on the shady slope, especially if the water other hand, its native Indian steep roof and broad eaves supply was not from the cistern. would render it a very picturesque object. As an instance of extreme simplicity, the illustration of Fig. 24 affords some opportunities for picturesque exte- the Bungalow, Fig. 23, may be cited. It could be made rior treatment. This design is only one of many that could more barn-like only by omitting the ridge-tile and the be erected on the plans (Figs. 11 and 12). It is severe and few bits of turning, which, however, are doing the ne- simple, and is mainly dependent on the forms given to the 58 BUILDING A HOME. EXTERIORS, ETC. 59 unusual amount of roof surface, which, whatever disadvan- tages it may have, insures a plentiful water supply, and much decreases the expense of exterior work. Fig. 25 is the exterior of the plan shown in Fig. 15, and is as nearly perfectly plain and devoid of decoration as can be ; any decorative effect being attained by the relative size and disposition of the parts. It was in connection with this house that we suggested making the veranda a conser- vatory in winter. The veranda affords opportunities for various treatment. In this instance we have, as already stated and shown on the plans, brought out the bedroom floor over the veranda, both to acquire more space on the second floor, and to get. rid of half of the veranda roof, which is usually of so low a pitch in comparison with the BIG main roof as to give the whole veranda the expression of being a mere addition or after-thought, in no way con- nected with the original design of the building. A large extent of flat, or nearly flat, veranda roof has also the dis- advantage of reflecting the sun back into the bedroom win- dows, and the only satisfactory compromise of this diffi- culty, where it is for some reason unadvisable to project the second story over the veranda, is to make a terrace open to the sky on top of it, with a proper balustrade, or to have, in Southern fashion, a double tier of veranda cov- ered by a projection of the main roof. Where the second story is projected, as in Figs. 15 and 25, an opportunity offers for a very picturesque treatment of the ceiling of the veranda, in lieu of the usual flat ceiling, by carrying up the slope to a ridge-line against the house, and gaining the effect of a wagon-headed, open-timber ceil- 60 BUILDING A HOME. EXTERIORS, ETC. 61 ing, in which the essential sticks may be turned, molded, simplest and most economical construction are assured. and even carved, according to the scale of expenditure Breaks in a roof, merely for their own sake, are certain to adopted throughout the building. This treatment is sug- gested in Fig. 26, and DRIVE sufficiently shows what could be achieved in this particular. In regard to roofs in general, one pitch should 2 FLOOR predominate throughout a building. Few things o give a design so ill-con- LANDING sidered an effect as the employment of various Cur BOARD pitches of roof; where more than one pitch is 1st FLOOR employed, there should exist an obvious and suf- DRAWINGROOM ANTE DINING ROOM nok26.0 EXIT nox16.d ficient reason for such a variation. The simplest SECTION.VERANDAH rule for designing a good FIG. 26. and economical roof, and VERANDA H one that shall have an expression of repose and shelter, is to lay out on the plan the lines of a roof, of four sides or slopes, that shall include or cover the largest possible portion of the house; from this FIG. 27. the necessary roofs for wings, dormers, etc., should always, as far as possible, so project that one slope of the wing look like what they are, to cost more, and to cause some in- or dormer roof may form a continuation of one slope of terior inconveniences. the main roof in this way simplicity of outline and the In the treatment of chimneys very important and pict- 6 62 BUILDING A HOME EXTERIORS, ETO. 63 uresque effects are attainable. We are obliged to carry a chimney well above the highest points of a roof to insure a good draft, and in many instances the altitude of any very near neighbors must control the height of our chim- neys, which may be a mere square column of brick with a mm FIG. 28. stone cap, or something much more .interesting. Where expense precludes any indulgence in elaborate brick-work, such as marking the various flues like a bunch of reeds, bound here and there with projecting bands, very satis- factory effects may be attained by surmounting our plain 66 BUILDING A HOME. EXTERIORS, ETC. 67 As to lightning-rods, the country is infested with ped- dlers who offer a useless article-either a hollow tube or a twisted strip, together with insulators of glass, and various childish contrivances. The virtue of a lightning-rod con- sists in the sectional area or quantity of fibrous metal, which should be galvanized to prevent corrosion, should be connected with all other metal fixtures inside and outside the building, should be fastened with a wire staple here and there directly to the building, and should extend below the foundations. When carried one incl above the chimney or finial to which it is attached, it is as efficacious as when extending upward for several feet. One lightning- rod is only a partial protection ; there should be one at each extremity of the building, and they should be connected together. Theoretically, the greater the number of con- nections with the ground, the greater the security. Any complete discussion of this subject, and of the scientific rea- sons for the above statements, is beyond the compass of thic book, but what has been said may be relied on as the latest result of scientific investigation and practical experience. 94 BUILDING A HOME. ECONOMY, CONSTRUCTION, ETC. 95 to disintegration. Where any bold and undercut treatment is required, terra-cotta will be found more satisfactory, both as a matter of economy and durability, and as offering many facilities in design and practical requirement hitherto unprovided. Almost any desirable color can be produced, and even combinations of different colors in the same piece. If two individuals intend to build in the same town or village, much money can be saved by agreeing upon some such arrangement as is shown in Figs. 35, 36, and 37, for two small cottages, and by building them under one contract at the same time. The material advantage to be derived from such a disposition consists not only in a saving of about twenty per cent. of the cost of either building if erected separately, but the overlapping of the kitchen wings screens the kitchen yards, which are usually unsightly from every point of view, and the whole pile of building can be made much more important and picturesque, as suggested in Fig. 35, while the approach on every side may be made attrac- tive, without considering the domestic economy that gen- erally renders one approach emphatically the back way, which must be planted out to hide the washing hung out to dry and other more objectionable evidences of housework. The usual way of employing an architect is to wait till the last moment, and then tell him that the building must be completed by a certain short time. How much wiser it would be to commence consulting and planning a year or two before building actually begins, to talk with half a dozen different architects, examine the buildings that they have executed for others, question the owners of these (al- ways trying to give the client and the architect their due 96 BUILDING A HOME. ECONOMY, CONSTRUCTION, ETC. 97 credit or blame respectively), study drawings and designs of all sorts-in fact, educate one's self to know what one does suppose that a man pays a few hundred dollars, more or less, want, and, as far as possible, what one ought to want ! Such according to the importance of his project, for advice, a course would often result in discouragement. But even sketches, etc., and spends much of his time in artistic and 9 98 BUILDING A HOME. ECONOMY, CONSTRUCTION, ETC. 99 practical study and discussion, when, after all said and done, his mind because architecture, like music, is an artificial he concludes not to build has he wasted his time and his art, not pretending to represent any natural object. money ? Not at all. He has spent both in gaining a peace In architecture, taste is governed by several well-defined of mind and confidence in his convictions that are worth excellences; and a building, in whole or in part, is good or much more in comparison to the dissatisfaction that SO often bad as a matter of fact, dependent upon no individual follows building, to say nothing of the increase of his gen- judgment. In the first place, there is the excellence of plan eral information and consequent enjoyment. to meet certain requirements, which is indisputable; and How many men are saying at this moment, " If I built this is closely allied to the aesthetic for the best plan is again, I should know better than to adopt this or that, or that one which, while it fulfills the practical needs of the plan in this way !" We only know of two ways to avoid this project, also admits of an artistic treatment expressive of disappointment: either to take the trouble to educate one's the purpose. A plan may be admirably adapted to the pur- self, as suggested, or, as most Englishmen do, to select pose of a building, while the building has no other merit; an architect on whose taste, ability, and character you can but this only shows that other dispositions should have been rely, and let him alone. The former of these alternatives made of the superstructure, while they should be the most will not always prove successful, because there are those economical consistent with mechanical and scientific prin- persons whose natural inclinations are not artistic, and, ciples. In regard to expression, there are the traditional, the again, those whose natural inclinations are not practical practical, and the sensual: sensual meaning the expression but in this they are no worse off than most of us, architects due to form and color, without regard to the purpose of the and all. building. Against the second alternative it may be said, that, how- Sensual beauty, in architecture, at all events, is not a ever competent and tasteful an architect may be, he still matter of opinion. There are combinations and relations may not produce a work that is to your taste. But, with few of form and color that are disagreeable to the eye for sci- exceptions, is it not your taste that is at fault ? For, while entific reasons, and those reasons the same for which some any person may with some truth express an opinion upon the combinations of musical notes are painful to the ear and merits of a picture portraying some natural object-that is, combinations of form and color can be refined to the same can, without any knowledge of the requirements of the art extent that those of musical tones can be. There are mil- of painting, say whether the object is truly represented- lions of people who derive more enjoyment from listening he can not be said to have an opinion upon a matter of to a hand-organ playing a popular air than they could architecture, any more than upon a composition of music, possibly appreciate from hearing Beethoven's "Seventh without more or less special study according to the bent of Symphony"; but do we doubt for an instant that this 102 BUILDING A HOME. ECONOMY, CONSTRUCTION, ETC. 103 as expensive to build in our way as it would now be for us family that has occupied the same home for two genera- to adopt such methods. tions. As soon as we work in brick, these particular character- This state of things is not favorable to domestic archi- istics disappear, and we find, by merely meeting the exigen- tecture, and it may be that its day is done, that in the not cies that arise, that the features of the buildings of the far future we shall build only apartment-houses in town reign of Queen Anne, or of those of an earlier date in Lom- and hotels in the country. Here and there a suddenly for- bardy, show themselves in our designs, always with such tunate individual may try in his own person to revive the minor differences as our climate, building laws, and mechan- ancestral home but he will soon die, and his mansion will ical appliances naturally suggest. It is easy enough to be become an institution of some sort for the amclioration of carried away by archxologic enthusiasm, and to find no some human misery, while his heirs mix with the throng. artistic possibilities in meeting the requirements of modern To the archmological mind this is a dreary outlook, but the life but it is somewhat unreasonable to expect our clients to occasional building of crenellated towers and the emblazon- pay for what they do not need, when it is difficult enough ing of heraldic devices will hardly stem the tide, if it is to buy them a really comfortable home for the money really rising above the old marks. they are able to invest. Of course, life, with no embellish- It is common to hear people say that they know no- ments or luxuries, would be as stale, flat, and unprofitable thing of art but they know what they like, and WC as to live over again the first dreary years of the Plymouth shrink from the responsibility of proving that such people colonists, and without the excitement of fighting Indians. have no right to an opinion, especially as it would now But there is a vast difference between expressive exterior be equivalent to asserting that the accompanying designs and interior decoration and the making a new home a mere are models of perfection. We have tried in designing record of long-departed habits, customs, and superstitions. them to practice what we have been preaching, while we We may learn many useful lessons from our ancestors' are alive to the fact that, "If to do were as easy as to homes in all countries, but the best use we can make of know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, them is to take advantage of the facilities which our an- and poor men's cottages princes' palaces. It is a good di- cestors did not enjoy, and so accomplish results that may vine that follows his own instructions." record our conditions as fully as their houses do theirs. One of our great differences is, that we build to sell. We feel even in the country that the world moves SO fast that at any time a railroad or the sudden growth of an industry may drive us away ; until now it is difficult to find a Note: Additional menoirs regarding the history of the Old farm site and its purchase by the Dorrs coube located in a file titled: "Memoirs of G.B.Dorr 1866-1882 R.Epp. NORTH ELEVATION HOUSE FOR c. H. DORR ESQ. BAR HARBOR ME. H. RICHARDS ARCH. SCALE MIN. TO FOOT The Inflation Calculator Page 1 of 1 The Inflation Calculator What cost $70000. in 1878 would cost $1154665.44 in 2003. Also, if you were to buy exactly the same products in 2003 and 1878, they would cost you $70000. and $4243.65 respectively. Do you want to do another calculation? This page was written and is maintained by S. Morgan Friedman Note: update 2016. Cost of Old Farm mansion in 1878 is roughly $ 70,000, in 2016 $1,767,440. http://www.westegg.com/inflation/infl.cgi 8/16/2004 C.) UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Acadia National Park Bar Harbor, Maine, May 1, 1939. Mr. Arno B. Cammerer, Director, National Park Service, Washington, D. C. Dear Mr. Cammerer: I have given Mr. Hadley a brief statement to enclose you in regard to Oldfarm, along with what he has written in answer to your request for figures from the Town Assessors' book and has just mailed you. I now write a further word concerning this and on some memories the question has brought up. In 1878 we returned from Europe - my father, mother and I - after a stay abroad unexpectedly prolonged by my older brother's death in New York two years before in the summer of 1876, while studying law in the office of an 01- der friend, Mr. Louis L. Delafield, one of the leading law- yers of the country at that time. We had planned returning home ourselves the fall of that year and building a permanent summer home at Oldfarm on a site my father had already purchased a half dozen years before. My mother was at work over plans for this, studying some of the old English country houses, when a cable reached us, telling of my brother's sudden illness, followed immediately after by another informing us of his death. Bar Harbor, when we returned in the fall of 1878, was just recovering from the effects of a typhoid epidemic two years