John Stavers, who came to Portsmouth from England, built the Earl of Halifax Tavern in 1766, later renamed Pitt Tavern. It was more than a place for food and lodging; its third floor was designed specifically as a meeting place for the St. John’s chapter of the Masons, and it was a terminus for the Flying Coach stageline, which Stavers’ brother, Bartholomew, operated.

During the American Revolution, Stavers’ loyalty to the colonial cause was questioned. Fears of him being a Tory were exacerbated by the fact that Bartholomew returned to England rather than support independence. The Masons moved their meetings to a different location, and stories of mobs attacking the tavern have since entered local folklore. Most notoriously, Mark Noble, in protest of Stavers’ supposed loyalties (or was it Noble’s own unpaid tavern bill?) attempted to chop down the tavern sign. Stavers sent his enslaved man, James, to stop the destruction, which James did by hitting Mark Noble over the head with an ax handle, injuring him non-fatally. Since James was considered nothing more than a piece of property without his own agency, Stavers was held responsible for his actions and was thrown in jail for a short time.

Thomas, Mark, Robert, Edward, and Zantford were five brothers who grew up on a farm near Madison, N.H. Born on Sept. 2, 1901, Zantford Delbert Granville (known as “Granny”) shifted from farming to aviation, launching a career that would make him both famous and infamous for his radical racing plane designs. Work began on the first Gee Bee, named in reference to the initials of the “Granville Brothers” in 1929. Between that point and 1934, the Granvilles produced some of the world’s fastest airplanes during the golden age of air racing.

But the good times weren’t to last, with the first Gee Bee accident of many taking place in 1931. The Gee Bees were built for speed but not for safety. Zantford Granville would eventually meet his own death in a Gee Bee, plunging into a nosedive while delivering a plane to a customer. But his dreams and daring designs made aviation history. In the memoirs of his widow, Alta, she recalled how Granny first described his drive to learn how to fly: “Listen Hon, I would rather live a few years doing something my heart and soul is in than to live a lifetime doing something I didn’t give a tinker’s damn about.”

Photographer and photojournalist Lotte Jacobi (August 17, 1896 – May 6, 1990) was best known for portraits of Germany’s leading theater actors, artists, writers, and political figures. She also photographed the local landscape and architecture and produced stunning documentary images of cities and people in Germany and the Soviet Union. In response to the encroaching danger of the Nazi regime, Jacobi left Germany for New York in September 1935. Within weeks she was again photographing the world’s leading artists, dancers, and writers. Among her most significant works from the 1940s and 1950s were her abstract, camera less images known as “photogenics.”

Jacobi left New York for rural New Hampshire in 1955. She had grown uneasy in the city following the death of her second husband Erich Reiss in 1951, and she was eager to pursue some of her environmental interests in the woods of New England. In Deering, Jacobi continued to develop as a fine art photographer. In 1963, she opened a gallery to exhibit the work of local and international artists. In the last decades of her life, Jacobi received numerous international, national, and state honors for her artistic achievements. Lotte Jacobi died in 1990 in Concord, New Hampshire.

One of the four houses that comprise the Woodman Museum in Dover NH is the Hale House, Home of former U.S. Senator and Abolitionist John Parker Hale. Born on March 31st, 1806 in Rochester, NH, Hale would purchase the home in 1840 from the founder of the Dover Manufacturing Company, later known as the Cocheco Mill and Printworks, John Williams. Originally a Democrat in Congress, Hale was kicked out of the Democratic Party after he voted against annexation of Texas and the spread of Slavery. Hale would return later join the Free-Soil Party, a pro-abolition party, and run as a Presidential candidate in the election of 1852. He would ultimately lose to the election to his political rival in New Hampshire, Franklin Peirce. He would return to Congress in 1855 as a member of the Republican Party where we would serve until 1865.[1] Hale’s career is defined by his efforts to end the institution of Slavery in the United States, from introducing multiple legislative actions in Congress to serving as legal counsel for abolitionists and the Enslaved [2] However, there is a dark mark on the Hale family’s legacy.

Following the assassination of President Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth would be shot dead by one of the soldiers that found him.[3] Among the contents of his pockets, the soldiers would find a picture of Senator Hale’s daughter, Lucy. Why would the picture of the daughter of one of the most ardent abolitionist Senators be found in the pocket of a pro- Confederacy assassin? As historian E. Lawrence Abel argued, it was because the two carried on a secret love affair. Whatever the circumstances of their meeting were, Lucy Hale received a love letter on Valentine’s Day 1862 from Booth.[4] Despite attempts to cover up the discovery of Lucy Hale’s picture, word still got out.[5] In 1878, a series of news articles would accuse Lucy of the scandal and assert that she had been in a love triangle between Booth and Robert Todd Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s oldest son.[6]

You can learn more about Senator Hale and Lucy Lambert Hale by visiting the Woodman Museum in Dover, NH. Click here to visit the museum’s webpage for hours and admission information.

 

[1] “Hale, John Parker (1806-1873).” Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. 2019. http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=h000034 Accessed 11 DEC 2019.
[2] Sewell, Richard H. “John P. Hale and the Politics of Abolition”. 1965. Harvard University Press. Pg. 152
[3] Abel, E. Lawrence. “John Wilkes Booth and the Women Who Loved Him”. 2018. Regnery History. Washington DC. Pg. 217
[4] Abel, E. Lawrence. “John Wilkes Booth and the Women Who Loved Him”. 2018. Regnery History. Washington DC. Pg. 177
[5] Abel, E. Lawrence. Pg. 219
[6] Abel, E. Lawrence. Pg. 248

For over 150 years, the Mount Washington has been cruising the waters of Lake Winnipesaukee, embodying the linked histories of lake transportation and tourism in the Lakes Region. Built by the Boston & Maine Railroad company, the SS Mt. Washington was launched in July 1872 to transport passengers and goods to key ports around the lake, as seen in early maps such as Calvert’s Map of the Lakes Region (1893). Tourism soon boomed at the Weirs transportation hub.

The Mount dominated lake transportation by the end of the 19th century, carrying more than 60,000 passengers annually. However, with the advent of automobile transportation and gradual decline of the railroad, the ship was sold in 1922 to Captain Leander Lavallee, who promoted area tourism with destinations around Lake Winnipesaukee. The original Mount burned at the Weirs landing in December 1939, where the fire also destroyed the wharf and railroad station.

Captain Lavallee then acquired the SS Chateaugay on Lake Champlain, and had that steamship cut into 20 sections and transported by train to Lakeport for reassembly. The new SS Mt. Washington II was launched in August 1940. The Mount has since undergone many changes, including lengthening and renaming as the MS Mount Washington. From a steam-powered sidewheeler to the 230-foot motorship today, the celebrated Mount endures as an icon of life on Lake Winnipesaukee.