To the editor:
In 1994, I arrived in Stockbridge with my wife Janet and our three tiny tots: four-year-old Sylvie and the two-year-old twins Lydia and Madeleine (Maddie). I rented office space for my architectural firm on the second floor of 40 Main Street.
The first time I saw Windermere, it was painted black, had purple shutters, and was sagging in places. I welcomed it as the worst house on the best street, and a house worth saving. I bought it. I wasn’t saving a house with a history; I was saving a well-sited house with good lines.
We came from Chicago to Stockbridge because it looked like America’s hometown. Without knowing it, I was knee deep in Stockbridge history: I rented Norman Rockwell’s studio and purchased a house built by Ephraim Williams, one of six white families that joined the Stockbridge-Munsee band to settle the village.
The Williams house was built circa 1750. It was fortified during the French and Indian War (1754–1763). From its position high on the hill with towers built at the corners, a lookout could see for miles. It had water and food gardens inside a fence reputedly made of black oak planks.
Pieces of the old fort, including the cisterns (water storage), are still in the basement surrounded by parts of the original foundation. They say it was an almost impregnable fortress. In the 18th century, it would have been called a “strong house.”
Until I started researching, I had no idea Ephraim’s daughter Abigail married missionary John Sergeant. The Reverend Stephen West married Abigail’s sister Elizabeth and occupied the house during his tenure (1759–1818).
It is said another minister, Henry Martyn Field, one of the Fabulous Fields, named it “Windermere” during his occupancy. Field owned the house across the street, but when he married Henriette Deluzy-Desportes, she refused to move in. True or apocryphal, she told Field she would not live in another woman’s house, and so Henry purchased Windermere.
Henriette was the governess to Charles Laure Hugues Théobald, duc de Choiseul-Praslin, who found herself in the midst of the scandal when the Duc killed his wife. It was said he did it for the love of Henriette, so she was arrested for inciting him or as a co-conspirator. Never absolutely clear what her crime was, Henry believed she was innocent of all. He saved her, spirited her out of France, and in England proposed marriage. When she accepted, he brought her home to Stockbridge.
With all that history unknown to me, I evaluated my new house only as an architect. I received my degrees from the University of Minnesota in architecture and environmental design in 1979. As I walked through Windermere, I was a member in good standing of the American Institute of Architects (AIA)—and a good thing I was. Windermere was in far worse condition than I thought, but as I learned the history, it was, in its way, far better.
For the previous 20 years, I had worked as an architect of new construction and a preservationist. Whether my architectural firm was in Chicago, Illinois, or Stockbridge, I tried to preserve our architectural heritage and America’s treasures.
In Chicago, we saved the Wilmette Village Hall. The community was prepared to see the “Gross Point Village Hall” razed. They displayed my drawings of the 1894 Village Hall restored on the official town decal, and it changed minds.
In Massachusetts, I sat on the Chesterwood National Trust Museum business advisory committee, the Naumkeag Trustees of Reservation Museum, and Laurel Hill Association Board of Trustees. I helped two museums that were in their early stages of existence: Ventfort Hall and Berkshire Scenic Railway Museum.
Back again in the Berkshires, I am interested in how much has been saved and how much remains to preserve, such as, Ramsdell Library, William Russell Allen House, the Shadowbrook gatehouse, Overleigh, Elm Court, and the house at DeSisto. I was also struck by the very intelligent resolution of an old problem. Once there were constant disagreements between those who firmly believed in the value of preservation and those who believed that new was better and tearing down was cheaper. We have matured. Now we suggest new construction as the income producer to save the old, a good financial plan.
I toured my old house and smiled. It is a centuries-old house made solid. It was a good home then, and it is a good home now. It speaks of a former age, and it is right that it is still standing.
Paul Froncek
Sedona, Ariz.
Click here to read The Berkshire Edge’s policy for submitting Letters to the Editor.