before, brought on by the rapid growth of the place as a resort and lack of realization by its citizens of the need or corresponding sanitary measures. It had learned its lesson, however, and steps were in progress to correct UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE 2. Director 5/1/39 the evil, but the effect on summer life, when we returned, and commenced to build, still lingered; no land was being sold, no houses built. Ours at Oldfarm as the first house to be built for summer residence, spaciously and comfortably, on Mount Desert Island and the regutation of it as the work went on gave confidence to others, starting what was known afterwards and long referred to as the &Bar Harbor boom. t The price of lands along the shore went up a hundred per cent within six weeks that summer and building continued ac- tively thereafter for years to come. The Oldfarm house was built for the first storey up of granite of a warm reddish have from the nearby Gorge and above that was covered with shingles hewn out of Cali- fornia Redwood, their tone blending well with the granite and still remaining, after all the years, untouched by decay. We had for architect Henry Richards one of the old Gardiner family of Gardiner, Maine, who had married the daughter of my mother's early friend, Julia Ward Howe. Henny Richards was then a recent graduate from the archi- tectural school of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and worked in well with my mother in the plans which she had made, producing a house that has ever remained for me one of the most attractive, home-like and best-fitted to its setting built on our eastern coast. The seale of wages at that time was low, one dollar to a dollar and a quarter a ten hour day for ordinary labor; two and a half to three dollars for skilled. The work was done by the day and was sound throughout and good. My father and mother were building for the future and spent liberally upon the work. When all was done, my father told me one day that the house and the work done upon the grounds connected with it had goat seventy thousand dollars, an amount far greater than it would seem t oday. UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE 3. Director 5/1/39 But the work has long since justified its cost in its enduring quality and the fitness and pleasantness of the home constructed. Yours sincerely, [G.B.DORR] GED-0 [Oldfarm Tract1] The site occupied by this home is that of one of the earliest cultivated farmlands on the Mount Desert coast, settled by migration from Cape Cod. This farm- land, with the woodlands and wild lands associated with it, is, owing to the bold, rocky character of the coast beyond, the last tract of farmland character capable of being cultivated upon the western coast of Frenchmans Bay or the coast beyond until Seal Harbor and the island- sheltered entrance to Somes Sound is reached. It also fronts directly upon the last good harbor for small vessels along that whole stretch of coast, lying closely outside the extensive sheltered basin of Upper Frenchmans Bay created by the breakwater extended by the Government, at great expense, from Round Porcupine westward toward the Bar Harbor shore, with passage-way left open between for smaller craft. The original Oldfarm grant acquired by my father extended back from the Compass Harbor shore and the Storm Beach point beyond for a measured mile, ending on the all but precipitous slope of Champlain Mountain, 2. the easternmost mountain in the Mount Desert Island chain, which, with Bear Brook and Beaver Dam Pool at its base, was one of the earliest gifts of land, made by myself, which now constitute Acadia National Park. This Oldfarm tract, which, in its entirety, I inherited from my father, is one of extraordinary in- terest and variety, with its harbored shore, its cul- tivated farmland, its bold granite heights above the cottage that I now occupy, its tiny lake, Compass Harbor pond, and the stream that winds its way down from it to the harbor. And along with these the tract across the public way, the Schooner Head Road, which I gave early to form part of the group of public reservations that presently became the National Park. Wide extended as the Park now is, it has, even yet, no frontage upon any harbored shore until Somes Sound is reached, midway of Mount Desert Island. The Oldfarm tract I now offer will fill this want, and in the most complete and satisfactory way. 3. The house itself, Oldfarm, built by day labor under my father's, my mother's and my own direction in consultation with the architect and the builder, is, owing to the care taken of it, in as good. con- dition now as it was when it was finished, sixty years ago, and no repair to it is needed, within or without. It occupies a magnificent situation above the shore and harbor and is completely furnished, having been rented to friends of mine at intervals throughout the years. This furniture is included in my offer. Private roads, avenues and foot-paths connect the house widely and directly with the lands now already included in the National Park, and it seems more natural and right to have the Park extended across the public way to Compass Harbor and contact with the sea and to the house that was my own. [G.B.DORR] STEPPING WESTWARD BY LAURA E. RICHARDS FOLIA DESTAULION And stepping westward seemed to be A kind of heavenly destiny. -WILLIAM WORDSWORTH D. APPLETON AND COMPANY NEW YORK : LONDON : MCMXXXI Laura Richard 2. STEPPING WESTWARD GREEN PEACE ONCE MORE "Her smile," said my father, "is like the open- For me, the change would have come in any ing of Heaven!" case. The moving finger was even then writing. The only one of my children who could keep Some time before this, my husband had be- even a dim remembrance of him was Alice, the come an architect on his own account in Bos- eldest; now Alice has followed him, going on to ton, and set up his modest sign in Pemberton her own new work, as he to his. Wherever there is Square. For some time all went well, with im- life, there will be work; the stars may be glad of mediate work enough to keep the fires burning, those two strong, patient, indomitable workers. and promise of more to come. He built houses Shortly before this time, the City of Boston in Boston, in Mount Desert, hither and yon; built had decided that a new street was needed in the castles, too, on paper; entering competitions for neighborhood, and that its lines should pass di- State Houses, churches, town halls; with what rectly through the old house. Notice was served toil, what high hopes, what disappointments, on my father that by right of eminent domain every young architect knows. (splendid and sounding phrase!) Green Peace Almost his first work was done for my father, would be taken over by the city. The news of in remodeling Oak Glen, changing it from a ram- his illness transpiring, the matter was postponed, shackle farmhouse into the sturdy foursquare to be brought forward once more after his death. dwelling that it is to-day. He and my father I have never seen the street that replaced had happy times over the plans. I like to think Green Peace. I sometimes wonder if it justified that S. G. H. may have had something to do with itself. That little happy valley, lying in the awakening the spirit of public service which has cupped hand of Nature, sunshine gathered into been my husband's companion through life, and it, winds tempered for it, bird song and child which then, in his early twenties, led him into laughter ringing through it-all that beauty, all work on Committees of Public Housing and the that warmth and glow of leaf and blossom and like. fruit, swept out of existence to make room for People began to seek him out; he was made rows of drab little houses in which no one ever Clerk of the Hospital Life Insurance Company, stayed long. Was it worth while? W as it fitting? Secretary of the Boston Society of Architecture Vain question, never to be answered. and the Boston Architects' Club; editor, too, of 166 167 3. STEPPING WESTWARD book, dedicated to my dear mother, has always been one of my favorites. 1890 was to see yet another book, in speaking of which I must pause a little. When we came to Maine, H. R. did not en- tirely give up architecture, the profession of his heart. He built a number of houses in the first ten years of our life in Maine, among them one for Mrs. Charles H. Dorr, at Bar Harbor. Mrs. Dorr was an old and intimate friend of my mother's, having been engaged in early life to my mother's brother. She was always a kind friend to us both. When the house was finished, she asked me to make her a visit. I well remem- ber how one day during this visit, sitting on the rocks below the house, and looking out to sea, I saw a distant lighthouse, and began dreaming and wondering as to what life might be in such a place So, up out of the sea, as it were, came to me the little story called Captain January. I wrote it quickly, and was rather pleased with it, but when I took it to my publishers, they would have nothing to say to it. It was too short for a long story, too long for a short story; very sorry, but not in their line. I think this story went to every reputable publisher, or to all that I knew about, in this country, and to several in England. No 326 May 2d transcription [oldfarm Tract-2] The site my mother, father and I, together with our architect, Henry Richards, chose for the Oldfarm house in the fall of 1878, was the broad, flat top of an old sea-cliff, facing north to the Gouldsboro Hills across the long reach of Upper Frenchmans Bay. This cliff rose well back from the present shoreline, where the breaking surf is now setting its makr on a new shore, thirty to forty feet below the old one, carved evidently in a stormier period. The gently sloping space over which the surf rolled up to break against the cliff, was covered at that time with dark evergreens, mingled with birch and pine. Bald Porcupine rieses opposite, a mile away, dividing eastern with its mass the and northern skies, the dawn long growing in this northern clime before the sun appears. From the high-placed casement windows of the chamber I chose for myself when the house was done the Sea Room as it as called, I used to see, day after day, this wonderful, slow breaking of the dawn, with the bold rounded mass of the Porcupine black a gainst the rowing light reflected in the Bay, then changing insensibly to greena the light grew stronger. 2. To the west of the site we built on, cliffed also on ed that side, a long level line stretch away, making what was at that time the cobblestone or sea-wall beach behind which had lain a considerable mass, as I discovered once on digging down for water, coming at nine feet depth on smooth. glaciated rock with the characteristic fine blue clay left everywhere by the over-riding ice-sheet of the last glacial period. In this I found shells of a shell-fish extinct in the regional waters now, but extant still in the arctic still. I gave these shells, in which my father took great interest too, to a friend of ours, Dr. Henry Chapman of Philadelphia, who presanted them to the Philadelphia Natural History Museum, where they were iden ified and placed. [oldform, the House] Oldfarm, the house, was built by the day, and most extraordinarlly well. Our architect was Henry Richards of Gardiner, Maine, a recent graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who took the keenest interest in his work and followed it closely, consulting constantly with my mother, my father and myself as the work went on, unhampered by any contract. Whatever changes suggested themselves as the work progressed, adding to the comfort and convenience of the house, were promptly made, for we planned for the future and an enduring home. The lower story of the house was built of granite, using, for effect's sake, the old oxidized surface from a new quarry in the Gorge opened for the purpose; cut stone was only used for the window frames and doors and the effect was excellent. The rest of the house was splendidly framed in wood, the best Maine could supply, with strong and heavy beams that made the structure of this portion as enduring as could be built in wood. The upper stories and the roof were shingled with California Redwood, imported for the purpose. The Redwoods all possess some quality that prevents decay -- they never rot, though they may wear thin and crack with time. This was a suggestion 2nt of our architect, who used them for their warm, reddish tone, fitting well with that of the granite used in the lower floor. The house was built sixty years ago the present year - 1940 - and no renewal or repair even of these shingles has ever been required, save for those upon the roof which ultimately wore thin and cracked and which I had replaced, as better fitted to the climate and exposure, with the best native cedar shingles pro- duced in Maine. We planned the house spaciously, that we might have our friends come to stay with us freely, and it became at once, with the rare gift for entertaining that 117 mother had, a social center of the pleasantest sort. It is the recollection of those days and the good times we had that makes me desirous now of making our old home serve the Government in recreation and in rest, if it so might be, for those who shape, at wash- ington, the policies of the National Government. [oldfarm Architect ] last quarter of record fresh beginning after interruption. the Oldfarm house was built under plans prepared by Keury one of the best younger architeots of his day and as Rehards thoroughly as could be, making no sacrifico to cost. It is in as good condition now as it was when first completed and the only change's made have been those needed to keep it level with the times in all new development. Electric lighting was unknown when the house was built and for twenty years the reafter at Bar Harbor. Thanxixx gracity So with the town water and SO with the telephone. But all that has been needed to keep it abreast of the time has been added. Life was simple in t he 1880° 8. So long H9 my mother and my father lived, Oldfarm was the scene of constant hospitalitity. The house was- is specious and was kept always full with delightful company. My father died first in 1893, my mothr seven years later. Ever delighting to havo friends about her, my own G specially. Oldfarm Construction ] Tr. May 13 The house we had looked forward to and planned for so long Europe after we started building at once on our return from/a stay, unexpectedly long, Start over The house we had planned for and looked forward to and looked forward to so long we started to build at once on our return from Europe in the autumn of 1878, after a stay unexpectedly prolonged. Almost immediately after landing, we came down with our architect, Henry Richards, to determine on our site and set things in motion. My mother soon returned to Boston but my father and I stayed on, studying and planning until the approach of winter made us thankful to return to Boston. The next spring we started in good earnest, our plans worked over through the winter contributing we made our part. My mother had been most interested during a stay in England in the work of William Morris , architect and designer, (which she had seen at an exhibition a year or two before and worked with our architect, a mo st happy choice, to carry out some of the ideas which she had got from them. The practical part my father and I contributed, but the artistic was hers and her architect's, young, enthusiastic, capable of absorbing new ideas. It was the first house at Bar Harbof/ to be really well built; and well built it was with nothing 2 2. spared in work or material. The first storey we built of granite split out from tumbled boulders in the gorge, weathered and warm-toned, save for where cut stone was water-table (*?) necessary for the and the windows, and at the last some brick was used that added their touch of color to the warm-toned granite. Above that first storey, all was shingled with shingled of t he warm brown, never rotting California Redwood, which, on all vertical parts of the house remain upon it still. Great chinmeys of brick rose above the shingles promising gnerous warmth, a promise which they have well fulfilled. In the interior, the frame was built with extra strength-- my father saw to that-- while all the interior skilfully and finish was carefully worked out from the best of Michigan and White Pine, Maine wood of similar grain being no longer floors obtainable. The, xxxxxthroughout were of well-seasoned, native oak, birch and maple, and better one could not have. The carpenters 6 and the Maine folk have a genius for that work, took great pride in thetxx their work and endless time about it. The result, when we at last moved in the summer of 1880, the carpenters still working upon the house, was a delightful home and a home it has proved to beat any season of the year. [oldform Property Development ] surveyed Have the ro se garden lot as laid out in my intention to take in my mother's old flower garden. from which at us back a beginning the Park developed. This takes thick to the c.1885 middle EXERY 1880's when the garden was fo rme d. The road to the shore lot above Storm Beach has its own entrance from The Way Road and the rose garden, as intended, will be entirely screened from it by the ridge of rock on the east, with the will brook on the west beyond. This road which bound the lot upon the east and south and it will be bounded on the west with the path through to and beyond The Way from Oldfarm, being open at some point to the- entrance from the path from Oldfarm, which it nowhere will A plan should be drawn by Breeze and Sherman for the development of the parking ground where the tennis sourt now is, the soil being carefully carefully preserved for use elsewhere in the garden. The ent rance to the rose garden will be byond the cedar he dge to the southeast and the opening through the hedge be allowed to close. The whole needs to be drawn out in detail and studied. Restrictions against building or di sfigurement or other use than flowering plant exhibition should be placed upon that portion of the nursery land above The Way road to the south, as far as KKX to the first crossroad from which northward the direction of the watering pipe [obdfarm and Admiral Mahan ] Diotaphone on Tuesday evening, May 16, 1939. 