by Don Keelan

The Town of Manchester, Vermont, Municipal leaders were bewildered by what they read on the front page of the Wall Street Journal’s July 29, 1976, edition. It was unwelcome news. They were still contemplating the fate of the 412-acre, 24-room Georgian Revival ancestral home of Robert Todd Lincoln (1843-1926).   A year had passed since Abraham Lincoln’s great-granddaughter, Mary (Peg) Lincoln Beckwith’s Hildene home became vacant after an illness took her life at a Rutland hospital.

The WSJ item read, “The First Church of Christ, Scientist has given local residents of Manchester, Vermont ninety days to come up with a plan to purchase Hildene before offering it to other buyers.” 

The perplexed town officials were asking what the role of the Church, generally referred to as the Christian Science Church, headquartered in Boston, MA, was, and how it obtained control of Hildene. 

In brief, we must go back to Peggy’s grandmother, Mary Harlan Lincoln, Robert Todd Lincoln’s wife. Upon the death of their 18-year-old son, Abraham (Jack) Lincoln II, in 1890, to an infection, Mary was disinterested in conventional medicine and took refuge with Mary Baker Eddy’s Christian Science movement and became a practitioner of the Church. 

Mary H. Lincoln wished that if there were no future heirs, the estate would be bequeathed to the Church. In her 1950 estate plan, Peggy followed her grandmother’s wish and also added her financial investments of over one million dollars. 

In July, 1976, Manchester town manager Hank Lambert met with local residents and informed them of the Church’s ultimatum. There were 50 in attendance. From that gathering, a committee of nine was formed whose mission was to see if it was possible to acquire the property with a $625,000 asking price by the Church. $3.5 million in 2026 dollars. 

Over the following 14 months, the board of trustees of the newly formed nonprofit, Friends of Hildene, held numerous meetings. At one such meeting, the board was informed that an anonymous donor would give the FOH $200,000 today and $1.5 million in total. It was a long way from what the Church was insisting it receive.

Some board members proposed selling off half the property to close the funding gap. After several contentious meetings, this was rejected. Difficult negotiations continued with the Church. In late December, 1977, the Church accepted the $200K offer. The property was titled to the FOH in August, 1978. The board of trustees was overjoyed, even though they had approximately $800 remaining in the FOH’s checking account. 

Over the next 48 years, Hildene has had four executive directors (presidents). Each has placed its imprint on the transformation. The late Gerrit Kouwenhoven made it his mission to bring back the majesty of the main house and gardens. In August 1978, the FOH opened the house and grounds to visitors (55,000 in 1991), developed annual programs, and recruited a cadre of 360 volunteers.

Seth Bongartz succeeded Gerritt in 2001, and for the next 14 years, this current State Senator repurposed Hildene by incorporating the estate’s connection to President A. Lincoln. He also capitalized on the estate’s hundreds of acres of farmland and magnificent wetlands. Today, Hildene has a working goat farm, accessible wetland trails, greenhouses, and classrooms for teaching agricultural and environmental sciences. RTL’s presidency of the Pullman Railroad Car Company inspired Seth’s board to bring a restored early-20th-century Pullman car to Hildene.  

In 2019, Seth was followed by Brian Keefe. Brian, along with his board and several donors, completed Lincoln Hall. This $7MM facility will enable Hildene to host year-round educational programs, organizational retreats, weddings, community meetings, and other celebratory events.

This past December, Dr. Craig Gemmell, PhD, assumed the role of Hildene’s fourth executive director (president).  He will be responsible for stewarding one of Vermont’s most treasured historic sites. He appears to be quite capable of doing so as Hildene’s Board of Trustees enters its next half-century. 

In July of 1976, almost 50 years to the date that Robert Todd Lincoln died at Hildene, less than a dozen residents of Manchester took on a task to save Hildene. In theory, it was not meant to succeed. With such a daunting task, little or no funding, and a financial and energy crisis unfolding nationwide, the nine souls prevailed. 

Editor’s note: Don Keelan was chairman of the Board of Trustees from 1994-97 and the author of the 2001 book, Robert Todd Lincoln’s Hildene and How It Was Saved. 

The author is a U.S. Marine (retired), CPA, and columnist living in Arlington, VT.