Zane Grey Museum (Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania)
Encyclopedia
The Zane Grey Museum in Lackawaxen Township, Pennsylvania, United States, is a former residence of the author Zane Grey
and is now maintained as a museum and operated by the National Park Service
(NPS). It is located on the upper Delaware River
and is on the National Register of Historic Places
. It contains many photographs, artworks, books, furnishings, and other objects of interest associated with Grey and his family.
The house was built in two sections, both from designs by Grey. The first was in 1905 by Zane Grey's brother, Romer Carl "Reddy" Grey
; the second seven years later by a neighbor, to serve as a writing studio and library after the success of Riders of the Purple Sage
. Grey and his wife moved to California so he could work on screenplays in 1918, but Lackawaxen and the house remained one of his favorite places for the rest of his life. It was added to the Register in 1983.
north of Roebling's Delaware Aqueduct
, an early suspension bridge which still carries vehicle and foot traffic across the river between Pennsylvania and New York. Along the riverfront to the north, it is 300 feet (91.4 m) to the Delaware's confluence with the Lackawaxen River
, the largest tributary of the Upper Delaware in Pennsylvania, resulting in slightly choppier water in front of the house. The grassy, maintained ground slopes gently from Pennsylvania Route 590
to the west toward the river, giving the house's east (front) a view across to undeveloped woods on the New York side in Minisink Ford
.
In front of the house, the slope exposes the northern corner more than the southern one. There is a small unpaved parking lot, sign for the museum and state historical marker as well. The house is to the north of a cluster of other buildings in the neighborhood, most notably the former D&H Canal Co. Office
, now a bed and breakfast
.
The two-story clapboard
-sided frame
structure rises from an exposed bluestone
foundation
. It is three bays
long by six wide, in an L-shaped plan. The older, east-west–oriented block of the house has a square hipped roof
with two large pediment
ed dormer windows with dentilled lintels on the east and south sides, with a smaller jerkin-roofed dormer complementing the eastern one. The newer wing designed by Grey and built by his brother has a rectangular hipped roof of gentler pitch
with three small jerkined dormers. Both roofs are surfaced with diamond-shaped shingles
of white asbestos
cement and pierced by a single brick chimney per wing.
A single wraparound porch with flat roof, balustrade and bracketed
columns runs the length of the south and east elevations, combining two previously separate porches, one of which had lost its original roof in the floods of 1955. White wooden posts mark the house's corners, and the second-story windows have awning
s.
Inside, the floor plans reflect the two sections' separate construction. The earlier one has a square plan, the later one a rectangular. Many original finishes and decorations remain. Opposite the original front door at the southeast corner is a brick fireplace trimmed with unglazed terra cotta
, including egg-and-dart molding. A T-plan staircase has its original decorative balustrade and newel
posts.
The northeast door is the main entrance to the newer wing. It opens onto a living space that runs the length and half the wodth of the addition. Opposite the door is its fireplace, likewise of brick and topped with a bevel
ed mirror to a height of 7 feet (2.1 m). Behind it the library includes many original trim, particularly a 2 inch deep painted frieze
depicting kachina
dolls, reflecting Grey's interests in the Southwest
. These rooms, and Grey's upstairs studio
, house most of the museum exhibits and visitor interest today.
, Grey had established a dental practice in New York City in 1896 but soon grew dissatisfied with the field. He dabbled in semi-professional baseball and wrote his first stories and novels. They were not successful, but by 1905 he had decided to leave dentistry for writing. They had begun the process of building the first part of the house, the southern wing, after seeing the site on a fishing trip that year, and later they moved their families into it.
Grey continued to write westerns
, and took two extended research trips to the Southwest over the next several years. He worked, at the time, in a bungalow
near the house that is no longer extant. These resulted in Heritage of the Desert in 1911 and Riders of the Purple Sage
the following year, his bestselling novel. With the proceeds from the latter work, he designed the study wing. It was built by a neighbor, Gottlieb Kuhn, in 1912.