60 The father of Admiral Mahan, famous a generation later for the books he wrote on the influence of Navies on the world affairs, which were much widely read and discussed on both aides the Atlantic. These books are in my Oldfarm library and have given meaning to the speotaolo when I have watched from 1to poroh the American and British squadrons, sometimes together, sometimes apart, come steaming into Frenohmans Bay on leaving it. Professor Mahan died at West Point three and a half years later, in the winter of 1871-172, and my father wrote to his widow, asking if she would be sell to him at her own price lands that she and her husband had bought at Mount Desert, and she sold them. In 1875, when we were planning to build the following year at Oldfarm, returning from Europem my father purchased from Mr. Lothrop hhe share he had taken in the land first bought, completing his ownership of the original Henry Higgins' traot, whose deed from the DeGrogoires is in the Oldfarm title Sunday [oldfarm Pleasure gardens ] $71 2- page / This search after my father's English ancestors, all of them whether ministers or not, belonging to the Puritan fold, material for which my father had brought out from home, proved of the greatest interest to both of us , taking us into towns and places we should not have otherwsie have visited and giving us real insight into the England of our origin. My mother is greater interest lay in the London galleries and their famous pictures and the famous old country seats with their gardens and their pictures, left open to the p blic on certain days and hours, upon payment of a Iee to the housekeeper or guide appointed to show people In over and- who took interest enough to come./ this too, the gardens especially, I took myself the greatest interest; and the memory of them , seen then or in later JEXEX,visit to the English countryside, led directly on upon our return to Mt. Desert America to the building of our old home at xxxxxxxxx and the establishement (bring to me to fit in if necessary of the first true pleasure garden on Mt. Deart Island and, on SO far/ as I know, xxx the whole Acadian shore from the Fenboscto east, -- and a beautiful garden, too, it was with its flowers of the olden type and bedding plants only to fill in the caps in the later summer when the earlier bl omin- perennia S had done their season's work of insect life attraction through color, form and fregrance, and were ripening their seeds. [oldfarm Tidal Pool To the west of Dorr Point, there wás a flat stretch of rock large enough for a salt-water bathing pool and at a level SO much below the Point that salt water from the harbor flooded over it at high tide. This space was, at a guess, some forty or fifty feet, ending toward the harbor against a somewhat higher rock of lava character, with surface of deep red, from which, at one time, I extended as a pier a float for my sailing boat. The lower stretch of level rock, between this and the Point, I walled about with granite blocks from my quarry, leaving certain open spaces between the blocks for the tidal water to flow in and out. When the tide was out the water that had come in, filling the basin below these inflow spaces, leached away through the rock and I planned some day to cover the lower portion of the basin with a thin layer of cement that would hold the water in, letting it warm with the air and sun. This should be done now under the Government's new owner- ship. The cost would be but relatively slight and it would become a most attractive feature of the Point. 2. Opposite the Pool, a short distance across the Point, there is a smooth level rock of laval character, rising near the level of high tide, fronting the sea and descending vertically into it at considerable depth. It made a splendid place for a deen plunge when the tide was right and running down from the house before I dressed in the morning I used to plunge in for a glorious swim. But, the swim over, it was difficult to climb out, and to mest this I had rungs of thick iron pipe driven into the vertical face of the rock far enough down to make it possible to climb out at any tide and had thereafter great joy for years in my plunge. This will make a splendid contrast to the sun-warmed, sheltered water in the pool for those hardy enough to brave the cold sea-water and take the plunge. This, too, along with the pool, should be maintained. This Point, which I have named for my father, its summer-resident owner, Dorr Point, is throughout of a most picturesque and interesting character, owing to the hard, resistant character of the laval rock. In storms, the surf, sweeping in from the outer bay, breaks magnificently, sending up great sheets of spray. 3. Inside the Point there is a beach of true quartz sand, the only one on the whole shore, and from it before we came into possession they used for chirneys and the like such small amount of sand as was needed. Some of this sand still remains, rolled as above the shore. To this same sheltered beach the light-keeper from DOE Rock used to row when the sea was still.and beach his boat while he proceeded on to the village for supplies. Egg Rock, the eastern end of a mile-long granite resf that fronts the open sea across the broad, un- sheltered entrance to Frenchmans Day, rises up soli- tarily some forty-odd Pest above high-tide level; and against it storms, sweeping in from the east, break at times with terrific force. On one such occasion, I remember the lighthouse keeper to have told me, great seas swept over the whole Rock and bettered in the strong oaken door with its iron bars and flooded with salt water the well in which fresh water for the keeper and his family was always kept. the whole structure quivered with the jar but held firm. This ledge on which the lighthouse stands was a great place in early days for sea birds to breed -- hence its name. [G.B.DORR] Dorie for [Oldfarm" Park Origins August 6, 1941 Oldfarm itself, our old family home through the long spring, summer and autumn seasons we used to spend there, was built upon a craggy height over- looking the shore and point, with a beautiful view across the Bay to the north, but sloping off south- ward to the Way Road, with garden ground and lawn. To the west the same craggy height breaks down abruntly to the lower level of the Compass Earbor shore, well separated by the different level from the Oldfarm tract. This Compass Harbor property, with its delightful beach of clear quartz sand and its broad level acres extending back to the Town road, we intended, from the start, should become a distinct and separate property which should, in due time, be sold, when a future friendly neighbor should come along to purchase it. It is this land, extending back to The Way Road, and with its own separate entrance from Main Street, that I am now planning the United States should take and pay for, in part return for the annual rental the Government has been paying me these many years for the 2. office and headquarters site opposite the Athletic Field, which, by the arrangement now entered into, becomes my free gift to the Park. Other compensation to the Government for the sum required -- its rental changed to permanent and assured ownership -- has been well studied recently and worked out in a manner that the Government, I feel, will welcome when it, too, shall have made a study of it through its r representatives on the spot, leaving the headquarters site itself and my Oldfarm home upon the shore to come to the Government through my own free gift, not in any part by sale -- an arrange- ment which, with the long and intimate association with it I and my family have had, I greatly prefer, for the story that it tells of my own strong personal interest in it and its intimate association with the origin and first development of the Park. That it may carry better the story of the life and days out of which the Park has sprung, my desire has been and is that the simple setting of those earlier days and the restful, home-like character of the life that was lived there and has given its 3. spirit to my work should be retained, and that all Nario your old vision ANP from connected with my gift of what has meant so much to me and mine, should remain, as guest house to the Park, as restful and peaceful still as in the fast- within receding days gone by, and should make its contri- bution to the story of the past as simply and at as slight expense to the Government as good care makes possible. To this end I have been giving lately my best thought, and trust that the Government, as represen- tative of the National Park Service, may find it good. [G.B.DoRR] 0000 DOI NORTH ELEVATION HOUSE FOR C.H. DORR ESQ. BAR HARBOR ME. H. RICHARDS ARCH, SCALE 0000 EAST ELEVATION HOUSE FOR C. H. DORR ESQ. BAR HARBOR ME. H. RICHARD$ ARCH. SCALE 0000 WEST ELEVATION HOUSE FOR c. H. DORR ESQ. BAR HARBOR, ME. H. RICHARDS ARCH. SCALE MIN. TO A FOOT 3 BALOONY Batcony Covered 0 DALEONY CHAMBIR CHAMBER HAMOER CHAMBER CHAMBER CHAMBER BATH Roomy HALL HALL Are mine OU HALL HALL CLOUD BATH CHAMBER CHAMBER BATH (o CLOSET Room LANGING CHAMBER CHAMBER PLAN OF SECOND FLOOR Scale 4.1-0" OLD FARM House Of GEORGE 0 DORR BAR HARBON. MAINE D COMPASS HARBOR LOCATION Pinner "OLLINEM Horsi 10/1/2020 1 - 25 of 297 results - Only showing results with images. . The History Trust Additions and Alterations to House for Mr. Alfred M. Coats Northeast Harbor Library Plan for the Treatment of a Portion of C. W. Bergner's Place Northeast Harbor Library my SOUTH ELEVATION HOUSE FOR C.H.DORR ESO. BAR HARBOR, ME. H. RICHARDS ARCH. SCALE x ##. TO House for C. H. Dorr Esq. Northeast Harbor Library View Item X The Redoubtable Lady of Reef Point Holy Redeemer Roman Catholic Church Northeast Harbor Library Northeast Harbor Library AE31 https://historytrust.net/digitalarchive/find?query=&view=4&filter=1&leaf_place=Bar 4/6 1. TERRACE VV LAUNDRY SERVANTS BUTLER'S ILBRARY DINING ROOM PARTRY DINING ROOM 8.- RM.AHS CAMINO. 10 PARIOR PIAZZA COVERED TERRACE - PASTAGE STAIR HALL KITCHEN casms. TRANTICK HALL FM.MO.2 LHI DEN ENTRANCE FORCH i SCALE =1'-0" UNITED STATES REGION DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE SHEET / 3 CONCURRED OLD FARM DRAWING NO. NP-Ram BASIC DATA-UNDATED BLUE HUNT. STAMPED is STROUD REDUCT REAL ESTATE &MEASUREMENTS TAKEN or BAR NAREOR APPROVED ACADIA NATIONAL PARK 2865-1-1 1100 Comilee Co.,Lr 1941 6/07 2. 14-1-0- UNITED STATES REGION DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARIK SERVICE SHEET CONCURRED DRAWING NO. NP-ACA APPROVED ACADIA NATIONAL DARK 2765-1-1 1941. 6/0 3 THE SEAT 20"HIEN SEA CHAMBER CHAMBER SHELYES LINEN ALCOVE BALCONY CANVAS CLOSET HALL PASSAGE Hook CLOSET photomes BATH the fl. ROOM TANK CLOSET PASSAGE CHAMBER CHAMBER RESIDENCE of ME. GEORGE B DORR BAR HARBOR MAINE SEAT SEAT THIRD FLOOR 1/4-IMCH # : / FOOT UNITED STATES REGION DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE - I SHEET 3 OF 3 CONCURNED OLD FARM DRAWING NO. APPROVED ACADIA NATIONA PARK 2765 A105 194H c 8/15/2002 MAINE HISTORIC ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITES INVENTORY SITE NUMBER SITE NAME ETHNICITY I TYPE ME 028-005 "Old Farm" Estate American domestic PERIODS OF SIGNIFICANCE Centuries Unknown re-Columbian 16th 17th 18th 19th 20th 21st Date statement late 19th century - post 1927 STREET OR HIGHWAY CITY OR TOWN COUNTY Old Farm Road Bar Harbor Hancock POSITION NAD 1927 (USGS Topos) UTM Zone 19 E564285 N4913553 USGS 7.5 min Quadrangle ACREAGE (as measured) NAD 1983 or WGS 1984 (GPS) UTM Zone 19 E564327 N4913779 44 Seal Harbor more than ten GEOGRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OWNER On Compass Harbor U.S. Gov't. SITE CONFIRMATION Identified in the field by n/a, recent memory Inferred from reference (literature or informant) BIBLIOGRAPHY References, reports, and informants Mastone, Victor T. and Alan E. Strauss, Archaeological Investigation of a Portion of the Areas to be Deleted from Acadia National Park, on file, MHPC, Augusta, ME, 1979. Anonymous, Historical Resources of Acadia National Park, Brown University, 1979. Bar Harbor Summer Residents Assoc., Map of Bar Harbor (1904), Bar Harbor, Me, 1904. Bar Harbor Summer Residents Assoc., Map of Bar Harbor (1927), Bar Harbor, Me, 1927. Colby, George N. & Co., Atlas of Hancock County, Maine, Halfpenny & Stuart, Ellsworth, Maine, 1881. Anonymous, Map of Mount Desert Island, US Geological Survey, 1875, 1882, 1885, 1922, 1935, 1942. RECORDED BY INSTITUTION DATE ENTERED Bradley, Robert L. Maine Historic Preservation Commission 10/1/1979 SENSITIVE DATA EXPRESSLY EXEMPT FROM THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT DO NOT REPRODUCE WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION FROM THE MAINE HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION! Estate of George B. Dorr, one of the founders of Acadia Nat'l Park. Property consisted of main building, servants quarters, stables, and other outbuildings. Brown University study site number 45. Update by Alaric Faulkner, U. Maine, 8/13/98: In August of 1998, Faulkner attempted to pinpoint this and other sites in the vicinity of Acadia National Park and assign them proper UTMs so that they could be incorporated into a GIS map of historic archaeological resources in the Park. Approximate UTMs have been assigned according to the original site description, and should be reasonably accurate. Color photographs below date to that visit. Update by Shannon Wright, 2-13-2002: This site was assigned ASMIS (Archeological Sites Management Information System) #ACAD00025, managed by the NPS, several years ago. Site visits identified: manorhouse, two servants quarters, barn, two additional buildings, saltwater pool, several pools and garden paths, tennis court, and cutting garden. Across the road were identified the Storm Beach House, which is the earliest building of the estate and used by George B. Dorr when older. It is still standing and used for park housing; a garden and garage are affiliated with it. George maintained a nursery to the SW, most of this became non-park, but portions may remain. Charles Dorr (George's father) began this estate (one of the earliest cottages) in the 1870s with Henry Richards (architect) and Alexander Oakley (designer). It was added to substantially over the years and more research will likely identify more features. There is extensive information on this estate in Acadia NP records including photographs taken by the park when the house was added to the park lands in 1946. Also, black and white photographs, like the ones below, can be found in Turner, Loretta. When Bar Harbor was Eden. Images of America Series. Arcadia Press, Dover New Hampshire, 1995. and Hill, Ruth Ann, Discovering Old Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park. Down East Books, Camden, Maine, 1996. Source : Farle Shettleworth. MHPC. Dec. 22, 2008. http://130. 