Last updated: January 11, 2022
Place
Brown Mountain Gatehouse
NPSPhoto
Quick Facts
Location:
Northeast Harbor, Maine
Significance:
Historic structures marking the entrance to Acadia's carriage roads
Designation:
National Register of Historic Places
Brown Mountain Gatehouse, and its counterpart, the Jordan Pond Gatehouse, guard the entrance to Acadia's historic carriage roads. In 1931, John D. Rockefeller, Jr. commissioned New York architect Grosvenor Atterbury in association with John Thompkins to design the elaborate gatehouses and gatekeepers' residences. Attenbury attempted in the design to recall the island's colonial heritage, choosing a highly picturesque style reminiscent of the provincial architecture of the Le Puis district in France. After their completion in 1932, Rockefeller donated both gatehouses to Acadia National Park. The gatehouses were built to control access to the network of carriage paths Rockefeller so meticulously planned and the 'lodges' to house the respective gatekeepers. Rockefeller even funded the design and casting of bells for each gate which could signal the gatekeeper when a carriages or mounted rider wished to pass through.
Located just north of Northeast Harbor near Lower Hadlock Pond, the Brown Mountain Gate Lodge rests on a semi-octagonal foundation that reflects the shape of its monumental gate-towers. The high masonry wall bordering the front of the structure, as well as the positioning of the entrance and garage behind it, result in a nearly unbroken facade intending to draw the visitor's attention toward the gate. Built in 1932, Brown Mountain Gatehouse, the Lodge/Keeper's quarters, carriage house and unifying fence bowing away from the auto route form a quadrilateral grounds scheme. The immediate impact of the exterior is one of rich variation in texture, materials and ornament interspersed in a composition of strong horizontal and vertical design elements. The lodge is almost whimsical in the quaint introduction it provides to the near-fantasy beauty of the carriage roads.
Both Brown Mountain Gatehouse and Jordan Pond Gatehouse are currently used as staff housing. Please respect the privacy of our staff and refrain from attempting to look in or access the interior of the structures.
The gates consist of two towers enclosing the 'pecky' cypress wood gates and a covered open-air passage set into the segmental-shaped opening. The towers are built in the banded granite and brick motif and are square in plan with chamfered corners giving them eight sides. They are each crowned by a steeply pitched, eight-sided spire with a copper finial. The gabled ridge between them has the same shingle tile for its coping as do the towers for their roofs. Each tower roof has a four-sided, bayed, blind dormer above a round-arched window which is set into the masonry. These windows have prominent keystones and voiussoirs and are filled with ornamental turned-wood spindles which reappear in window openings of the other two structures.
The two-and-one-half story lodge is a picturesque rending of a late-date Tudor Revival style. It is distinguished by half-timbering on its upper levels that reach up into the gable ends of a steeply pitched roof and also covers a dormered oriel window on the west facade. The predominantly vertical half-timbering is a composition of so-called pecky cypress that was burned and treated so as to appear a weathered grey. This framing is filled in with panels of softly variegated red brick laid decoratively in a primarily Flemish bond pattern.
The bellcast, gabled oriel of the west facade is flanked by hipped bay dormers. These window treatments have respectively two-and-three-light casement windows glazed in rows of decorative circular panes. Massive cypress brackets support the oriel and enclose a horizontal band of two-light casements below it. At the gable peak a pierced wood, round, floral decoration ventilates an attic.
The Lodge's entrance is oriented to the rear or eastern expanse of lawns, away from the auto route. The entrance is protected by a projecting, gabled porch with half-timbering in its substantial gable end which in turn frames a ventilating opening to an attic that is filled with turned wood spindles. The west dormers similarly reappear on the east facade. The main entrance has rectangular side and toplights glazed wit circular panes. There are original and decorative lead gutters, cachers and leaders.
At either gable end of the house and chimneys, slightly inset into the main block, and one is of the banded motif which the other is of granite blocks and randomly placed bricks. They have one and three terra cotta chimney pots. The south chimney has undergone the only major structural alteration, during which an octagonal copper-roofed cupola, a weathervane and wooden wind shield were removed and the stepped stack with is projecting stone copings was built.
The original design for the Gatehouse had a front facing entrance door and a bell post which were eventually incorporated into the plans for the Jordan Pond gatehouse. Rockefeller also asked landscape architect Beatrix Farrand for advice concerning the plantings around the Gatehouse and she initially advocated plantings that would screen the driveway and entrance. She later decided to use low plantings instead.
The carriage house has a hipped and very steeply pitched roof with a gabled dormer on the east slope presenting a "suicide door" with a hoisting hook suspended above it. A square cupola with a bellcast speaking spire boasts windows filled with turned and wooden spindles ventilate the loft. The rectangular structure carries through the banded granite and brick motif and on the west facade is a row of windows across which march turned wooden spindles between a long stone sill and cypress lintel.