He continued writing novels there for six more years until the nascent film industry beckoned. He and his wife moved to Altadena, California
, where they eventually purchased an estate
as he became even more commercially successful as a film producer as well. He remained in California until his 1939 death, but retained the Lackawaxen house for visits east. Both he and his wife are buried in Union Cemetery, not far from the house.
In 1945, Grey's widow sold the house to a friend, who operated it as an inn for 25 years. During that time, in 1955, the building suffered some serious flood damage, tearing off the roof of the first front porch. In 1973, they converted it into the museum, which they sold to the Park Service in 1989.
Floods in the summer of 2006 left 6 to 8 ft (1.8 to 2.4 ) of water in the basement. The Park Service was able to get the collection to safety, but it was necessary to thoroughly dehumidify
the space before reopening the museum.
Zane Grey
Zane Grey was an American author best known for his popular adventure novels and stories that presented an idealized image of the Old West. Riders of the Purple Sage was his bestselling book. In addition to the success of his printed works, they later had second lives and continuing influence...
and is now maintained as a museum and operated by the National Park Service
National Park Service
The National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...
(NPS). It is located on the upper Delaware River
Delaware River
The Delaware River is a major river on the Atlantic coast of the United States.A Dutch expedition led by Henry Hudson in 1609 first mapped the river. The river was christened the South River in the New Netherland colony that followed, in contrast to the North River, as the Hudson River was then...
and is on the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
. It contains many photographs, artworks, books, furnishings, and other objects of interest associated with Grey and his family.
The house was built in two sections, both from designs by Grey. The first was in 1905 by Zane Grey's brother, Romer Carl "Reddy" Grey
Reddy Grey
Romer Carl "Reddy" Grey was a professional baseball player. He played one game in Major League Baseball in 1903 for the Pittsburgh Pirates.- Baseball career :...
; the second seven years later by a neighbor, to serve as a writing studio and library after the success of Riders of the Purple Sage
Riders of the Purple Sage
Riders of the Purple Sage is Zane Grey's best-known novel, originally published in 1912. Most critics agree that it played a significant role in shaping the formula of the popular Western genre.- Plot in a paragraph :...
. Grey and his wife moved to California so he could work on screenplays in 1918, but Lackawaxen and the house remained one of his favorite places for the rest of his life. It was added to the Register in 1983.
Building
The house is along Scenic Drive, a short road along the Delaware RiverDelaware River
The Delaware River is a major river on the Atlantic coast of the United States.A Dutch expedition led by Henry Hudson in 1609 first mapped the river. The river was christened the South River in the New Netherland colony that followed, in contrast to the North River, as the Hudson River was then...
north of Roebling's Delaware Aqueduct
Roebling's Delaware Aqueduct
-External links:...
, an early suspension bridge which still carries vehicle and foot traffic across the river between Pennsylvania and New York. Along the riverfront to the north, it is 300 feet (91.4 m) to the Delaware's confluence with the Lackawaxen River
Lackawaxen River
The Lackawaxen River is a tributary of the Delaware River in northeastern Pennsylvania in the United States. The river flows through a largely rural area in the northern Pocono Mountains, draining an area of approximately ....
, the largest tributary of the Upper Delaware in Pennsylvania, resulting in slightly choppier water in front of the house. The grassy, maintained ground slopes gently from Pennsylvania Route 590
Pennsylvania Route 590
Pennsylvania Route 590 is a long state highway located in Lackawanna, Wayne, and Pike counties in Pennsylvania. The western terminus is at PA 435 in Elmhurst Township. The eastern terminus is at PA 434 in Lackawaxen Township....
to the west toward the river, giving the house's east (front) a view across to undeveloped woods on the New York side in Minisink Ford
Minisink Ford, New York
Minisink Ford is a hamlet on the Delaware River fifteen miles northwest of Port Jervis. It is in the town of Highland, Sullivan County, New York, in the United States.-History:...