111.165.142/fmi/iwp/cgi?-index=30&-recid=40124&-relatedrecid=40124&-buttonscri 12/22/2008 COMPASS HARBOR SKETCH OLD FARM AREA COMPASS HARBOR sus PORTION of EXHIBIT TOBE OPEN WITH OVERHEAD TRELLIS WA PORTION OF EXHIBIT TO as ROOFED * EXISTING BRICK TERRACE WALLS TO REMAIN WALLS TO BE REMOVED WAYSIDE BASEMENT TO BE FILLED TO PREVIOUS 1ST FLOOR LEVEL THE FLOOR EXHIBAT BRICK REMIBIT AND PATTERN AS THE TERRACE STORE TO BE SALVAGED FROM RAZED PORTION OF THE HOUSE DIRECTION & HUMBER OF PHOTO VOLOG (SEE ATTACHED SUPT DIR MEMO APRIL TO BE OBLITERATED ELANDSCAPER WAY SIDE MEMORIAL COMINT AREA OPERATIONS SUPT'S RESIDENCE (BLOG HEID PROPOSED CAR PARKING INTERP PROPOSED IS REGION CAR PARKING 2 VICINITY MAP DORR HOME MEMORIAL EXHIBIT SCALE 1"a 20" DORR HOME SITE 4 SHOWING PROPOSED PARKING FOR MEMORIAL EXHIBIT SCALE 1":100 3. OTHER PREPARED STUDY SEE SUPT GIVENS 018 MEMO OF 5-9-96 HAL SCALE AS SHOWY UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE 5 DIVISICN-DESICN CONSTRUCTION BAR HARBOR BASIC CHIGGINS REPORT 70.46 PERSPECTIVE VIEW DORR HOME WAYSIDE MEMORIAL IX HIBIT MEMORIAL EXHIBIT NP-ACA OLD FARM ARSA SCALE 1"10" APPROVED 2720 ACADIA NATIONAL PARK 5/7/56 s remains grove seawall pipehole briak firepisce stonepile building site? downed util pole P36arsythis field rockwall end steps stairs end stonews Woondation Trize standpipe path entrance rockwall-path start Jone stairs stonelined signamoationpipe water.ap Ons steps survey Standpipe path-social? fountain/well? steps well-spring neighbor property road foliage blocking Danemoop survey stone 0 steps Single staphe-bricks rk path terrace pond stream driveway? s kitchen stebs sunverjastine-Alte boundary covered tenace brickpile maids path to house steps concrete slab Oldfarm entrance vertical pipe bldg foundation slab bridge O house repy-chawHeur? macadam waterfall garden site? house remains-moidsaterspigot path 6-in vertical pipe survey stone orange azalea tree pond stream stonewall survey stone park lot gate entrance road apple trees pond stream stonebrdge/weterfall path jct vemal pool cement bridge support bricks bridge over stream 3-inch pipe road jct imigation pipe stonebridge/wf cement curbing ANP trailpost daffodils out granite pieces claypipe cutting garden site? O stonebridge/wf gazebo floorwstenheel? tennis court site? old road tossed metal culvert O chickentripe irrigation pipe tossed slabs pond stream Oldfarm Road pond outlet road entrance 3-stone roadblock Storro Beach cottage copy I March 2C16 Cultural Landscape Inventory and Assessment FRENCHMAN BAY Oldfarm Property Acadia National Park Bar Harbor, Maine Existing Conditions, 2015 Long Steps to Point OLMSTED CENTER Age Pool Remnants Maintenance Oldfarm National Park Service Marior House Foundation Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation Dorr Point www.nps.gov/oclp Storm,Eeach Cattage tknob, Tennis Courtry SOURCES Terrace Schooner Head Terrace Path 1. ACAD GIS files Area Garden Area 2 Field Surveys, November 16. 2015. Oo 3. Town of Bar Harbor: Property Tax Maps 4 1938 Map of Property of George B Dorn 5. 1946 Suggested Development Plan Dorr Property COMPASS HARBOR @ 6 1948 Aerial Photo Historic Driveway Bed Outbuilding DOG Sites DRAWN BY O Ericka Duym, OCLP. FOA, 2016 AutoCAD Map 3D, Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator CSG Caretaker's Are GIS 10.2 Cottage Nursery 24 Caretaker's Area Area in Cottage LEGEND Stone Bridge Site Existing roads Compass Harbor Existing Buildings (Park owned) Trail Compass Harbor Pond Existing Trail Garage ¥ Acadia National Park boundary Site 5 Feet contour Foundation remoants and building sites Historic road bed Deciduous and Evergreen trees SEE DRAWING 2 to of Collupsed Bridge Parking NOTES 1. All features shown in approximate scale and location. 125 250 500' DRAWING 1 LIST OF CLASSIFIED STRUCTURES (LCS) SINGLE ENTRY REPORT Identification IDLCS: 41370 Structure Number: HS10 Structure Name 1: DORR POINT - GRANITE WHARF RUINS Structure Name 2: DORR ESTATE - BOAT SLIP RUINS Structure Name 3: OLDFARM Park Alpha Code: ACAD Name: ACADIA NATIONAL PARK ORGCODE: 1700 County: HANCOCK State: ME Regional Office: NORTH ATLANTIC Subunit ORGCODE: Name: Alpha Code: County: HANCOCK State: ME Number of UTM's: 0 Zone/Easting/Northing Significance NR Status: INELIGIBLE-MANAGED AS RESOURCE Date: / / Significance: NOT SIGNIFICANT NHL: NO Date: / / Significance "OLD FARM" LAND GRANT WAS PURCHASED IN 1868 BY CHAS. H. DORR (FATHER OF GEORGE B. DORR, FOUNDER OF ACADIA NP). EXTANT GRANITE BOAT SLIP & BULKHEAD REMAINS ARE UNDOUBTEDLY DORR IMPROVEMENTS BEGUN IN 1876-79. Historical Information Period of Construction: HISTORIC Date: 1879-CA. ? (BU) Designer: ( ) Date: - ( ) Designer: ( ) Date: - ( ) Designer: ( ) Date: - ( ) Designer: ( ) Functions, Uses, Materials, Impacts, and Condition Historic Functions Current Uses LANDING (WHARF, DOCK) RUIN Buildings Materials Structures Foundation: Sub-structure: GRANITE Framing: Walls: Roof: Super-structure: GRANITE Other: Volume: Description RUINS OF GRANITE BULKHEAD @ DORR POINT FOLLOWED SHORELINE IN ROUGH SEMICIRCLE, BISECTED BY GRANITE I WHARF; MASSIVE QUARRIED GRANITE BLOCKS NOW MOSTLY STREWN ABOUT THE ROCKY BEACH. WHARF & BULKHEAD ALSO INCORPORATED EXIST'G. ROCK OUTCROPPINGS. mil Impact Level: MODERATE Impact Types: INUNDATION (FLOODING) EROSION Condition: POOR page 1 of 2 PHOTO GUARD # 3224 LIGHT IMPRESSIONS Rochester, NV LIST OF CLASSIFIED STRUCTURES (LCS) SINGLE ENTRY REPORT Identification IDLCS: 41369 Structure Number: HS09 Structure Name 1: DORR ESTATE - HOUSE AND TERRACE RUINS Structure Name 2: OLD FARM - HOUSE AND TERRACE RUINS Structure Name 3: OLDFARM Park Alpha Code: ACAD Name: ACADIA NATIONAL PARK ORGCODE: 1700 County: HANCOCK State: ME Regional Office: NORTH ATLANTIC Subunit ORGCODE: Name: Alpha Code: County: HANCOCK State: ME Number of UTM's: 0 Zone/Easting/Northing Significance NR Status: INELIGIBLE-MANAGED AS RESOURCE Date: / / Significance: NOT SIGNIFICANT NHL: NO Date: / / Significance RUINS OF "OLD FARM," OUTSTANDING EARLY EXAMPLE OF "COTTAGE" ARCHITECTURE ON MDI; ERECTED FOR CHARLES H. DORR (FATHER OF GEORGE B. DORR, FOUNDER OF ACADIA NP) OF BOSTON. DESIGNED BY ARCHITECT HENRY RICHARDS (1848-1949), A GARDINER, ME. NATIVE. Historical Information Period of Construction: HISTORIC Date: 1876-1879 (BU) Designer RICHARDS, HENRY (A) Date: 1919-CA? (AL) Designer:SAVAGE, FRED (A) Date: 1951- (RM) Designer:] (O) Date: - ( ) Designer: ( ) Functions, Uses, Materials, Impacts, and Condition Historic Functions Current Uses SINGLE FAMILY DWELLING RUIN ESTATE LANDSCAPE Buildings Materials Structures Foundation: Sub-structure: STONE Framing: Walls: Roof: Super-structure: STONE Other: BRICK Volume: Description ABOVE-GROUND REMNANTS OF QUEEN ANNE/COLONIAL REVIVAL MANSION DEMOL. BY NPS IN 1951 INCLUDE THE E PIAZZA : PAVED w/ BRICK IN HERRINGBONE-PATTERN & ENCL. w/ BRICK & STONE COPING - - AND THE N TERRACE. RUINS OF OUTBLDGS. ALSO SURVIVE ON SITE. Impact Level: MODERATE Impact Types: VEGETATION EROSION Condition: POOR NEGLECT page 1 of 2 20 BAR-HARBOR SHIPPING. BAR-HARBOR'S MAIN STREET. 21 Island), but usually adequate to its summer duties. It carries from two to five fathoms of water at low tide. canoeists, naturally, are the Indians, who carry visitors in their Here is a favorite anchorage-ground of famous yachts; frail boats around the harbor and islands, or even on longer and Iroquois, Viking, Meteor, Mohican, Adrienne, Ambassadress, more daring voyages. Lewey Mitchell, one of these aboriginal Wanderer, Gitana, Priscilla, Stranger, Galatea, and many Argonauts, recently paddled his canoe entirely around the island another renowned ocean-racer. Delightful receptions are of Mount Desert, a distance of sixty miles, in twelve hours. given on these vessels, whose discipline is as stringent as The Mount-Desert Canoe Club was founded in 1886, and has that of a man-of-war. In summer, also, comes the North- its headquarters at Bar Harbor, with Edmund Pendleton as Atlantic squadron: the Atlanta, in salmon-color and black; commodore, and a membership of more than sixty persons. the white-and-gold Dolphin; the black old Richmond; the Its flag bears a red fleur-de-lys, couched with blue, on a white Ossipee, Galena, Yantic, Dispatch, and others, lying at anchor ground. The club-house, on Bar Island, was built in 1888; and for weeks in the harbor, gay with bunting, and thunderous its chief feature is a cheery and capacious fireplace. Turning from the harbor and its crowded wharves, let us with salutes. As many as a thousand blue-jackets have been stroll about Bar Harbor. Main Street runs from near the landed at Bar Harbor at once, to be reviewed by their gray old admirals. steamboat-pier to the foot of Strawberry Hill, a distance of not quite a mile, and is lined by the chief shops of the village, and Then there are the local passenger-steamboats, the Sappho, several of its hotels. It is a busy, crowded street, with plank from Mount-Desert Ferry; the Sebenoa, running up French- sidewalks, and borders of irregular and huddled wooden build- man's Bay; the Cimbria, or the new Bar Harbor, of Bangor; ings. In the Oriental stores are treasures of Benares brass and the City of Richmond, from Portland or Machias; the Mount India silks ; at Huyler's, delicious ice-cream soda and confections, Desert from Rockland and Southwest Harbor; the Silver Star, Jacqueminot roses and pink pond-lilies; at Sproul's, ice-creams from Winter Harbor and West Gouldsborough ; the Electa, and dainty viands; at Bee's, the novels and newspapers of the Creedmoor, and other gallant little steamers, fearless of the day; at the Indian store, odd baskets and carvings; at Koop- August sea. man's and Clothier's, rare antiques and old English furniture, The Conners and Pendleton and other boatmen have more Norwegian silver-ware, and other precious bric-d-brac. Here, than a hundred rowboats and canoes, and a score or so of also, are apartment hotels ; rooms to let; the newspaper offices yachts, besides three or four small steamers, for lease. There of The Bar-Harbor Record, The Bar-Harbor Tourist, and The are also catamarans, Rob-Roys, canvas-boats, cat-boats, and all Mount-Desert Herald; the financial house of the Bar-Harbor manner of small craft, insomuch that the harbor is at times Banking and Trust Company; the fashionable ladies' store of fairly crowded with little shipping. The rates for row-boats are L. P. Hollander & Co: (with Jordan, Marsh & Co. just off the 35 cents an hour, or 75 cents with a boatman. People unac- street); decorators, milliners, lawyers, doctors, and many other quainted with these waters should take boatmen with them, for offices and stores: Near the sidewalks stand the public car- the rocks are scattered about inconveniently and there are riages: of the village, drawn up by scores; buckboards, single- occasional unexpected squalls, attended with little or no danger and double and quintuple, cut-unders, and barouches, with their to one familiar with the place, but hazardous for strangers. drivers keenly vigilant for fares, and familiar with all the island Cat-boats and yachts, with competent skippers, can be hired for roads. Here; also, are the private equipages of the cottagers; longer voyages up and down or across the bay, to the lower dog-carts; village-carts, tally-ho coaches, phaetons, chaises, road- Heads, Egg Rock, Ironbound, the Ovens, South Gouldsborough, wagons, and ponderous and resplendent family carriages, with Winter Harbor, Sullivan, or Sorrento. The most expert of the drivers and footmen in full livery, and a silvery rattling of Chishalnis Monest-Deset Guide book. M. Sweetser Portland : Chisholm Brothers, 1888. 22 MOUNT-DESERT READING-ROOM. THE SHORE WALK. 23 harness-chains. Equestrians, men and women and children, ride costly memorial altar erected in remembrance of Gouverneur up and down the littered street; and here and there a wheelman Morris Ogden of New York. The church was built in 1878, pursues his solemn way. by the summer residents, and several services are held every In these equipages, and along the sidewalks and in the stores, Sunday, patronized by the wealth and fashion of the place. St. move the beauties of Belgravia and Vanity Fair, their trim Sylvia's Roman Catholic Church, near the Malvern, is a quaint and well-groomed appearance contrasting strangely with the wooden structure, accommodating 500 worshippers, and attended unkempt surroundings. The young men, in their vivid-colored by the Indians from the camp at Eddy Brook, the Milesian and striped blazers, or garments of white India silk, their dependents of the hotels and summer homes, and several well- bright-colored caps and Tam-o'-Shanters. tennis suits or yacht- known families. of cottagers. The altar crucifix was carved by ing suits, äre hardly less resplendent than their sisters, the Joseph Mayr of Ober-Ammergau, and presented by Dr. Derby. high-bred patrician girls, dressed like Parisiennes of the Fau- The new Baptist Church is on Ledge-Lawn Avenue; the Con- bourg St. Germain, in trim tailor-made suits, impressive in gregational Church, on Mount-Desert Street; and the Method- their apparent simplicity, or fairy-like in delicate summer gowns, ist Church, on School Street. with marvellous pleatings, vests of India silk, panels of rich The Indian encampment at the outlet of Eddy Brook, just yelvet, sprayings of lace, and shimmerings of white lawn. Here north-west of Bar Harbor, will be found a pleasant place to come Peepy Marshmallow, and Lina Van Rooster, Chicky while away an hour or two. These semi-savages are of the Chalmers, and Poodle Van Ulster, and the Hon. Hare Hare: Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, and St.-John-River tribes, mainly and there in the background, in their moiré and black lace, are half-breeds, crossed with French-Canadian stock, expert with Mrs. Gatling Gunn and Mrs. Wellman Heidsieck, and even their canoes and at hunting and fishing. The village is com- Mrs. Stylington Ribblehurst herself. posed of a score or two of little wood and canvas shanties, in The social rendezvous of the gentlemen is the Mount-Desert which are sold a great variety of aboriginal trinkets, skins of Reading-room, built in 1887, on Birch Point, between the New- seal and deer, baskets of birch-bark, moccasins, bead-work, port House and Alpheus Hardy's cottage. It was designed by snow-shoes, gulls' breasts, stuffed birds, clubs, carved tusks, W. R. Emerson, the celebrated architect, and cost $30,000. bows and arrows, etc. Here dwell scores of fat squaws, not The great piazza is supported on a cyclopean wall of masonry, clothed by Redfern, black-eyed little pappooses, and lazy braves, near the water. The house contains the spacious hall, billiard- idling in the welcome sun. room, smoking-room, reception-room, parlors, library, and read- One of the pleasantest rambles at Bar Harbor is The Shore ing-rooms, each with a great fireplace, and beautiful architectural Walk, 2/2 of a mile long, on the edge of a sea-bank, about 15 feet details. The membership of the club includes many of the high, with beautiful lawns and villas on one side, and the weedy foremost gentlemen of the summer population, - men well ledges and lapsing waves and open bay on the other. It may known in New York; Philadelphia; and Boston. The president, be entered alongside the Rockaway and the Newport, near the is Charles T. How, the treasurer Dr. Robert Amory, and the steamboat wharf. The first edifice beyond the Club House, on secretary Ogden Codman. Birch Point, is the simple little cottage built in 1867 by Alpheus The religious welfare of the people, natives and visitors, is Hardy of Boston, and for many years the summer home of his guarded by several churches, which are well filled on pleasant son Arthur S. Hardy, the author of But Yet a Woman, etc., summer Sundays. St. Savior's Episcopal Church, on Mount- and also the boyhood home of J. Montgomery Sears, Mr. Desert Street, is a picturesque building, with low and massive Hardy's ward, now the celebrated Boston millionnaire. Alpheus granite walls, a high timber roof, stained-glass windows, and a Hardy died in 1887. This was the first summer cottage at 24 THE SHORE WALK. OGDEN'S POINT. 