The Old Homestead

 

The history of the Stillwater Hotel is a bit complex. It starts with the construction of the Old Homestead by H. C. Churchill. Harlow Young subsequently bought the hotel and renamed it the Beaver River Inn. When the reservoir was expanded in 1925, Young demolished the hotel, saved what material he could, and reconstructed it on higher ground in its current location. After Young retired, the hotel had a number of owners each of whom renovated and added to the hotel until it reached its current configuration. I will tell the hotel’s story in three chronological posts, beginning with the story of Churchill’s Old Homestead.

 

The historical record does not clearly identify exactly when or why H. C. (Henry Charles) Churchill first came to work at Stillwater. The Churchill family was from Binghamton, N.Y.  An advertisement in the Utica Daily Press on June 12, 1901 lists him as the manager of Stanton’s Adirondack Camp. Stanton’s Camp was located on the north shore of the Beaver River on a peninsula near the outlet of Wolf Creek. It was a beautiful, isolated spot that could only be reached by water. Someone from the camp would meet the afternoon train at Beaver River Station and bring guests to camp in a boat. Stanton’s camp was established as early as May 1897. The owner of the camp, Lafayette Stanton, later had a long-running legal battle with New York State that resulted in his camp being evicted from state land in December 1905. For more on Stanton’s see my post of 05/21/2021 https://beaverriverhistory.blogspot.com/2021/05/stantons-camps-and-camp-wiliwana.html

 

It appears that Churchill only managed Stanton’s for one season. In June 1902 the Beaver River Club at nearby Stillwater hired Churchill to be its manager. Founded in 1893, this exclusive outdoors club had wealthy members primarily from Syracuse, Utica, and Lowville. A dam on the Beaver River, built in the same year the Beaver River Club was founded, raised the water level enough so the club sat on a two-hundred-acre island. The club also leased six thousand acres on the north shore of the Beaver River for their private hunting preserve. Members slept and took their meals in the clubhouse. Some members built their own cottages on waterfront lots. For more on the Beaver River Club see my post of 05/03/2021 https://beaverriverhistory.blogspot.com/2021/05/the-beaver-river-club.html

 

When he started to work at the Beaver River Club in 1902, Henry was 45. His wife, Anna Mayo Churchill, was 40. They had three young daughters: Alice 14, (Anna) Louise 10, and Lena, 7. The whole family lived at the Beaver River Club from May until November. During the spring and fall, the girls attended school in Lyons Falls where they boarded with a family while their parents worked at Stillwater. They lived in Binghamton the rest of the year.

 

H. C. Churchill proved to be a good manager. His duties included hiring and managing the clubhouse staff, taking reservations, collecting payment for rooms and meals, ordering supplies, arranging for guides, serving as desk clerk and postmaster, transporting luggage to and from the train station and numerous other daily tasks. 

 

One of Churchill’s duties was arranging for transportation for club members and guests from the train at Beaver River Station to the club. The first leg of the journey was covered in Pop Bullock’s buckboard a mile from the station to Grassy Point on the Beaver River. The rest of the trip was by boat about eight miles down the Beaver River Flow to Stillwater. To make the river trip more comfortable, Churchill ordered a twenty-five-foot steam launch from boat builder D. H. Tuttle of Canastota, N.Y. Churchill named this boat “Alice” after his eldest daughter.

H. C. Churchill was a smart businessman. He knew the Beaver River Club was doing well financially. When he took over as manager in 1902, the club had just completed a fine new clubhouse that cost $10,000. Cottage lots were being sold as prime real estate. Wealthy families from all over Central New York were building elegant new camps at the club. The clubhouse had a steady stream of paying guests. Churchill knew there was a market for more tourist accommodations at the west end of the Flow. In October 1905, at the end of the season, Churchill resigned as manager of the Beaver River Club to build his own fine hotel.

 

Earlier in 1905 Churchill bought fifty acres of land immediately adjacent to the west boundary of the Beaver River Club. Part of this parcel was separated from the rest by Alder Creek. The road out to Lowville ran through the plot. A wooden road bridge connected the two parcels. On the smaller eastern parcel Churchill built a modest camp for his family that he called “Forest Home.” On the larger western parcel Churchill build a substantial hotel that he named “The Old Homestead.”

The Old Homestead opened for business in the spring of 1906. Its advertising brochure claimed visitors could expect “good health, rest, good water, plenty to eat, and a general good time.” The hotel had plastered walls. The windows were screened against insects. Wide porches surrounded the building on both levels. The reception area was furnished with rustic Adirondack furniture and a large fireplace. The Churchill family grew their own fresh vegetables, had a cow for milk and chickens for eggs. Canoes and rowboats of all sizes were provided to guests at no extra cost.

The first entry in the Old Homestead’s guest register was on May 5, 1906. Review of that guest register now in the Goodsell Museum in Old Forge shows the new hotel quickly became a success. Due to its proximity to the Beaver River Club and its fine amenities, it attracted a distinguished clientele, such as noted Arts and Crafts furniture makers J.G., Leopold and Charles Stickley. During the 1908 Christmas holiday the Old Homestead entertained fifteen guests from New York, Texas, Maryland, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and The Netherlands.

 

H.C. Churchill only operated the Old Homestead for four seasons: spring 1906 until fall 1910. In October 1910 he sold the hotel and the land on the west side of Alder Creek to Harlow Young. The story of the hotel will continue in the next installment of this blog. 

 

The Churchills continued to use their camp on the smaller parcel until at least the fall of 1921. By that time, it was clear that the state was going to increase the height of the Stillwater dam and flood most of the land where the camp was located. The Churchills wanted to continue to have a camp at Stillwater so they purchased a lot that would be on the shore of the expanded reservoir. Most likely in that winter or the one following, they had the Forest Home cottage moved across the ice to their new lot. In October 1923 the Churchills sold the former location of their camp to the State of New York. After the reservoir was flooded in 1925 what remained of that plot became a small island now known as “State Island.”

 

Forest Home cottage still exists. After H. C. and Anna Churchill died, the cottage was inherited by their eldest daughter Alice Churchill Snover. It was later purchased by her nephew Jerome Shaver and his wife Esther. In 1993 they sold it to their friends, Jack and Nancy Fergerson. The Fergersons sold it to the current owners J. R. and Monica Kellogg in 2015.

 

About 1925, the Churchill’s second daughter, Louise and her husband Clarence Shaver built their own cottage next door to Forest Home on a portion of the Churchill shoreline lot. It was later inherited by their son, John Shaver. In 1983 it was inherited by his daughter, Carol Shaver Fox. It too still exists in excellent condition and is enjoyed year-round by H.C. Churchill’s many descendants.

 

Sources: interviews with Carol Shaver Fox and her husband Jim Fox as well as archival material preserved by the Fox family. An earlier version of this article with footnotes appears in Chapter 13 of my book Beaver River Country, Syracuse University Press, 2022.