.
In front of the house, the slope exposes the northern corner more than the southern one. There is a small unpaved parking lot, sign for the museum and state historical marker as well. The house is to the north of a cluster of other buildings in the neighborhood, most notably the former D&H Canal Co. Office
Delaware and Hudson Canal Company Office
The D&H Canal Co. Office, now known as the Roebling Inn, is located on Scenic Drive in Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania, United States. It is a mid-19th century wooden house in the Greek Revival architectural style....
, now a bed and breakfast
Bed and breakfast
A bed and breakfast is a small lodging establishment that offers overnight accommodation and breakfast, but usually does not offer other meals. Since the 1980s, the meaning of the term has also extended to include accommodations that are also known as "self-catering" establishments...
.
The two-story clapboard
Clapboard (architecture)
Clapboard, also known as bevel siding or lap siding or weather-board , is a board used typically for exterior horizontal siding that has one edge thicker than the other and where the board above laps over the one below...
-sided frame
Framing (construction)
Framing, in construction known as light-frame construction, is a building technique based around structural members, usually called studs, which provide a stable frame to which interior and exterior wall coverings are attached, and covered by a roof comprising horizontal ceiling joists and sloping...
structure rises from an exposed bluestone
Bluestone
Bluestone is a cultural or commercial name for a number of dimension or building stone varieties, including:*a feldspathic sandstone in the U.S. and Canada;*limestone in the Shenandoah Valley in the U.S...
foundation
Foundation (architecture)
A foundation is the lowest and supporting layer of a structure. Foundations are generally divided into two categories: shallow foundations and deep foundations.-Shallow foundations:...
. It is three bays
Bay (architecture)
A bay is a unit of form in architecture. This unit is defined as the zone between the outer edges of an engaged column, pilaster, or post; or within a window frame, doorframe, or vertical 'bas relief' wall form.-Defining elements:...
long by six wide, in an L-shaped plan. The older, east-west–oriented block of the house has a square hipped roof
Hip roof
A hip roof, or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope. Thus it is a house with no gables or other vertical sides to the roof. A square hip roof is shaped like a pyramid. Hip roofs on the houses could have two triangular side...
with two large pediment
Pediment
A pediment is a classical architectural element consisting of the triangular section found above the horizontal structure , typically supported by columns. The gable end of the pediment is surrounded by the cornice moulding...
ed dormer windows with dentilled lintels on the east and south sides, with a smaller jerkin-roofed dormer complementing the eastern one. The newer wing designed by Grey and built by his brother has a rectangular hipped roof of gentler pitch
Roof pitch
In building construction, roof pitch is a numerical measure of the steepness of a roof, and a pitched roof is a roof that is steep.The roof's pitch is the measured vertical rise divided by the measured horizontal span, the same thing as what is called "slope" in geometry. Roof pitch is typically...
with three small jerkined dormers. Both roofs are surfaced with diamond-shaped shingles
Roof shingle
Roof shingles are a roof covering consisting of individual overlapping elements. These elements are typically flat rectangular shapes laid in rows from the bottom edge of the roof up, with each successive higher row overlapping the joints in the row below...
of white asbestos
Asbestos
Asbestos is a set of six naturally occurring silicate minerals used commercially for their desirable physical properties. They all have in common their eponymous, asbestiform habit: long, thin fibrous crystals...
cement and pierced by a single brick chimney per wing.
A single wraparound porch with flat roof, balustrade and bracketed
Bracket (architecture)
A bracket is an architectural member made of wood, stone, or metal that overhangs a wall to support or carry weight. It may also support a statue, the spring of an arch, a beam, or a shelf. Brackets are often in the form of scrolls, and can be carved, cast, or molded. They can be entirely...
columns runs the length of the south and east elevations, combining two previously separate porches, one of which had lost its original roof in the floods of 1955. White wooden posts mark the house's corners, and the second-story windows have awning
Awning
An awning or overhang is a secondary covering attached to the exterior wall of a building. It is typically composed of canvas woven of acrylic, cotton or polyester yarn, or vinyl laminated to polyester fabric that is stretched tightly over a light structure of aluminium, iron or steel, possibly...
s.