25 Mount Desert. A little- way back is the handsome stone man- surroundings. Beyond Redwood the path comes out on Crom- sion built by Mr. Hardy a year or two ago. Just off the shore. well's Cove, and the rambler can regain Main Street by follow- is Pulpit Rock, a natural rostrum looking out upon the sea. ing its north shore. The next two houses on the shore belong to F. M. Weld and At the head-o the cove stands the cottage occupied by Cal. G. R. Minot of Boston, plain buildings, with broad verandas, Markoe of Philadelphia. Close by is Aldersea, a lovely estate, famous for their elegant hospitality. Back of these is Mrs. owned formerly by Mr. Prentice of Bangor, and now by Edward T.C.-A. Linzee's (of Boston) Yellow House; and next to the Coles. of Philadelphia. Near Cromwell's Cove the patient Minot place is the cottage of H. A. Grant, Jr., of Tarrytown, explorer may find the rocky figure called the Assyrian, sitting N.Y., This region of cottages between Main Street and the on a natural pedestal on the face of the cliff. The Indian's Shore Walk and Cromwell's Cove, is known as the Back Bay, or Foot is a singular impression, as of a footprint, in a rock near The Field, and contains over a score of well-known houses. On the old Conner farmhouse. the shore is Balance Rock, a huge glacial bowlder, which can [Out on Ogden's Point, on the south side of Cromwell's Cove, be stirred by a strong hand. Next to the Grant place appears is the beautiful villa called Watersmeet, famous for its lawn the sombre mansion (with stone terrace) of Dr. Hasket Derby, parties and its cool breezes. It belongs to Mrs. Gouverneur the celebrated Boston oculist. Then comes the smaller Villa Morris Ogden, the earliest of the New-York cottagers at Bar Mare Vista, belonging to the Musgraves, and lately occupied Harbor, and has lately been rebuilt, and leased for a term of by Leon Del. Monte, a wealthy Cuban New-Yorker. Beyond years to Mr. George W. Vanderbilt of New York. is dark Edgemere, pertaining to the Hon. Thomas B. Musgrave The cottages south of Ogden's Point are reached only by the of New York, with the stone tower at the end of its bowling Schooner-Head road, from which they are far secluded. The alley almost closing our shore path. Then comes Reef Point, first is Glen Gordon, pertaining to Gardiner Sherman of New belonging to F. R. Jones of New York; followed by the noble York; beyond which comes Old Farm; owned by Charles H. lawn and long façade of Devilstone, once owned by Mrs. G. P. :Dorr of Boston, and built of Newport-Mountain stone, at a cost Bowler, and occupied by the Vanderbilt family. It now belongs of $50,000. South of the pretty little cove that makes in here, to James T. Woodward of New York, who paid $40,000 for it. on the crest of Sol's Cliff (once owned by Solomon Higgins), is The lower story is of gray rubble stone, with wide piazzas, rich the cottage of Miss Lucy Ellis of Boston lawns, and fragrant pine groves. The next house is Fernierest, Farther down the shore; near the mouth of Bear Brook, is belonging to W. F. Cochrane of Yonkers, N.Y., followed by Chatwold, the. immense and beautiful summer estate of Miss the handsome mansion of Joshua Montgomery Sears of Boston. Bowler of Cincinnati, with its walls of red granite and stucco, Wayman Lane leads from the shore path at this point to the its round stone towers, carved balconies, dormers, etc., and its main street of Bar Harbor, passing Crow's Nest, where lived interior rich in curios from all over the world. It is a quarter the late Wayman Crow of St. Louis, and near the cottages of of a mile from the Schooner-Head road, hidden among thick Professor J. B. Thayer of Harvard, and Mrs. Rodman Rotch trees. (Ledge Hollow) of Boston. Turning now from the south shore to the north shore, we Beyond the Sears place, on the shore; is the Ledge, the home may take a pleasant stroll toward Duck Brook. Eden Street of Professor Lucien Carr of Cambridge; and some ways farther runs from Mount-Desert Street, near the Malvern; past the on rises the long façade of Redwood, belonging to Charles J. cottage of Mrs. E. L. Stanton of Washington, and the retired Morrill of Boston, and one of W. R. Emerson's finest archi- home of De Grasse Fox of Philadelphia (both on the left), to tectural triumphs, with a beautiful lawn and other appropriate the bridge over Eddy Brook, about which are several shops. Dictaphone - January 26, 1940. It was the wonderful beauty of the flowers that grew so naturally and simply in my mother's garden by the sea at Oldfarm that, more than aught else, led me on along the way, step by step and all unconscious of the greater goal to which it was to lead me, to the founding of Acadia National Park. I loved the flowers for their own beauty's sake, but when later I learned how they had grown in a great northern belt the world around before man took note of them, but only the birds and insects that fed upon and cross-fertilized them, I became interested in experimenting with them and natural- izing them out along the wild garden lines then rife in England, and found, though they might come from the great grassy plains of Northern Asia, they held their own like natives, given but the sunlight and the soil they needed. And presently I started a nursery to grow them on some of the old, admirably suited farm lands that we had in our Oldfarm property, SO that all might have them at a price. Thus it was that the Mount Desert Nurseries had their origin. George Dorr's Vision for "Garden Approaches" to Acadia National Park Ronald H. Epp Nearly ninety years ago, the Founder of Acadia National Park, George Bucknam Dorr (1853-1944), published a plan for developing "Garden Approaches to the National Monument." This little known essay is one of several that develop the Acadian plant sanctuary theme wherein Mr. Dorr argued for permanent exhibits of hardy plants in the form of "garden walks" extending from the park toward Bar Harbor. This article will look at two key expressions of Dorr's approach to gardens as interfaces between natural and cultural habitats: the gardens at his home and the Wild Gardens of Acadia. Dorr is well known as a trail builder who laid out pathways to previously hidden sanctuaries. He established the Jesup Path, the Wild Garden Path, and the Cadillac Path to connect Bar Harbor to botani- cally interesting areas. The gardens he envisioned are a blend of nature's unpredictability and the human desire to impose order. From the time that he was 25 years of age, Mount Desert Island was Dorr's home, and the two garden projects considered here were one developmental element in his complex array of strategies to conserve the matchless grandeur of the island. The Gardens at Old Farm In late 19th-century New England, dependence on the land for subsistence was still an imperative. However, for the wealthy who summered on this island, gardens were not designed to meet the nutritional needs of the household. Instead, statuary, fountains, stone- work, and water features were incorporated into increasingly elaborate gardens that symbolized the status of the owner. The garden concepts of the park founder, however, were rempered and framed by his family experience in Massachusetts. Chebacco VI (2004):55-64. Josiah Royce to Mrs. Charles E. Dorr North Conway August 11, 1890 My dear Mrs. Dorr, I am in a very different landscape now, with shadows flying over the mountains, a great white cloud hiding the summit of Mt. Washington, and a wavering sunlight that alternately brightens and leaves the forests all about us. We have spoken much here of you, and of the delightful companionships OF Bar Harbor; and I find Mrs. Merriman one with me in the desire to let you know what warm affection we feel for you, for the forethought that plans and the tireless devotion that SO fully watches over the good times that you offer your friends at Old- farm. As I have, for my own part, so much needed the rest and the companionships that I have enjoyed under your roof, SO I have profited by them far more than I could express to you while I was there, or than I can even now write down on paper. Everything with you, amidst all the variety, tends to spiritual strength and health, and all the coming year through the memory of the hills and the waves and the conversations and the kindness will EO with me and cheer me. I thank you once more for it all. 1 (August 11, 1890) 2. I shan't forget your paper. It will be a poor offering, but I will try to make it in an earnest spirit. I learn so much from you and at your house that I should indeed do ill if I did not try to put on paper some of the thoughts that have come to me as I have listened and talked amongst your friends. Remember me kindly to Mr. Dorr and to George, with love, and also to all of our company who are still with you. The invitation for September is very fascinating, but I must devote myself to my books in Cambridge after this week, and one can't carry 2. library about with him. Yours affectionately, Josiah Royce. BEATRIX FARRAND VISITS OLDFARM Source: Beatrix Farrand, "Book of Gardening, 1893-1895," Environmental Design Library, University of California, Berkeley. Beatrix Farrand Collection. Handwritten journal entry. October 12. [1893] I tried to get a Kodak of grouping of shrubs in front of Oldfarm. Two small round lilac bushes on 2 either side of the front door, an arbor-vitae standing back in a corner made by the L, backed by two or three large white spruces. A large lilac by the kitchen [illegible], and a pyris jap. On the 3,4, 5 right of the approach. Two magnolias out of key but a good Pinius mughs very effective. The 6,7 epiraeas at the entrance to the garden are very effective and have grown well. I. callosa was very striking in spring and early summer with its red young shoots. I Douglasi does not seem as yet to be a great improvement on the common steeple bush (V. tomentosa)/ I Van Houttic very graceful Spirace a tomentosa with an adicentiens-like (sic) like leaf, I. crategifolia looked a bit moth eaten, while I. robasta (sic) was carrying out its name well I. ulifolia was thrifty and seems to be the common door- yard kind about here, I. theonbergi (?) had grown enormously and was very pretty [with] its feathery plumage. I callosa and I. thumbergii are of a yellow green than the other kinds mentioned. In the garden itself I learned thayt Eulalia gracilliseima had wintered perfectly without the slightest covering. The perennial Helianthus had gone, it has been extremely handsome about seven feet high a mass of bloom of about the size of a large black-eyed susan. What var.? 2. The hollyhocks, and before them, the larkspur have been very good against a solid background of arbor vitae hedge. Aralia spinosa is very useful during the summer, perfectly hardy & blooms in large numbers at the top of the [illegible] at a height of 10-15 feet; and in the autumn the foliage turns a deep maroon and the leaves fall early. I. sigrinum splendens is in full flower, the stalks about four ft. in height; also I. speciceum (sic) albura praecox, very handsome, and the latest aurcetumns in full bloom in the rhododendrum bed. Lolida semiperviens(sic) grown from seed started last winter is now magnificent; although planting from 1 ft. to 15 inc. apart is crowding too much. Aster novae angelicae is also in full glory and seems to improve vastly under care. The exposure is south west and very warm. Aster ericoides is vey lovely too being in full flower and height. I. semipervisens 2 to 4 ft. A. iovae angelicae, 18 ins. To 3 1/2 ft. A. encoidei 18 ins. To 3 ft. A beautiful aster grows about 2 1/2 feet high at itys best, has palest mauve rays and reddy disk flowers, heads very full, and flowers about 1 1/2 to 2 inches across very desirable var (?). Spiraea sorbiflora has lost all its leaves and is most unsightly. The Lea Buckthorn botanical name not known(?). Salicefolia is a good shrub and the foliage is still bright and pretty, and it has tree like habit, the leaves are a gray green beneath and the twigs are grayish. The Deutzia pride of Rochester seemed to be doing very well, and combined with the finer leaved weigelia (sic) said to be effective. The columbines are never unsightly as they leave a tuft of green leaves after the flower stalks wither. Cleome pongeus has been very striking in the garden this summer, having a five-fingered leaf and throwing its bunch of butterfly-like pink mauve flowers (an idea like honeysuckle) about four feet high. The scarlet trumpet honeysuckle over vthe porch has small 3 bunches of scarlet berries all over it, which make it as effective as in the blooming season. Am much disappointed in Viburnum opulces, the berries hardly made up for the leafless stalks and generally the worse for wear look of the leaves. There was a very handsome Verbinum in the Oldfarm garden, however, a compact shrub about four feet in height with lead blue berries, glossy foliage which was much indented in wavy lines, that is not sharply serrated. Could it have been V. dentatum? Comus sanglcenae has just been planted out this year, and is growing well, the question is whether it will be hardy? Lymphoricapus vulgaris is now very pretty, a graceful habit in a shrub 2 feet high on October 15th Noticed the col,oring of the leaves more beautiful than before this season before we left, day before yesterday, went to Oldfarm, where there was a perfect composition. The prominent objects in the immediate foreground were a paper birch and a white spruce. The birch had had turned deep gold and against the whoite spruce was a beautiful piece of coloring. The trees along the Oldfarm waterfront are quite tall SO that one cannot see their coastline. This seems to give the effect of quite a big drop, that is, it looks as though the trees were on top of a cliff, and SO gives the hill on which the house stands more height. The middle distance is the blue water with, on the left, Pointe d'Acadie, & on the right Round Porcupine, with its black cliffs. This is on to the three next Porcupines, & on the horizon lie the Gouldsboro hills. The view is not seen all at once, and the lines of the foregrounb are as irregular as those of the hills in the distance. Looked at the B.H.V. I nursery, all the shrubs look well with the exception of Rhus cotenies (sic?), which although a handsome small shrub 2-3 ft. bears the marks of severe winter killing.. 4. [Farrand's inventory of plants ordered follows]. The next day I noticed a good arrangement of trees on a hillside. [What follows appears not to refer to the Oldfarm property]. Transcribed draft. Copy generously provided byMartha Harmon. Librarian at Garland Farm, Bar Harbor. Plant scientific names require further research. September 7, 2011 Ronald H. Epp, Ph.D. 532 Sassafras Drive Lebanon, PA 17042 717-272-0801 10f2 James & Royce re Bar Harbor Notes 7/27/72 Wm. In B.H. for more than two weeks. Pp. 425-8 Corr. Wm. James In Vol. 4 he writes to sister Alice of his first -largely - impressions entering Bar Harbor by sea. Impressed by the island and mainland hills, but where "society here is abundant and excellent, "I suppose few watering places[s] present such an intellectual front to the sweather." too many social acquaintances. 'wagon excursions to different cliffs and hilltops, and rowing and sailing are the amusements here and when a day here is fine, it is resplendent. The finest skies I have seen in America." More detail here than elsewhere in the james correspondence. Describes "The fresh wind, the interminable spotless twilight, the dark heaving ocean, the solemn might of the cliffs on our left hand, the incipient northern light which later became one of the finest I have ever seen, all made a first class night of it." However, in a letter to Alice (9/17/94) says he may not go to MDI because too much talk there will do him "no good at all." - twelve day visit with Dorrs WJ & AJ. 7/29/90 - WJ to AJ, Royce will return to Dorrs in 10 days 8/16/96 - Cambridge, has been ill with GI issues. Wants to go to Bar Harbor for he needs wilderness, but changes mind and went to the Adirondacks with Harry for a restorative vacation. 8/11/97 writes to Ellen Gertrude from Oldfarm, described as a "really grand place." Off to Intervale by the 15th. Writes to Alice that he spent a.m. working on Immortality lecture wqith Hodgson but and when he departs on the 13th he thanks MGWD for as jolly a three days "as he has ever passed," bragging to Alice about the vitality he found at the Dorrs. Heads for Mt. washinton enroute to Chocorua, then onto Keene Valley, walking to improve his constitution je says to brother Henry. 8/30/97. 