Mount Kineo House Moosehead Lake Greenville Maine

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Mt. Kineo House Moosehead Lake Greenville Maine Oriental Rug Review/Asian Trade is pleased to offer a small group of items, c. 1900 having to do with Mount Kineo House, Mt. Kineo, Moosehead Lake, Greenville Maine. Michael Wentworth was the overall manager of several resort hotels including Wentworth Hall in Jackson, NH, Mount Kineo House on Moosehead Lake, Maine, The Lakewood Hotel, Lakewood NJ, The Hygeia Hotel at Old Point Comfort, VA, The Raymond Hotel in Pasadena, CA and The Frontenac on Round Island, 1000 Islands. His personal secretary and stenographer, Grace Lulu Bickford, at times, moved from hotel to hotel with him and at other times spent whole seasons at one or another of the hotels. Besides being a stenographer, she was also a skilled photographer and if she were to be at a given hotel for more than just a few weeks, she would commander a bathroom and set up her darkroom. She was also a frequent letter writer, averaging a letter home about every other day, always starting them, "Dear Folks at Home:". She left a paper trail from all these hotels of letters, photos, and promotional materials that came to us years ago from a country auction. The items offered here are from Moosehead Lake.(1.) Annual photograph of the Mt. Kineo House staff, but not all of them. Manager Judkins, Grace Bickford and none of the 15 or so hunting and fishing guides and horse wranglers are present. Come to think of it Miss Bickford could well be behind the camera, 6" X 8", our scanner cut into one margin, but the margins are equal all around. (2.) A copy of the letter Miss Bickford sent to C. A. Judkins, manager of Mount Kineo House, seeking employment. In it she tells him that her immediate past Boss, Mr. James N. Berry, Manager of The Lakewood Hotel, In Lakewood, N. J., would send him a letter of recommendation. Later, after she was hired and Judkin and she had become friends he told he, "You said I would get a letter from Mr. Berry. I got 20 letters, one each from all the managers in the system and from some of their assistants, and even from some guests Three guests said they would come to the hotel only if you were to be here." (3.) A letter from Manager C. A. Judkins answering the above letter from Miss Bickford. (4.) Two photos, one of Mrs. Wadsworth of NYC, seated, with her maid standing behind her on the Hotel's front porch, and a photo of Doctor John M. Greene, who came over on the steamboat from Greenville Maine, to attend to Mrs. Wadsworth. This was an unscheduled trip for him. He usually went to the Hotel for two days, Tuesday and Wednesdays, to attend to guests. In his bag he had his framed diploma and a small sign that said "the doctor is in." that he would put on the door of whichever room he had been assigned that particular week, and the diploma would go on the room's wall. We sold another photo of the doctor asleep in a chair with his diploma on a nearby wall. Miss Bickford claimed he always checked into the Hotel's bar first, and set out to prove it by this photo. In the photo someone wrote "Gold Brick" on the Doctor's bag. It is in Miss Bickford's handwriting. (5.) Two photos, one of a cottage on the hotel's grounds, the other of that cottage's boat dock. The hotel built outlying cottages to lease to long term guests. Each cottage had several bedrooms, a lake view, some with a boat dock, and full kitchen facilities. The cottages leased for $4000 to $6000 depending on amenities, with a ten year renewable lease. Guests could dine at the Hotel for a discounted fee, or they could go to the nearby hotel owned farm which provided produce and meat for the hotel, and buy provisions at the same price the hotel paid the farm. (6.) A letter, on Kineo letterhead August 22, 1901, from Miss Bickford to her Mother. In part, she wrote, " I had a fine trip to the head of the lake last Tuesday with Capt. Cof(fin). Saw Camp Caribou and how they come out in canoes to meet the boat because the boat cannot go to the landing, Am going up the lake on the Kahtahdin (steamboat) some evening ... read more

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