Located just north of Northeast Harbor near Lower Hadlock Pond, the Brown Mountain Gate Lodge rests on a semi-octagonal foundation that reflects the shape of its monumental gate-towers. The high masonry wall bordering the front of the structure, as well as the positioning of the entrance and garage behind it, result in a nearly unbroken facade intending to draw the visitor's attention toward the gate. Built in 1932, Brown Mountain Gatehouse, the Lodge/Keeper's quarters, carriage house and unifying fence bowing away from the auto route form a quadrilateral grounds scheme. The immediate impact of the exterior is one of rich variation in texture, materials and ornament interspersed in a composition of strong horizontal and vertical design elements. The lodge is almost whimsical in the quaint introduction it provides to the near-fantasy beauty of the carriage roads.
Both Brown Mountain Gatehouse and Jordan Pond Gatehouse are currently used as staff housing. Please respect the privacy of our staff and refrain from attempting to look in or access the interior of the structures.
Architectural Details
Exterior
The overall composition of these structures is tied to a whole by the use of strong horizontal polychrome bands running the full length of the structures. The entire western facade is a continuous surface, from the gates at the north to the carriage house at the south. The three structures integrated by fences of the same materials. Atterbury used dressed rubble stone masonry from a locally-quarried granite which was laid random and interrupted by a precise string-courses of contrasting red Virginia-made brick stretchers in horizontal bands at 15 foot intervals. An additional unifying feature is the roof materials which is used on all three main structures as well as for the coping on the connecting stone and brick fences. It is a crudely made French shingle tile, similar to terra cotta, that comes in shades of brown, red and black.The gates consist of two towers enclosing the 'pecky' cypress wood gates and a covered open-air passage set into the segmental-shaped opening. The towers are built in the banded granite and brick motif and are square in plan with chamfered corners giving them eight sides. They are each crowned by a steeply pitched, eight-sided spire with a copper finial. The gabled ridge between them has the same shingle tile for its coping as do the towers for their roofs. Each tower roof has a four-sided, bayed, blind dormer above a round-arched window which is set into the masonry. These windows have prominent keystones and voiussoirs and are filled with ornamental turned-wood spindles which reappear in window openings of the other two structures.
The two-and-one-half story lodge is a picturesque rending of a late-date Tudor Revival style. It is distinguished by half-timbering on its upper levels that reach up into the gable ends of a steeply pitched roof and also covers a dormered oriel window on the west facade. The predominantly vertical half-timbering is a composition of so-called pecky cypress that was burned and treated so as to appear a weathered grey. This framing is filled in with panels of softly variegated red brick laid decoratively in a primarily Flemish bond pattern.
The bellcast, gabled oriel of the west facade is flanked by hipped bay dormers. These window treatments have respectively two-and-three-light casement windows glazed in rows of decorative circular panes. Massive cypress brackets support the oriel and enclose a horizontal band of two-light casements below it. At the gable peak a pierced wood, round, floral decoration ventilates an attic.
The Lodge's entrance is oriented to the rear or eastern expanse of lawns, away from the auto route. The entrance is protected by a projecting, gabled porch with half-timbering in its substantial gable end which in turn frames a ventilating opening to an attic that is filled with turned wood spindles. The west dormers similarly reappear on the east facade. The main entrance has rectangular side and toplights glazed wit circular panes. There are original and decorative lead gutters, cachers and leaders.
At either gable end of the house and chimneys, slightly inset into the main block, and one is of the banded motif which the other is of granite blocks and randomly placed bricks. They have one and three terra cotta chimney pots. The south chimney has undergone the only major structural alteration, during which an octagonal copper-roofed cupola, a weathervane and wooden wind shield were removed and the stepped stack with is projecting stone copings was built.
The original design for the Gatehouse had a front facing entrance door and a bell post which were eventually incorporated into the plans for the Jordan Pond gatehouse. Rockefeller also asked landscape architect Beatrix Farrand for advice concerning the plantings around the Gatehouse and she initially advocated plantings that would screen the driveway and entrance. She later decided to use low plantings instead.
Lodge Interior
The interior elements include a full basement and attic. The first story has an entrance hall and staircase to the second floor, a vast living room, a dining room, a kitchen, laundry and pantry. The second floor has four bedrooms, a bath and several closet spaces. There is one fireplace in the living room and the second chimney supports the kitchen wood stove.The carriage house has a hipped and very steeply pitched roof with a gabled dormer on the east slope presenting a "suicide door" with a hoisting hook suspended above it. A square cupola with a bellcast speaking spire boasts windows filled with turned and wooden spindles ventilate the loft. The rectangular structure carries through the banded granite and brick motif and on the west facade is a row of windows across which march turned wooden spindles between a long stone sill and cypress lintel.