8/30/97 spent 4 days alone at the Dorrs. TO Alkice James- - 6/27/1904 wants GBD to be one of his pallbearers aftrer attending Sarah Whitman's funeral. Where GBD was one of ushers. 12/5/08 WJ came to BH to investigate movement of a table without contact, reported by GBD. WJ repeatedly sought relief from anxiety through travel. Hiking mountains hefre hope and abroad See 1917 letter from Tom Ward re preservation, a letter not from WJ but a lifelong friend. Who was also on the Hafrvard Phil Dept. Visiting Committee. and Doris interes Vin the experients elusus character claim of innie life worked after Jonesideath Dop.a the James my have advenced for day the past derable his the wildnes t Nature le pressed - in Dain, 202 New llanin 1 but he made us cap touit at texts about SHE threat to the davise or th red to protect it. This wa GB tash. Peings la the Procell actuary that took please at Have, WS'S forces was 104 on intenal issues Whereas the of 6BD bad alread brown external in focus. OR, do I wish to 5g. The impacts of the consecuation writing: of Chanks Shot ad the preveiples attectated in 4c HeTPR, prooded new urgang. BAR HARBOR Town OFFICE 1873 CHAS Dore 81 ALRES CROMOUEN HARBOR 800 The 1901 INVENTORY & VALUATION ALRES TAX DORR GEO. B. No. PORTION OF COT FORMERLY ouner BY 27 398x25 JOHN CORRORS 1200 COTTACE ON SAME 1500 STABLE is 4 500 FARM HOUSE - a 200 SURNS LT 200 DOUGLASS 6.1 5 100 ICE HOUSE " 100 " LAUNDRY 25 SHED 7 - 75 BOAT HOUSE c. c 500 GREENHOUSE & COTTACE 2500 NEW 4 4 100 NEW STABLE 400 COLD STORAGE BLOG 50, PORTION OF LOT FORMERLY. OUXED BY John CORRORS INCLUDING GRANITE Gutray 114 5415 Guaney BLOGS. on SAME 200 LOT LYING BETWEEN OTTER CREEK t HEAD 5 1200 ROADS LOT BOUNDED NORTH sy OTTER (REDE ROAD NE SE x su BY LAND OF SELF 2 200 LOT BOUGHT OF w. M. ROBERTS BOLIDED NW By OTTER CREEK Rs. NW sy LAND on SELF SE BY SUTTONER HEAD Ro., SW BY 6 8/10 340 CANOOF W, m. ROBERTS RELORDED iNH.R. OF O. VOL. 28607 HOUSE ON NEWPORT MT. ROAD 250 BLOG ON MAINST. BETWEEN BUNKER BLOCK x STEPENS LAND ON LAND OF T.C. ROBERTS 1000 STABLE ON LAST DESCRIBED LOT 100 66730 MONEY AT INTEREST CARRIACES in EXCESS OF DEBIS 10 500 Cows HORSES 5000 2 50 8 400 MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS HOUSEHOLD IN EXCESS OF 415 in EXCESS of TOTAL VALUANA TO TAC / 150 $200 OF PERSONAL ESTATE 500 1600 68380 Josiah Royce to Mrs. Charles H. Dorr Cambridge August 11, 1894 Dear Mrs. Dorr, I reached home, after a very long and refreshing sleep, in good time this morning. I am in every way better for the few delightful days at Oldfarm, where beauty of so many sorts, outer and inner, combines to make one meditative, happy and free of soul. You can- not tell how much good you have done me, and I am sorry that it is so poor a return that I can make. I plan now, under the inspiration of your counsel, to make my study of Eckhart fuller and deeper, and to enlarge as well as improve my paper before I publish it, when, as I warmly hope, you will find it worthier of your kind interest than it has been in its present hastily wrought form. I write just before going on to Plymouth. Thank you again many times for the profit and pleasure of this visit. Give my affectionate greetings to George, and my thanks for all his care of me, too, and believe me Yours very truly, Josiah Royce. Josiah Royce to Mrs. Charles H. Dorr Cambridge Sept. 20, 1896 Dear Mrs. Dorr, With a feeling of great refreshment, as of one who has seen and shared a new experience of life, The boys have been much stirred up over George's two gifts, and think that your island must be a very wonderful place, about which they now wish to ask many questions. I answer as I can, feeling unable to tell them where the real wonder of the place lies, but hoping that they may some day know friendship as kind and in- spiring as yours has been to me. My love to George, and my special and repeated thanks for your goodness. Yours very truly, Josiah Royce. File 2 oldfarm Memo: "The Oldfarm Series" Date: 9 March 2014 Scribe: Ronald Epp Psychologist William James published many papers on psychical research prior to his death in 1910. Of the many spiritualists and mediums that he encountered, Mrs. Leonora Piper intrigued him more than the others. George B. Dorr was allied with James in these investigations for more than two decades, both intent upon demonstrating the accuracy or inaccuracies of efforts to communicate with the deceased. On June 5, 1906, nearly five years after the death of Dorr's mother, Mary Gray Ward Dorr, Dorr questioned a medium at Oldfarm who claimed to a "control" or intermediary to Australian physician Richard Hodgson, deceased but a few months. Hodgson had been one of the foremost psychic researchers and was very familiar with Oldfarm and the Dorr family. George Dorr then tests the unnamed medium and in the process previously unknown aspects of life at Oldfarm are laid bare that will not be touched upon in Dorr's memoirs. Dorr adds his own comments to the published exchanged, inserted in brackets, which can be taken as historically accurate in part because they would have been reviewed and discussed later with William James. All quotes are those entered by G.B. Dorr. We had "a big buckboard that carried six people and was the only wagon which we had big enough to take all the people up [to town] the people used to go off from the kitchen, which is at an end of the house and cannot be seen from the living rooms or piazzas " 6699 the piazza itself, which in not a conspicuous object in the house from without, and which was only familiar to my mother's more intimate friends, is not a thing which would occur naturally to anyone not familiar with our life " "The [living]] room is one in which, the fireplace, broad and arching, is the central figure and would be first thought of in thinking of the room." [Storm Beach Cottage] "was across the lawn and garden upon a hillside opposite the house. We always kept some rooms in it for our guests, overflowing into it when the house was full." "We use to take long walks over the mountains and go down for a plunge when we returned from them. There were often three or more men or more going in it together when the house was full My bath-house was not on the beach, but on a point running far out into the sea, very bold and rocky, and we use to spring off the rocks into deep water, climbing out by a perpendicular ladder fastened to the ledge." On July 6, 1906 the inquiry resumes: 2, "My mother use to have pansies spread loosely over the tablecloth when she had people to dine or sup with us at Bar Harbor, where we had a large bed of them planted near the house SO we could get them freely for this purpose. " "A dozen years ago I made a bicycle-road on my own backland, which ran through the woods beneath a mountain over which we often used to walk. It was a pleasant and familiar feature of our summer life there." "[Minna Timmins Chapman} used to smoke cigarettes occasionally and was the only person of the feminine sex whom I now recall as having done SO at our house." "I used to carry a little canvas bag slung over my shoulder and a cup in it, when we went on long tramps. " Source: William James on Psychical Research. Compiled and Edited by Gardner Murphy M.D. and Robert O. Ballou (New York: Viking Press, 1960. Re-issued by Augustus M. Kelley, Clifton NJ, 1973). Pp. 150-158. To the west of Jorr Point, there was a flat stretch of rock large enough for a salt-water bathing pool and at a level so much below the Point that salt water from the harbor flooded over it at high tide. This space was, at a Guess, some forty or fifty feet, ending toward the harbor against a somewhat higher rock of lava character, with surface of deep red, from which, at one time, I extended as a pier a float for my sailing boat. The lower stretch of level rock, between this and the Point, I walled about with granite blocks from my quarry, leaving certain open spaces between the blocks for the tidal water to flow in and out. When the tide was out the water that had come in, filling the basin below these inflow spaces, leached away through the rock and I planned some day to cover the lower portion of the basin with a thin layer of cement that would hold the water in, letting it warr with the air and sun. This should be done now under the Government's new owner- shin. The cost would be but relatively slight and it would become a most attractive feature of the Point. 2. Opposite the Pool, a short distance across the Point, there is a smooth level rock of loval character, rising near the level of high tide, fronting the sea and descending vertically into it at considerable denth. It made a splendid place for a deep plunge when the tile was right and running down from the house before T dressed in the morning I useu to plunge in for a Clorious swim. But, the swir over, it was difficult to climb out, and to meet this I had rungs of thick iron pipe driven into the vertical face of the rock far enough Town to make it possible to climb out at any tide and had thereafter great joy for years in my plunge. This will make 3. splendid contrast to the sun-warmed, sheltered water in the pool for those hardy enough to brave the cold sea-water and take the plunge. This, too, along with the pool, should be maintained. This Point, which I have named for my father, its summer-resident owner, Dorr Point, is throughout of a most picturesque and interesting character, owing to the hard, resistant character of the laval rock. In storms, the surf, sweeping in from the outer bay, breaks magnificently, sending un great sheets of spray. S. the Point there is 3 beach of truo sand, the only one on the whole shore, and from it before we came into possession they used for chinneys and the like such small amount of sand as was needed. Come of this sand still remains, rolled u.) above the shore. Co this same sheltered beach the light-toencr Pro 200 Roots useu to row when the sea was still and beach his boat while lie procedued on to the village for supplies. 380 Rock, the eastern end of a mile-long granite resf that fronts the open sea across the broad, un- sheltered entrance to Frenchmans Bay, rises up soli- tarily some forty-odd feet above high-tide level; and against it stores, sweeping in from the east, break at times with terrific force. On one such occasion, I remember the lighthouse keeper to have told me, great seas swept over the whole Rock and bettered in the strong oaken door with its iron bars and flooded with salt water the well in which fresh water for the keeper and his family was always kept. the Whole structure quivered with the jar but held firm. this Isuze on which the lighthouse stands was a great place in early days for sea birds to breed hence its name. THE DOWNEAST DILETTANTE: MONEY USED TO GO FURTHER, # 3: Bar Harbo Page 1 of 34 Share 0 More Next Blog Create Blog Sign In THE DOWNEAST DILETTANTE Tales & Opinions From Maine Regarding Architecture, Art, Books, Design, Lan 23.2.11 MONEY USED TO GO FURTHER, # 3: Bar Harbor Property Taxes 1903 In the course of researching a story about the Vanderbilts in Gilded Age Bar Harbor for today's New Y Diary, I came upon this little tidbit in the July 3rd, 1903 New York Times. Here in down east Maine, li is when the annual Town Reports are released, and absolutely everyone indulges in the voyeuristic spor how much their neighbors paid in property taxes in the preceding year. Apparently it has been ever thus BAR HARBOR TAX LIST. George W. Vanderbit of New York Assessed nt Highest Figure. Special to The New York Times. http://thedowneastdilettante.blogspot.com/2011/02/money-used-to-further-3-bar-harbor.h... 10/31/2013 Wednesday evening Cyl 1 Note to get the proposed property lines and the sewage and cistern line drawn for the properties on the shore. And to get line against the Phelps property drawn out on paper from road to shore with the restrictions against building and for tall trees on the property obtained from David Ogden shown also throughout , from Main street to the shore. The pipe line against the Phelps line to its outflow or: the shore needs also to be shown. The land I own on the Otter Creek road beyond the Gorge upon the west , descending from the Otter Creek Road crossing the Brook and there extending to the woods nor thward needs also to be surveyed and shown. This whole property should be thoroughly studied, its possibilities looked into and the access to it studied. The spring on the Parkland where the old loggers lived should be looked into also for its possibilities. This property is interesting and unless right arrangements can be made for it, it should he held and not given away. The tax upon at the present date cannot be but very light. A good ground survey not only of bounds but of woods and levels would help also. The footpaths and old woodroads as developed on the Park land north of it should not be opened hence through by land as at present owned and tickexnot used at all. for riding or driving. This is to be watched out for and strictly held to. THE DOWNEAST DILETTANTE: MONEY USED TO GO FURTHER, # 3: Bar Harbo Page 2 of 34 BAR HARBOR. Me., July 2.-In the tax list which the Assessors of Bar Harbor have just completed the highest tax as- sessed against any Individual or corporation is that against George W. Vanderbilt of New York. Mr. Vanderbit pays to this village each year $3,200 for the three cot- tages which he has built along the shore on the Cromwell's Harbor Road, and one of which is this year occupied by L. z. Leiter of Washington or the 250 cottage owners who come here in Summer. 123 pay more than $200 in taxes, while many of them pay near or over $1,000. George B, Dorr ranks next to Mr. Vanderbilt. paying $2,390. A. C. Gurnee of New Yerk, who owns one of the most beautiful cottages here, pays $1,369. Charles T. How, one of the pioneer cottagers from New York, contributes $1,263.90, while George S. Bowdoin, one of J. Pierpont Mor- gan's partners, is taxed $980. John S. Ken- nedy of New York Is taxed $2,280 on his cottage, Kenarden Lodge, and its surround- ings. Joseph Pulitzer pays $2,198 for his property down on the ocean drive. John J. Emery is down on the list for $1,375. Ed- gar T. Scott of Philadelphia heads the Quakers with a tax of $2,451. while Con- gressman Morrell of Philadelphia pays $1,046 and Charles Allen Porter of that place $1,135. Robert P. Bowler of Philadel- phia contributes $1.175 and President Cas- satt of the Pennsylvania Railroad pays SCOO J. Montgomery Sears of Boston pays $1,200, Naturally, I found this entertaining, and since I had far more important things to do, I decided to match those long ago taxpayers to their houses instead. Tax assessing has always been something of a mystery to this Dilettante, and this list was no exception. several of the grandest estates in Bar Harbor, and left out several others. Four of the cottages, Vanderbilt, Dorr Kennedy and Morrell, sat on properties of 20-35 acres, and had many support structures---gatehouses, cottages, greenhouses, stables and carriage houses. Most, as is typical in many resorts, sat on smallish acres, with perhaps a carriage house or lodge. http://thedowneastdilettante.blogspot.com/2011/02/money-used-to-further-3-bar-harbor.h.. 10/31/2013 DOWNEAST DILETTANTE: MONEY USED TO GO FURTHER, # 3: Bar Harbo. Page 3 of 34 Pointe d'Acadie, the main house on the George Vanderbilt estate. 