Years ago, when our friends Tom and Paul asked if we’d like to join them at a party at Red Roof near our Gloucester home, we leapt at the chance. The party was an annual one thrown by the multiple owners of the historic house, complete with great food from a local BBQ joint, live music, a talent show in one of the outbuildings and a relatively open house for the curious like me. (I ran right to Isabella Stewart Gardner’s room and to the secret library, filled with stacks of old French Red Cross posters and accessed by pressing a hidden button to activate the sliding bookcase.) Built in 1902 by A. Piatt Andrew (Harvard economics professor, founder of the American Field Service during WWI, director of the U.S. Mint, Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, Republican member of Congress and local legend -- the bridge into Gloucester bears his name), the house has a gym on the top floor accessed only by the fit via rope ladder. (It also had at one time, we were told, an underground tunnel to Beauport next door, allowing clandestine trysts at the home of Andrew’s fellow gay pal Henry Davis Sleeper.) The elaborate stonework in the back descends to the water and includes six terraces and a natural saltwater swimming pool. I recently paid another visit to Red Roof, this time to an estate sale when Andrew’s heirs put the storied home up for sale. My pieces of history: a necktie I found in a closet and book from the 1920s (inscribed in French) from Mrs. Gardner’s bookcase.
A secret library. A hidden passageway. Clandestine gay trysts. What things that necktie has witnessed!
ReplyDeleteHAVE ENJOYED AND PHOTOGRAPHED RED ROOF SOME TIME AGO... MANY GREAT TIMES WERE HELD THERE, FOR SURE
ReplyDeleteGreat photos ~ Great to meet another 'Glosta' blogger ~ thanks, ^_^
ReplyDeleteps. here is my blog ~ www.acreativeharbor.com
Since reading Joe Garland's book "Eastern Point" last summer I have been obsessed with "Dabsville"...Red Roof, Wrong Roof and Beauport. I too would have leapt at the chance to attend a party at Red Roof and If I had known about an estate sale, I would have left with much more memorabilia than I'm sure I could afford.
ReplyDeleteIs it a B&B now? Can people rent it for the week?
ReplyDeleteSandy, I need to correct some of your recounting. First, there was no tunnel to Beauport since there was a house between them. Second, there is no hidden button to activate a sliding bookcase. Everything is manual. There is an antique piece of furniture (a large antique couch) covered with pillows that you open manually. Third, we pumped the water into the pool from the ocean. Here is the link to the house in between Red Roof and Beauport. http://www.gloucestertimes.com/local/x1048565758/Still-standing-on-Eastern-Point Fourth, there is the upper terrace, the Italian Terrace (chives grew between the stones), the opera seats, the mexican terrace and then the pool area. Did you see the photo of FDR? http://www.hoover.org/library-and-archives/acquisitions/70546 Finally, there was no gym on the third floor. When my Mother was a child, they weren't even allowed to go up to the third floor.
ReplyDeleteMy in-laws own #77 Eastern Point Blvd (the house between Red Roof and Beauport). There is no tunnel beneath their house connecting the neighboring properties. However, there is a door in an exterior stone wall that previously allowed above-ground passage between properties. Considering that both Red Roof and Beauport have hidden rooms I can see how such a rumor spread. So sad that Red Roof has been demolished.
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