Summer Cottages…Large and Small

Summer Cottages…Large and Small

By Kathi Caldwell-Hopper

When we think of a summer cottage, a tiny, one or two room wooden structure comes to mind. The cottage might fit more than one vacationing family, with everyone spending long, lazy days on a nearby beach or boating on the lake.

Another type of summer “cottage” brought wealthy people to the Lakes Region, where their version of a summer place was quite different. If you were a wealthy Bostonian or upper-class member of New York society in the late 1800s to mid 1900s, your summer cottage might have up to 10 rooms, a luxurious screened porch and every amenity possible.

When upper-crust members of society built summer homes in the Lake Winnipesaukee and White Mountain areas of NH, they brought with them what their idea of “cottages” and vacationing should be.

Castle in the Clouds

Undoubtedly the most famous estate in the Lakes Region is the property known as Lucknow or Castle in the Clouds. The castle’s original owner, Thomas Plant, was a wealthy inventor and businessman who bought the mountain property in about 1911. The Moultonboro site was perfect for Plant’s ultimate home, which he envisioned as sitting high on a mountainside with incredible views of the lake and mountains. The mansion was made of cut stone and had every modern-day amenity such as state-of-the-art showers, central vacuuming, a cooled wine cellar, forced hot water heating and more.

The Castle welcomes the public daily for tours in the spring, summer and fall, as well as offering the estate for many activities.

Elsewhere in the area, the Schrafft family, owners of a famed candy company, came to the Squam Lake region and put down summer home roots in the early 1900s. According to Squam by Rachel Carley, Robert Herman Otto Schulz (of Boston) and his wife, Louise Schrafft, built a home on a cove in the area. They named their summer home Indian Carry after a supposed Indian trail on the land. Not one to do things sparingly, the couple’s estate had seven buildings, including the large home as well as a boathouse and bunkhouse.

Most likely Louise’s family visited her summer home and fell in love with the area as well. Her brother, William Schrafft and his wife built nearby on a rise with breathtaking views of the area. The home was called Chimney Pots and was designed in a chalet style, probably large and well furnished.

Other Schrafft family cottages were Lochland, later to be purchased by television broadcaster William S. Paley (Frank Sinatra and other Rat Packers were said to be among the guests to the home) and the former Sunset House (inn). Benjamin Moore paint chairman Livingston Moore once owned the property.

In nearby Tamworth, an old Boston family built a summer cottage in the 1890s. Elliott Channing Clarke liked the area and began to buy and consolidate small farms, which he built into one large country estate called Great Hill Farm.

A successful engineer, Clarke added on to a one-and-a-half story, circa 1790s home. He filled the estate with gaming tables, beautiful furniture and big game trophies from his hunting expeditions.

According to Summer Cottages in the White Mountains – The Architecture of Leisure and Recreation 1870 to 1930 by Bryant F. Tolles, Jr., among the first houses built with the express purpose of becoming a summer “cottage” in the Squam Lake Region was that of engineer William Norton. The Nortons were so impressed with the beauty of the Squam area that they bought land in Holderness. On the site they built The Pines, a wonderful summer home. According to Squam by Rachel Carley, it was the custom to build summer homes away from the lakes and ponds in the late 1800s. It was thought that insects around water bodies carried illness; the Nortons built their cottage near the top of Shepard Hill, which gave them great views of the lake and mountains.

Friends and associates of Mr. Norton soon followed to the Shepard Hill Area. One of the enterprising groups built the Asquam House hotel. The hotel would become a busy spot with summer tourists over the years.

One visitor, John Nicolay, was private secretary to Abraham Lincoln and later a marshal of the U.S. Supreme Court. The cottage that Nicolay built for his family’s summer use was called Tannenruch. The property remained in the Nicolay family until the death of John’s daughter, Helen Nicolay, a respected artist and writer.

Occasionally a famous person or family built or bought a summer home in the Lakes Region. Actor Claude Rains was one such personage that settled in the area. Rains was well known in the 1930s and 1940s as a character actor. He was quite a famous movie star in his time, perhaps best known for his role as Inspector Renault in the 1942 film classic, “Casablanca”. Towards the end of his life, he resided at the former Weed house at the junction of Route 109 and Little Pond Road in Sandwich.

Rains had an impressive resume as an actor; he was known for his roles in “The Invisible Man” and as Sir John Talbot in “The Wolf Man”. He also had a role as a Nazi spy in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Notorious”, and he earned four Academy Award nominations during his career.

When Rains and his wife sent their daughter to camp in New Hampshire, they were introduced to the area, according to written accounts. A family friend who resided in Sandwich each summer invited the Rains family to visit.