'Islecote House' at 'Pointe d'Acadie', the cottage occupied by Mr. Vanderbilt's niece, Mrs. William Jay Schieffelin, desig Alexander Wadsworth Longfellow, nephew of the poet. A rights-free image could not be found of 'Whileaway', also designed by Longfellow, the third main cottage at George Vanderbi d'Acadie' Total Tax Bill 1903: $3,200. edowneastdilettante.blogspot.com/2011/02/money-used-to-further-3-bar-harbor.h. 10/31/2013 THE DOWNEAST DILETTANIE: MONEY USED TO GO FURTHER, # 3: Bar Harbo... Page 4 of 34 The main house at George B. Dorr's 'Old Farm' off Schooner Head Road, designed by Henry Richards (click HERE to see t 2014 the left today) Tax Bill in 1903, $2,390 in 62,014 Augustus C. Gurnee's 'Beaudesert' on Eden St., designed by William Ralph Emerson Tax Bill in 1903, $1,369 http://thedowneastdilettante.blogspot.com/2011/02/money-used-to-further-3-bar-harbor.h. 10/31/2013 118750 march, 1921 Houseandgarden 32 Pr 23 SOME GARDENS A T BAR HARBOR Where the Climate and Soil of the Maine Coast Make Possible a l'ariety and Perfection of Flower Growth that Can Hardly Be Rivalled Elsewhere MERVIN JAMES CURL T HE thing that kept Diocletian down eight and even nine feet. Unfortunately for Mrs. George Vanderbitt of New York City. was his lack of travel. Could he have the emperor, no regular line of steamships was or these the senior Olmsted designed the Van- sailed around the matchless rock head- running to Mount Desert in his time: but for derbilt gardens: Mr. James 1.. Greenleaf, the lands of Mount Desert, Maine, and landed such gardens as Bar Harbor can show. well Blair garden: Mrs. Farrand, her own and those and strolled through Bar Harbor, his cabbages might he have abdicated a throne. of Mr. Satterlee, Mr. Young and Mrs. Scott; would have suffered, but how the man would Among the well known gardens are those of Mr. Herbert Jaques and Mr. Joseph Curtis, have gained For it is not possible to be de- Herbert L. Satterlee, Murray Young. and Mrs. the Bowen garden. voted exclusively to cabbages when you can John S. Kennedy of New York City: Mrs. Well might the finest designers spend their walk through your garden in the cool of the Edgar Scott, Mrs. John Markoe, and Miss efforts here, because floriculturists de "lare that evening and observe your foxgloves rising six Coles of Philadelphia; Mrs. Farrand of New the climate of Mount Desert is the finest along feet and more high, your larkspurs attaining Haven; Mrs. J. T. Bowen of Chicago, and our eastern coast for the growing of flowers. The Bar Harbor region is Q land of wooded hills and blue water, everywhere. From here. on the summit of the Beehive, one of jar-reaching views and the romantic wildness of a North that looks down upon the Satterier estate with its gardens and bungs- smone the trees. Great Head lies beyond House & Garden 24 Whatever the reasonable demand of the gardener may be, here is his satis- faction. If he ask for health and vigor of growth, for brilliance of color, for a reasonably long season and a large variety, here he will find what he asks for. And if he should request a romantic setting, a gar- den that is a very part of the sun and the air and the soil of this 10- mantic northern island, he will find no denial. There is a reason for this perfection of gar- dens. Where wild flowers grow in profusion and strength, there will a well-watched g arden thrive. Mount Desert is the very home of wild flowers. Professor M.L. Fernald, of Harvard University, wrote after twenty-five years of in- vestigation, "This ex- traordinary accumulation within oue small area of the typical plants of the arctic realm, of the Ca- The regular planting of the nadian zone, and in Murray Young garden, its bright colors set off by the dark spruces many cases of the south- and pines, softens to informality ern coastal plain, cannot along a lose stone wall. The be duplicated at any crests of Flying Squadron and Champlain mark the skyline point known to the writer." These wild plants of various latitudes, which find their home on Mount Desert, are always sure of cool nights. However hot the day may have been, after the sun sets the cool air sweeps in from the sea over the island, the dew is heavy, and the plants are refreshed. So they are never weak or puny. Plentiful moisture comes in again by day from the sea. The heavily wooded reaches of spruce, pine and hemlock aid by retaining much moisture in the soil. When cultivated, the wild flowers attain much greater size, like the Solomon's seal of the Farrand When wild flowers, like the meadow The charm of different levels is rue in the Farrand garden, are evident in the garden of Mrs. John transplanted with rure they attain S. Kennedy, Three old millstones wonderful size and projusion of have been set in as steps, flanked bloom, A gainst the dark green of by a low retaining wall with gera- the forest wall they show to pey- niums bedded at its base. Here, as fection. Mrs. Farrand herself de- in other Bar Harbor gardens, trees signed the garden scheme form the background 25 garden, which is as at- tractive as if imported from distant lands. To this felicitous climate is added a kindly soil of powdered granite, shale and slate with plentiful humus from the falling leaves of succeeding au- tumns. And the result: note the meadow rue in the Farrand garden, which rises a good two feet above the gardener's head; note the bluebells reaching almost to his shoulder, considerably over four feet; note in the Kennedy garden the larkspurs along the wall, about nine feet high. Everywhere a growth that would be rare in other gardens is in these the normal thing. Not only size, which is a good but not exclusive virtue; the number of flowers to each plant is here much larger than usual, The great pools of bloom in the Scott garden are not the result of many and large plants only, but Mrs. Scott's garden has all the also of the vigor of the charma in its wall of complete of birches seclusion and spruce with- individual plant. A lawns, well the colors fine of amplitude the flowers. of CS as d noted gurdener has re- and the friendly gables of the marked that in Bar Har- house showing above the trees bor plants thrive, where- as often in more southern gardens they merely grow. Surely he is right. But even the most brilliant, most sumptu- ous blooms fail of their full effect when set in the midst of a naked waste. A background, a frame, a setting must be had, else something is lost. Mount Desert gardens always have this setting. The red spruce, which here reaches well toward its southern seaside limit, rears its almost black branches in great pro- fusion. Against such a black-green rampart wall veiling the romance of the garden, the (Continuedon page 70) Where the little stone bird back, The planting among the rocks that the bluebells, the meadow THE and circle the Sieur de Mont's spring other pleasant lesser place plants intimacy form against a write to is of mattuc grasses and Howers of like thoroughwort and hardback, a the evergreens that surround the scheme of simplicity and great Farrand garden. Here bird life centers about the constant lure of is apparent charm. The in spirit all the of the surround- North water and seclusion ings 70 HOUSE & Garden La France Giant Simple Surgery in the Orchard (Continued from page 68) Everbearing of connection of the scion with trunk will be no undue strain on these living OF and limb. Also cover the wounds of bridges. RedRaspberry the limb where it split from the parent Often the lower limbs of a tree are tree. Grafting wax should be used free- sickly or weak. In this case, suckers ly so that all moisture may be kept out may be used as scions. If suckers do of the crotch of the tree, If the scions not develop at the base of the tree- BIG JUICY SWEET BERRIES are now left exposed to the weather, and they should not if the tree is planted they frequently dry out. Therefore it properly-one may remove from 2" FROM JULY TO NOVEMBER is advisable to wrap burlap or some to 4" of soil from the base of the tree other material around them to protect 50 that the air and light can reach the them from the direct rays of the sun wild stock into which the desired va- and the drying winds. It is to the ad- riety has been grafted. In this way G ROWN in the gardens of J. P. vantage of the tree to leave this pro- suckers frequently appear. After one or tective covering on for at least a year. two years' growth, cut out all buds and Morgan, Glen Cove, N. Y.; The tree should be wrapped with great cut the tips of the suckerswedge-shaped. John D. Rockefeller, Pocantico Hills, care and stakes driven around it so that Insert these tips into incisions made in N. Y.: P. S. du Pont. Wilmington, Del.: Chas. M. the scions will not be disturbed. the sickly or weak limbs and cover the Schwab, Loretto, Pa.: James J. Hill Estate, Lake Geneva, The following spring the scions will wounds with wax. Frequently the have made the proper connections and suckers are bound with tape to hold Wis. Henry Ford. Dearborn, Mich. and others who de- the covering may be removed. In a few them in position. This operation should mand the world's best. years the scions expand and not only be performed early in the spring, about The La France Red Raspberry is perfectly hardy. It supply the necessary sap to the broken one week before the buds start. The limb, but completely heal the wound. suckers will grow vigorously and supply has been carefully tested for years, to absolutely prove All fruit should be kept from the broken an extra supply of sap to the sickly its merit. limb for at least two years so that there limbs as well as form natural braces. Fruits early in July. the first sea- son planted, and continues in fruit until frozen. Free Some Gardens at Bar Harbor from insects and disease. A dozen (Continued from page 25) plants will sup- gardener can secure his delight. The Mont's Spring. in the Lafayette National ply the average white of meadow rue, the red and the Park, near Bar Harbor, for a moment family all sea- blue of other flowers make their most there sweeps over him the delusion that son. year after eloquent gestures against the evergreens. here is Italy, but he is quickly recalled Nothing of effect is lost when such a to his northern surroundings. The ef- year. Plants screen stands behind the flowers. fect is more truly that of the Scottish multiply rapidly. Best of all, the wall has exquisite coast. The gardeners have therefore BRI The bushes texture of its own. Upon the spruces obeyed, most often. the demands of a grow rapidly. and cedars around the Murray Young strong landscape, and have conformed. garden, for example, the light falls in Some of the gardens, being on the and are covered dark or in light masses where twig tips edge of the rocky seashore, make no with firm. lusci- spread it in silver gleams or recesses attempt to wrench the coastline into ous. wonderfully of branches dye it black. The wall new forms, but adapt their own to what @@@@@@@ flavored berries, with few thus is significantly beautiful itself. they find. In the same way the gar- This general character of the natural dens do not contend with the walls of seeds, from July until setting has deeply affected the style of trees which are ready to make the frame, freezing weather. The the gardens. One who stands on any but conform to the winding edges that August fruit is twice the size of of the mountain peaks and sweeps the the trees allow. By so doing they often 1821 other raspberries and of surface of the island with his eye sees gain in winning charm. The fine free- at the same delicious flavor 123436 once how shaggy, how romantic, how dom when plants creep snugly into all wild it is. Thus the view of the Sat- the little recesses among the trees but from first to last. Im- terlee bungalow and its surrounding give way for the thrusting growth mense branches covered forest. wherever it serves, makes a perfect A288362 with berries are constant- Though some gardens are here wholly transition from garden to natural ARAB formal, and others have sections of growth and unites the whole landscape ly ripening. formal planting and architecture, the into a complete composition. It is the best for home gardens general tenor is informal. As a famous To the gardener's aid in this finely and a great money maker for 1031 gardener has remarked, it is impossible informal work comes the chance for marketing. to make this northern island look like paths and stone work from the granite Awarded medals and certifi- Italy though one spent a million dollars that the island so richly holds. A step cates by leading Agricultural and a year. It simply won't be made into from the porch leads into the lawn. Horticultural Societies, including what it is not. When one spies the ex- The eye catches the light from the gray the Massachusetts Horticultural quisite spring house of the Sieur de (Continued on page 72) ****** Society, Horticultural Society of New York, The American Insti- tute of New York, etc., etc. It October 1921 pays to buy the best. Strong, field grown, bearing plants $1.50 each, $16.00 per dozen, by prepaid parcel post. Safe delivery guaranteed in proper time for planting if ordered new, Cir. ******** culars on request. November John D. Scheepers 1901 Isc. 522 Fifth Avenue cor. 44th St. New York N.Y. Rx spberry F $ a Sound Beach UP Conn., and Glen Head. The garden path must invite the feel if it is to be a N. Y. real success. Along this path of stepping stones in the Farrand garden the landscape designer and the stroller alike realise their dreams Digitized by Google Original from UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Garden Carters Tested Seeds Famous for a Century Evidence of the success met by flowers under cultivation at Bar Harbor is given by these plants of native Solomon's seal which are jur larger than others growing in the wild state Some Gardens at Bar Harbor (Continued from page 70) "They Come up Smiling" stepping stones as in the Farrand gar- invitation in the Murray Young garden den that beckon off into the delights of to raise the eyes to the crests of the flowers. When stepping stones are not mountains that loom above the spruces. desired, when the wish is rather for In other gardens the eyes gaze down TRADE MARK grass walks, the gardener is equally long alleys where the roses shine, fortunate, because the cool nights and sometimes past them and out to sea, the sea mellowness make turf such as sometimes into the heart of the woods, Are the product of generations of may well be his pride. With incidents sometimes to a gleaming pool at the such as stone seats or bird baths in end. For many people this intimacy careful selection, scientific propa- order, the granite awaits its use. The with the woods and the sea is priceless. beauty of this work is that around and The rocks of the northern and the gation and testing for Germina- behind and beneath the seats native castern shores are high and rugged. Be- ferns will thrive, making the fine com- low them the sea churns and sobs or tion, Purity and Vitality. This bination of strength and solidity and roars and pounds. Through gaps one assures a certainty of results not lacey delicacy that New England can catches the blue-green waters of French- so well boast. The bird bath of the man's Bay or the Atlantic. Now and possible with seeds of less definite Farrand garden, sunk in the ground, then a stately white sail moves among appears to be of primordial age. Be- the islands. The tang of salt is in the parentage. tween it and its surroundings there is air. Romance stirs the pulse and whisks no quarrel. the beholder away to the land of heart's For better vegetables-for fine and FREE In some ways the finest thing about desire, the perfect land of flowers and these gardens is their vistas. Note the of dreams. flowering plants, sow CARTERS TESTED SEEDS How To Make Livable Rooms of Green They cost no more than the ordinary (Continued from page 32) kind, and results considered, are the most economical and profitable to use. nignly accepting these tributes up- momentarily caught by the sun; a tone lifted to its pale glory. So, too, might that is beautiful in Nature because of Carters Tested Grass Seed sold in one and the green room be. its rarity and briefness, but which is But leading to the accomplishment of deadly spread all over a floor in a bril- five pound packages. Used in producing any miracle there is a slow path of liant fixed stare. By and by the floor quality turf on the foremost Golf Courses patient plodding: the honest study and permitted one to glance painfully at the experiment of effects, the wielding of rest of the arror: the rich cream walls of America and England. transforming paint brushes, the prick- nearly bilious in color. at the windows ing of the needle as the thread of the long floor-length curtains of moss- Price 55c per pound flaming amber wool slides vividly be- green velours, the fatly overstuffed tween its fellows of green; there is the chairs resembling the stream-bank in contemplation of texture and its effect color texture and form,-rolling, bland, By the Bushel (25 lbs.) $8.50 in this color; the importance of the mass-covered. And yet the pride of decorative breaking up of surfaces, the possession kept the well-meaning in- peeping of flowers, the judicious placing habitant of this greenness from realizing of delicate green tones charmingly the thin ohviousness of the scheme. CARTERS 1921 CATALOGUE GARDEN AND LAWN" against somber gray ones; the tall slen- But the joy that may be gotten from der grace of green furniture. the green room brought about on this MAILED ON REQUEST To know how to accomplish a really wise! Misty gray walls, which are just successful