The Grange as it appeared in the summer of 1970.
The portico is not original to the structure and it is being
held up by tree logs.
Lucy C. Carnegie built The Grange probably around the late 1890's. The estate manager William E. Page and his wife lived in the structure until his death.
The Grange is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is part of the Dungeness Historic District. The residence was built just behind the neglected and ruined Pool House.
An old slide of The Pool House in 1970.
The house and it's few acreages are in a Reserved Property Agreement (RPA) with Carnegie descendants. The family has maintained the structure throughout the years and appears to be reasonably sound. I believe that they have learned that keeping a maintained roof helps to preserve a structure.
The RPA lease will expire in a few months and become property of the NPS. Once the ownership is taken, the NPS will be responsible for maintaining and renovating the historic significant structure, forever.
The problem, and everyone knows this, no additional funding will be available for this home or any of the other 100 or so structures to be maintained on the island, especially during the state of the present economy.
I believe that the NPS should consider extending the present RPA to the present owner so that the building will be preserved for generations to come. We are learning now that some property is deteriorating in the NPS hands because of lack of funding. The current owner has stated they would upgrade the structure to NPS standards.
For the record, I do not know any previous or current owners of The Grange. I'm just a concerned citizen.
Please check out these sites:
Please comment on your concerns here about The Grange and The Stafford Beach Cottage and how they need to be preserved and maintained.
http://www.hscl.cr.nps.gov/insidenps/summary.asp
The National Park Service List of Classified Structures for Cumberland Island National Seashore.
http://www.hscl.cr.nps.gov/insidenps/summary.asp
The National Park Service List of Classified Structures for Cumberland Island National Seashore.
sorry that even though your statements DO NOT fall upon deaf ears... NOBODY has the balls to step up and take claim. It's very unfortunate that all the women here now have to worry about
ReplyDelete"what other people think"...
do you think I give a damn?
Let me tell ya something....
ReplyDeleteAin't nobody gonna take my house. If this were my house. HA!~I'd been shoutin from the rooftops A LONG time ago...
see where negotiations get ya?!?!
no. they do not.
but. they are about to.
I believe you. As an outsider, I have long wondered why the park service aggressively ran over property owners like your family and left the Fergusons alone.
ReplyDeleteSpent all day searching the internet for information on that and hardly found a thing!
ReplyDeleteI will not go before all the other fee simple land owners are gone. We've had 4 houses, all fee simple, at different time. Each one was taken by the park. Do you think I'm going without letting the truth out and making the park do what the 1972 CINS Act says they are suppose to do? no! Why the Grange didn't say, "we are the only ones who ever gave a thing to park... Plum Orchard, Contents, 50,000.00 and now you want us to leave when there's folks like a commercial institution here? and then Thornton Morris who got his land by promising to marry Peggy Perkins and had it deeded to him and then did not marry her and yet still lives smack dab in the middle of the wilderness and built a lodge while on Art Fredericks watch w/backhoes and all kinds of crap and is STILLLLLLLL bldg, plowing down trees,etc. while they come after folks like Doc Jenkins,etc. It's all so convuluted. I tell ya, I'd be shouting from the rooftops YEARS ago.... but, no they are worried about what the papers will say about them. Just like the Goodsells. I'd have built a landing strip in the middle of the wilderness on the land that they own. That would have shown the park. But no, they are just gonna turn it all over to them now that 2010 is here. Do you think I would have done that? Ha~! I'd of had backhoes up there and cement trucks. Folks have no backbone anymore.
ReplyDelete