The couple must have decided to relocate to New Hampshire and it is said Rains missed the country life when he resided elsewhere. Eventually, Rains approached Denley Emerson, a Sandwich real estate agent, about finding a manor-style in the Sandwich area, and Emerson successfully brokered the sale of the Weed house. Rains bought the property from Dorothy Weed, age 84 in 1963.

The Rains family modernized the home somewhat, but every effort was made to maintain the original. Rains believed in keeping the integrity of historic houses and barns. The kitchen was updated, and he had a small porch enclosed, and an icehouse turned into an art studio for Mrs. Rains. Other alterations were cosmetic, such as painting the walls. Rains also took pride in the yard, planting lilacs, magnolias, hydrangeas, and crabapple trees. Claude Rains enjoyed his time in the area, and passed away in the late 1960s.

In the Newfound Lake area, a farm in the Whittemore Point (Bridgewater) locale was purchased by E. P. Lindsey of Boston. Refurbished from top to bottom, the farm had a cottage for hired help and a modernized barn. Many renovations were made to the brick farmhouse. Lindsey may have been originally from the Newfound area, and it is known that as a young man he worked as a common laborer in Bristol. Eventually, he amassed a fortune, and when his wife died in the 1930s the estate was valued at over $1 million.

While the wealthy upper class were settling in the Squam and other lake areas, farmers and innkeepers were starting to take in summer vacationers on a more modest scale.

In 1880, the first summer boarding house was built in Bridgewater on the eastern side of Newfound Lake. Originally called Lake View House, the structure was three stories high, with a dining room, dance hall and 75 bedrooms.

Soon other hotels sprang up in the area, according to Newfound Lake, by Charles Greenwood: Elm Lawn; Bayview House, and later, Pasquaney. Large farms continued to help meet the demand for lodgings, and just a few were Ackerman House, the Silas Brown property known as Newfound Lake Farm, and the Norman Smith farm. The largest town in the area was Bristol, and it boasted the Hotel Bristol and the G. G. Brown Hotel in the mid-1800s.

Cottages were also springing up around the lake in the late 1800s. One area on the eastern side of Newfound Lake near Bridgewater became known as "Cottage City." Owned mostly by professional and local businessmen, the summer homes were at the time the largest grouping of private cottages.

By the early part of the 1900s, housekeeping cottages sprang up in the area to meet the demand for inexpensive tourist housing. The cottages were rented to visitors for a week, or sometimes for an entire summer.

W. F. Darling of Bristol built a large group of cottages in the 1920s. The colony was first known as Hiland Park with about 100 cottages. Guests could rent a cottage, cook their own meals, and best of all, relax on their porch and take in the wonderful views. Eventually this cottage colony would become known as Bungalow Village.

Vintage Lake Winnipesaukee Postcard

About this time, at the foot of Newfound Lake, Walter Prince bought over 1,000 feet of shore property, on which he built a cottage colony. Prince saw further opportunities for income by building a store, restaurant and gas station. Everything the vacationer could want—from a dip in the lake, to dinner in a restaurant and gas for the family car—was at Prince's.

On Lake Winnipesaukee, cottage colonies, as well as private summer homes/cottages have come and gone over the years. There was the Terrace Hotel in Laconia, a stately inn overlooking the water; the Sweetwood Cottages, Little Cape Codder Cabins, Look Off Rock Cabins, to name but a few of the summer lodging establishments that offered overnight or longer accommodations to the vacationing public.

Whether a modest wooden structure or a cottage colony or inn establishment, or a grand private summer home for a wealthy person, the Lakes Region attracted all sorts of people. Their homes may have been different, but the thing that brought them here: the beauty and tranquility of a summer spent by the water, is something they had in common. 

What Lady Blanche Did for Love

What Lady Blanche Did for Love

By Kathi Caldwell-Hopper

In the month of February, our thoughts turn to Valentine’s Day and romance. What could be more romantic than a bit of history, wealth, travel and of course, a young couple falling in love?

The Gainsborough family of England had it all: money, title, a vast estate and a secure future. It had been that way for generations, since the 1600’s when the Noel family obtained the Earldom title. 

But one of the Gainsborough’s - Lady Blanche - gave it all up to move to the United States and a life much different than what she had known as a child and young woman. She endured a lot over her lifetime, but the question is why? 

The answer, as for many who willingly change their life circumstances, was love. Her story started in England but ended thousands of miles away, in the remote Conway, NH area, although it seems the most unlikely of places for a titled lady to settle in the 1800s when roads were not good and travel difficult.

Lady Blanche Elizabeth Mary Annunciata Noel was born on March 25, 1845 at Exton Hall in England. She was the daughter of the second Earl of Gainsborough and Lady Ida Harriet Augusta Hay. 