green room is to know and as they imply, the color of a misty appreciate color and form, plus acquir- early morning gray woodwork of a ing the ability to capture a certain shy slightly deeper tone, and, since the room Carters Tested Seeds beauty, perpetuating its charm without is a dining room, a built-in corner cup- rosing its fresh sweetness. This may board, from which peep out alluring not be accomplished by sheer expense lemon yellow china things from between INC: of materials. neither by brilliant ex- the soft green curtains; at the windows panses of color: such effects are too green curtains, too, of a pleasant rough clearly not to be bought by the yard. silk; the buffet and drop-leaf table of Address: 106 Chamber of Commerce Bldg., Dept. A, Boston This we know intuitively, but never leaf green decorated in a dull mustard do we realize it so poignantly as when yellow nearly the color of gold, the Main Office: 25 West 43rd Street, New York we stand, is I did just lately, in the interior of the drawers of the buffet room fairly recking with rich unctuous lined also with this; on the yellow Philadelphia Chicago Toronto green. The floor was covered with a Chinese lacquer tea wagon a pewter tea London. England thick-piled, moss-green carpet. not service, and on the buffet a pair of moss-green in shadow, but the insistent- pewter candlesticks and a black bowl ly brilliant tone of a mossy stream-bank (Continued on page 82) Google Original from Digitizen by UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Memo: "The Oldfarm Series" Date: 9 March 2014 Scribe: Ronald Epp Psychologist William James published many papers on psychical research prior to his death in 1910. Of the many spiritualists and mediums that he encountered, Mrs. Leonora Piper intrigued him more than the others. George B. Dorr was allied with James in these investigations for more than two decades, both intent upon demonstrating the accuracy or inaccuracies of efforts to communicate with the deceased. On June 5, 1906, nearly five years after the death of Dorr's mother, Mary Gray Ward Dorr, Dorr questioned a medium at Oldfarm who claimed to a "control" or intermediary to Australian physician Richard Hodgson, deceased but a few months. Hodgson had been one of the foremost psychic researchers and was very familiar with Oldfarm and the Dorr family. George Dorr then tests the unnamed medium and in the process previously unknown aspects of life at Oldfarm are laid bare that will not be touched upon in Dorr's memoirs. Dorr adds his own comments to the published exchanged, inserted in brackets, which can be taken as historically accurate in part because they would have been reviewed and discussed later with William James. All quotes are those entered by G.B. Dorr. We had "a big buckboard that carried six people and was the only wagon which we had big enough to take all the people up [to town the people used to go off from the kitchen, which is at an end of the house and cannot be seen from the living rooms or piazzas " 6659 the piazza itself, which in not a conspicuous object in the house from without, and which was only familiar to my mother's more intimate friends, is not a thing which would occur naturally to anyone not familiar with our life " "The [living][ room is one in which, the fireplace, broad and arching, is the central figure and would be first thought of in thinking of the room." [Storm Beach Cottage] "was across the lawn and garden upon a hillside opposite the house. We always kept some rooms in it for our guests, overflowing into it when the house was full." "We use to take long walks over the mountains and go down for a plunge when we returned from them. There were often three or more men or more going in it together when the house was full My bath-house was not on the beach, but on a point running far out into the sea, very bold and rocky, and we use to spring off the rocks into deep water, climbing out by a perpendicular ladder fastened to the ledge." On July 6, 1906 the inquiry resumes: 2. 3 'My mother use to have pansies spread loosely over the tablecloth when she had people to dine or sup with us at Bar Harbor, where we had a large bed of them planted near the house SO we could get them freely for this purpose. " "A dozen years ago I made a bicycle-road on my own backland, which ran through the woods beneath a mountain over which we often used to walk. It was a pleasant and familiar feature of our summer life there." "[Minna Timmins Chapman} used to smoke cigarettes occasionally and was the only person of the feminine sex whom I now recall as having done SO at our house." "I used to carry a little canvas bag slung over my shoulder and a cup in it, when we went on long tramps. " Source: William James on Psychical Research. Compiled and Edited by Gardner Murphy M.D. and Robert O. Ballou (New York: Viking Press, 1960. Re-issued by Augustus M. Kelley, Clifton NJ, 1973). Pp. 150-158. Friends of 20 BOARD OF DIRECTORS Anne Green, Chair Bill Eacho, Treasurer ACADIA Hank Schmelzer, Vice Chair Jack Kelley, Secretary Mark Amstutz C. Boyden Gray Summer 2019 Julie Banzhaf-Stone Margaret Jeffery Volume 24 No. 2 Journal Emily Beck David Katona Gail Clark Story Litchfield Hannah Sistare Clark Paul Mayewski Sam Coplon Lili Pew Andrew Davis Edward L. Samek Dave Edson Nonie Sullivan John Fassak Christiaan van Heerden Elsie Flemings Bill Zoellick HONORARY TRUSTEES Noni Ames Debby Lash Robert and Anne Bass Linda Lewis Fred Benson Liz Martinez Curtis Blake* Phoebe Milliken 5 14 Sylvia Blake George J. and Heather Mitchell Frederic A. Bourke Jr. Joseph Murphy Tristram and Ruth Colket Nancy Nimick Gail Cook Jack Perkins Shelby and Gale Davis Nancy Pyne* FEATURES Dianna Emory Ann R. Roberts Nathaniel Fenton Jeannine Ross 7 Acadia's Power to Heal Frances Fitzgerald Jack Russell Nature's magic elixir holds great power Sheldon Goldthwait Howard Solomon Neva Goodwin Erwin Soule By Dianna Emory Paul and Eileen Growald Diana Davis Spencer Paul Haertel Julia Merck Utsch 8 Capturing Acadia in Full Moon Shadow Cookie Horner Dick Wolf Photographer lets nature light the way Lee Judd By Lisa Horsch Clark EMERITUS TRUSTEES 10 Trail Crew Stuck Between Rock and Hard Place W. Kent Olsen Charles R. Tyson Jr. Shutdown, hiring woes limit scope of work FRIENDS OF ACADIA STAFF By Earl Brechlin Mary Boechat David R. MacDonald Development Officer President & CEO 14 The 'Other Side' of George B. Dorr Earl D. Brechlin Amy Magill Father of Acadia explored interest in paranormal Communications Director Administrative Assistant By Ronald H. Epp Sharon Broom Dana Petersen Development Officer Stewardship Volunteer 20 Liddy Hubbell Draws Inspiration from Acadia Coordinator Stephanie Clement Park's elegant motifs infuse artist's work Conservation Director Mike Staggs By Carl Little Lisa Horsch Clark Office Manager Director of Development Paige Steele PERSPECTIVES & Donor Relations Conservation Projects Sarah Curts Manager 1 President's Message Many Choices, Many Voices Enhance Acadia Accounting & Administrative Julia Walker Thomas Associate Digital Media Manager 3 Acadia Questers Mom, Daughter Connect Via App Jason Irwin Lisa Williams 6 Benefit Outlook 30th Benefit Is A Bridge To Future Vice President for Finance Communications 9 Superintendent's View Investing In The Future & Administration Web & Design Associate 13 Donor Profile Quiet Conservationist, Visionary Philanthropist Shawn Keeley JoAnne Wood Senior Development Officer Development Assistant 31 Chair's Letter Summer Swings Into High Season 32 Special People Couple's Love Grows With Acadia DEPARTMENTS 4 Where in Acadia? 12 By the Numbers 16 Test Your Acadia Bridge IQ FRIENDS OF ACADIA 23 New Donors 24 Updates 29 Business Members 2 Summer 2019 Friends of Acadia Journal THE OTHER SIDE' OF GEORGE B. DORR By Ronald H. Epp Acadia co-founder George B. Dorr, is silhouetted by the view of Frenchman Bay from the veranda of his home Old Farm in Bar Harbor. I t is 75 years since the Father of Acadia developed out of his relationship with today still celebrate about Acadia National died at Old Farm in Bar Harbor on Harvard University's William James, a Park, the "endless vistas," of the island, the August 5, 1944. From that family physician, philosopher, and psychologist. "fragrant worlds of steadfast land and sea," home, George B. Dorr also planned the His revolutionary "Principles of Psychology" "the mountains their silent promises establishment of the Mount Desert Island (1890) substituted the methods of of eternal peace," many wishing that "this Biological Laboratory, the Jackson Lab, laboratory science for faith-based belief in desert was my dwelling place." and Mount Desert Nurseries. In addition an immortal soul. James attracted Dorr to During the first three decades of Old to these scientific pursuits, the emerging his studies because neither dismissed nor Farm, Mary and her husband, Charles, paranormal science developed at Old Farm accepted paranormal claims. entertained academics with paranormal has received little notice. Yet ultimately, it interests. Harvard philosopher Josiah too would play a role in the evolution of the James and Dorr stood apart Royce dedicated his influential book on national park. the religious aspects of philosophy to Mrs. in their commitment to be In the late 1870s, his mother, Mary Gray Dorr. The stature of physiologist Henry Ward Dorr, enlisted the Boston spiritualist strictly scientific-cautiously P. Bowditch prompted author Margaret community in her efforts to contact her perched on the fence of Deland to write in "Golden Yesterdays," "if eldest son William following his death from a man like Dr. Bowditch is interested in this typhus. This was not the first instance of uncertainty. In his memoirs, 'psychic stuff, perhaps there is something her reliance on the occult, for the death of Dorr expresses the Jamesian in it?" From abroad, English philologist her brother John in 1856 initiated a similar view that such phenomena Frederick W.H. Myers and Australian effort. Consequently, George Dorr matured "are not impossible," attorney Richard Hodgson entered into in a spiritualistic family. When Old Farm their heady dialogues. was completed in 1880, some guests that reminding us that "the realms These were not just maverick scholars, his mother invited were investigators of explored by science are for they formed the core of a new the spirit realm. "extraordinarily complex." professional organization. The Society for These researchers used existing Psychical Research had been established in scientific methods and developed new The James family were frequent guests London and immediately formed in 1884 experiments to analyze premonitions, at the Dorr residence. Their signatures an American branch which Hodgson led apparitions, clairvoyance, psychokinesis, are contained in the "Old Farm House after its establishment by James. At the telepathy, automatic writing, and Book," displayed at the Bar Harbor same time, G. Stanley Hall received the first other paranormal practices. Mary Dorr Historical Society Museum. This historic American doctorate in psychology under favored mediums who "fell asleep" only document contains scores of signatures, the mentorship of James, quickly rising to to awake later apparently as another poems, musical passages, and photographs the presidency of Clark University-where person-a disincarnate spirit control who there is a collection of Dorr-Hall letters on documenting the positive feelings associated manipulated the body of the medium. with the property and the island. More parapsychology. Her surviving son's interest, however, than a dozen poems revel in what people James' argued that the ideal of every 14 Summer 2019 Friends of Acadia Journal look on the w That not gle cec ook on the n reech Inlia Bark home Bearnyfores Their silent promise of eternal peace Oliver Wendell Homes, Migur 123/188 Among the many luminaries who visited the Dorr family home, Old Farm, in Bar Harbor, and made entries in its guest book were, from left, President Chester Arthur, author of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" Julia Ward Howe, and Beatrix Jones (Farrand). Behind those photos is an image of a note and autograph by physician and poet Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. science-that of a coherent and closed lost interest in paranormal research. Perhaps associated with the supernatural beliefs system of truths-necessitates that it was because Clark and Harvard became implicit in psychical research with the phenomena unverifiable within the system the first American academic institutions to satisfactions implicit in efforts begun to must be untrue. Consequently, belief that receive endowments for parapsychology protect the natural world celebrated in all crows are black is not defensible if one studies. The New York Times emphasized poetry by many Old Farm guests and other witnesses the appearance of a white crow. that "the acceptance of [Harvard University] island visitors. Hodgson, James, and Dorr were the funding makes it impossible for any other Julia Ward Howe, her daughter and principle investigators in America of a institution in this country to disregard or to author Laura E. Richards, and others did "white crow," Mrs. Leonora Piper-an Old disrespect this work." not document an awareness of the need Farm guest in 1907. A Boston housewife Dorr contrasted the recurring frustration continued on page 18 with exceptional powers that appeared first in childhood, she had never been to Bar Harbor. Nonetheless, Piper "recalled" the pansies Mary Dorr spread loosely over the Old Farm table as well her delight in riding the bicycle path that her son built at Beaver Pond at the north end of today's Champlain Mountain. Careful scrutiny led James and others to conclude that Piper was not telepathic, and that the source of her claims could not be explained. The "Old Farm Series" of experiments were published by James and to this day are referenced in the psychological literature. James and Dorr stood apart in their commitment to be strictly scientific- cautiously perched on the fence of uncertainty. In his memoirs, Dorr expresses the Jamesian view that such phenomena "are not impossible," reminding us that "the realms explored by science are "extraordinarily complex." In 1905 Hodgson died; five years later Dorr biographer Ronald H. Epp displays the guest book of the Dorr family home Old Farm James, and six years later Josiah Royce. Dorr which is in the collection of the Bar Harbor Historical Society. Friends of Acadia Journal Summer 2019 15 Dorr, continued from page 15 PERUVIANLINK ALPACA COLLECTION 44 COTTAGE ST. BAR HARBOR (207) 288-8988 W WALLACE EVENTS LET'S GET THIS PARTY STARTED 36 Commerce Park Ellsworth, ME 04605 (207) 667-6000 Old Farm, the family home of the Dorr family, was located near Compass Harbor in Bar Harbor. It was WALLACEEVENTS.COM torn down in 1949. An online app, available on the Friends of Acadia website, allows users to take a virtual tour of the property. - BAR HARBOR - to protect Nature from degradation. It was century away from the otherworldliness their host, George Dorr, who understood of spiritualism to the pragmatic yet THE CAT CAME BACK the growing threats and allied himself with still spiritually-inspiring national park- MAINE NOVA SCOTIA Harvard President Charles W. Eliot to building goal: conserve for the public the establish in 1901 the Hancock County natural splendors of Mount Desert. * Trustees of Public Reservations, the organization that eventually acquired RONALD EPP is the author of "Creating the lands that became Sieur de Monts Acadia National Park, The Biography of THE CAT FERRIES.CA National Monument, the core of George Bucknam Dorr," published in 2016 today's Acadia National Park. by Friends of Acadia. It is available locally In effect, Dorr's priorities shifted and online at Sherman's Book Store and the during the first decade of the 20th- Bar Harbor Bookshop. BOOK PROFILES CREATING ACADIA FOUNDER ACADIA Copies of Creating Acadia National NATIONAL PARK Park, The Biography of George RONALD H. EPP Bucknam Dorr by Ronald Epp can be The Biography of picked up at Sherman's Bookstore in George Bucknam Dorr Bar Harbor, the Bar Harbor Book Shop in Hulls Cove, the Eastern National gift shop at the Acadia National Park Visitor Center (seasonal), and at the Friends of Acadia Office on Cottage Street in Bar Harbor. For links to order a copy online please visit friendsofacadia.org/epp. 18 Summer 2019 Friends of Acadia Journal