Not all historic buildings will be able to be preserved
by Don Keelan
One hundred years ago this month, on July 25, 1926, a death took place in Manchester, Vermont. Robert Todd Lincoln died at age 83. The eldest son of the assassinated president died peacefully in his bedroom at his ancestral home, Hildene.
RTL was a successful lawyer and business executive, having served for many years as president and chair of the board of the Pullman Railroad Car Company. At the time of his death, he left an estate valued at over $3 million, the equivalent of $57 million in 2026.
More noteworthy was how RTL valued his privacy, especially so when he and his wife, Mary Harlen Lincoln (1846-1937), came to Manchester from Chicago or Washington, D.C., in May and stayed until October. Their privacy was secured in the 24-room Georgian Revival home they completed in 1905. The spectacular house, located on a private road, a mile in from Vermont Route 7A sat on a promontory surrounded by over 400 acres.
RTL’s quest for privacy at his Manchester retreat was in part derived from the loss of his father, mother, brothers, Tad, Eddie, and Willie. But it was the loss of his son, Abraham (Jack) Lincoln II, in 1890, that had a profound and lasting impact. His wife, MHL, even more so, abandoned acceptance of conventional medicine and became a practitioner of Mary Baker Eddy’s The First Church of Christ, Scientist.
When Mary Lincoln (Peggy) Beckwith, RTL’s granddaughter and the last of the Lincolns to reside at Hildene, died in 1975, this special place, Hildene, was transferred under her will to the Christian Science Church. In 1978, the Church sold the estate to a recently formed local nonprofit organization, The Friends of Hildene.
During RTL’s 21 years at Hildene, he made his isolation paramount. Beginning in 1978, the privacy and seclusion of Hildene would change. Over the past 48 years, the FOH has welcomed several million visitors, transforming the property into an educational, historical, cultural, and agricultural gem for the community of Manchester, Vermont, and the Nation.
The FOH mission for Hildene was common. Its repurposing of the estate was preceded by several other former mansions in Bennington County. Notably, Yester House at Southern Vermont Arts Center, the Edward Everett Mansion at the former Southern Vermont College, and the Park-McCullough estate in North Bennington.
A common thread among these homes was that they were built as second homes by folks who were successful in lumbering, mining, and bottle-making. Also, in common, three of the four homes were originally occupied by attorneys.
Today, all of the above estates are in the hands of nonprofits (the Everett House is in transition to becoming a hotel and being owned by a private company). Their challenging work in preserving the properties was not unlike that of the folks who had the same goals in revitalizing the Flynn, Paramount, and Latchis Theaters in Burlington, Rutland, and Brattleboro.
What is described above required the tenacity, commitment, perseverance, and creativity of countless volunteers, donors, staff, and trustees. Their mission was clear: transform and repurpose a part of Vermont history for the education and enjoyment of future generations. The execution was not simple, nor will it be for the next generation of preservationists.
Presently and into the next decade, the Vermont landscape will have dozens of closed public schools, houses of worship (churches), shopping malls, colleges, office buildings, and motels becoming vacant and needing to be transformed into new purposes.
If such efforts are undertaken, they will entail risk, enormous cost, and the need for numerous lenders, donors, grantmakers, developers, and preservationists to be involved. The Benn-High school conversion in Bennington, the complete repurpose of SVC, and the repurpose of the former Catholic Church, rectory, and church hall in Arlington are present examples. The dollar investment required to make this happen exceeds $100 million.
Some of the buildings that might be or are now closed will face costly deferred maintenance if they are repurposed. All will require huge sums of money, the commitment of scores of volunteers and real estate developers, and the willingness of towns to rezone such properties.
With dollars and volunteers limited, many properties will not have the same fate as those mentioned above. They will be lost.
The author is a U.S. Marine (retired), CPA, and columnist living in Arlington, VT.