The family’s wealth meant the Earl and his wife traveled in the same circles as the country’s nobility. Indeed, Queen Victoria was the godmother of little Blanche. 

One of the advantages of all that wealth was convenience. While those less fortunate walked to church or rode in a horse-drawn wagon or cart, the Earl and his family attended services right on their property. (At that time, the wealthy often had chapels on their elegant estates.) 

It was in the estate’s Catholic church that young Blanche met Irish commoner and organist Thomas Murphy. Hired as a music teacher for young Blanche, it did not take long for romance to blossom between teacher and pupil. In fact, the attraction may have been instantaneous. Blanche was said to have been charming, with a charismatic personality and long, golden/brown hair. 

Along with teaching music to Blanche, Thomas served as the organist at the estate’s chapel. Blanche had musical talent and was part of the chapel choir. In an article in The Granite Monthly titled “The Story of the Lady Blanche”, Mrs. Ellen McRoberts Mason wrote that Thomas was said to be extremely talented as a musician. That alone was probably a great attraction for Blanche.

Such a match would have been frowned upon due to the differences in their social standing, but perhaps Blanche’s father eventually gave in to a marriage between his daughter and a commoner. Other stories claim the couple eloped. Whatever the truth, it can be assumed Lady Blanche was about to step into a very different world from the one she had known. Thomas was not wealthy and worked for his living. It is unknown what support the young couple received from Blanche’s father. 

While Blanche found Thomas hard to resist — he was said to be educated, talented and very charming — how that charm held up when the couple made a difficult seven-week Atlantic ocean crossing to reach America is not known, but Blanche later wrote that the trip was taxing. 

Arriving in New York with little resources, Blanche and Thomas first tried their luck in the city, but eventually moved to New Rochelle where Thomas found work as an organist. 

Then, in the 1870s, Thomas got a job at a Conway, NH area boys’ school at a place called Three Elms. He taught music and French and Blanche, a well-educated lady, filled in for her husband when needed.

Perhaps the work history of Thomas was erratic, because after his contract ended, the couple moved from the area, but eventually returned. Blanche was said to love the Conway area with its woods, mountains and flowers which might have reminded her of Exton, her childhood home in England. 

Although she was no longer the wealthy lady of privilege, Blanche saw the plight of the rural poor in the area and did all she could to help. Most likely Blanche had seen her mother tend to the welfare of servants who worked on the family estate; she now echoed that interest in the welfare of her neighbors. 

She visited the sick, gave Christmas gifts to poor neighbors, and hosted meals for local children. (Although Thomas and Blanche had no children, they were very fond of the young people in the area.)

According to Cardinal Manning, who was well aware of her generosity, “The love of the people of Exton (her home in England) toward her expresses what I meant in saying that her heart and sympathies were always with the poor, with their homes and with their state.”

Possibly looking for a genteel way to contribute to her husband’s finances, Blanche discovered she had a talent for writing and began to submit articles for publication. Her writing was skilled and showed a high degree of intelligence, reflecting her early education. And she respected and befriended those in the Conway area; although they were of vastly different life circumstances and education, she admired their hard-working lifestyles and may have written about all she observed.

What was her husband doing in all this time? They lived in the Conway-area community and Blanche found a footing by reaching out to others and becoming a beloved resident. Likely, Thomas found work as a music teacher and the couple stayed together. 

In a marriage fraught with poverty and hard work, Blanche seems to have been willing to put up with a lot for love. Although she willingly left her life of wealth in England, their circumstances may have been made more difficult because the life and work of a musician such as Thomas was uncertain and jobs tended to come and go.

Blanche was the bright light in the lives of her neighbors and the community, as well as in her husband’s life. Sadly, she died suddenly and unexpectedly while only in her 30s in March of 1881 after catching a cold which turned into a more serious illness. Her body was returned to England, where she was laid to rest beside her mother in the family plot on the Earl’s estate. 

Thomas grieved for his wife, and his life was probably difficult without her positive personality and support. The Earl of Gainsborough lived just a few years after the passing of Blanche, but while he was alive he gave Thomas an annuity. Thomas moved from the home he shared with Blanche and resided with friends in the Conway village area, unable to bear living in their former home without his wife. He never remarried and according to the Granite Monthly article, “revered her memory with a loyalty rare among men.”

On a trip to Maine in the summer of 1890, Thomas became ill and died suddenly. He had made his own mark upon the Conway area by bringing classical music to the isolated part of NH. In his own way, he was as admired as Lady Blanche.

Although Blanche and Thomas’ love story took place many years ago, it is one that continues to fascinate, offering wealth, titles, romance and evidence of what one woman was willing to sacrifice for love.