Inside, the floor plans reflect the two sections' separate construction. The earlier one has a square plan, the later one a rectangular. Many original finishes and decorations remain. Opposite the original front door at the southeast corner is a brick fireplace trimmed with unglazed terra cotta
Architectural terracotta
Terracotta, in its unglazed form, became fashionable as an architectural ceramic construction material in England in the 1860s, and in the United States in the 1870s. It was generally used to supplement brick and tiles of similar colour in late Victorian buildings.It had been used before this in...
, including egg-and-dart molding. A T-plan staircase has its original decorative balustrade and newel
Newel
A newel, also called a central pole, is an upright post that supports the handrail of a stair banister. In stairs having straight flights it is the principal post at the foot of the staircase, but it can also be used for the intermediate posts on landings and at the top of a staircase...
posts.
The northeast door is the main entrance to the newer wing. It opens onto a living space that runs the length and half the wodth of the addition. Opposite the door is its fireplace, likewise of brick and topped with a bevel
Bevel
A beveled edge refers to an edge of a structure that is not perpendicular to the faces of the piece. The words bevel and chamfer overlap in usage; in general usage they are often interchanged, while in technical usage they may sometimes be differentiated as shown in the image at right.-Cutting...
ed mirror to a height of 7 feet (2.1 m). Behind it the library includes many original trim, particularly a 2 inch deep painted frieze
Frieze
thumb|267px|Frieze of the [[Tower of the Winds]], AthensIn architecture the frieze is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Even when neither columns nor pilasters are expressed, on an astylar wall it lies upon...
depicting kachina
Kachina
A kachina is a spirit being in western Pueblo cosmology and religious practices. The western Pueblo, Native American cultures located in the southwestern United States, include Hopi, Zuni, Tewa Village , Acoma Pueblo, and Laguna Pueblo. The kachina cult has spread to more eastern Pueblos, e.g....
dolls, reflecting Grey's interests in the Southwest
Southwestern United States
The Southwestern United States is a region defined in different ways by different sources. Broad definitions include nearly a quarter of the United States, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Utah...
. These rooms, and Grey's upstairs studio
Studio
A studio is an artist's or worker's workroom, or the catchall term for an artist and his or her employees who work within that studio. This can be for the purpose of architecture, painting, pottery , sculpture, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, radio or television...
, house most of the museum exhibits and visitor interest today.
History
A native of Zanesville, OhioZanesville, Ohio
Zanesville is a city in and the county seat of Muskingum County, Ohio, United States. The population was 25,586 at the 2000 census.Zanesville was named after Ebenezer Zane, who had constructed Zane's Trace, a pioneer road through present-day Ohio...
, Grey had established a dental practice in New York City in 1896 but soon grew dissatisfied with the field. He dabbled in semi-professional baseball and wrote his first stories and novels. They were not successful, but by 1905 he had decided to leave dentistry for writing. They had begun the process of building the first part of the house, the southern wing, after seeing the site on a fishing trip that year, and later they moved their families into it.
Grey continued to write westerns
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
, and took two extended research trips to the Southwest over the next several years. He worked, at the time, in a bungalow
Bungalow
A bungalow is a type of house, with varying meanings across the world. Common features to many of these definitions include being detached, low-rise , and the use of verandahs...
near the house that is no longer extant. These resulted in Heritage of the Desert in 1911 and Riders of the Purple Sage
Riders of the Purple Sage
Riders of the Purple Sage is Zane Grey's best-known novel, originally published in 1912. Most critics agree that it played a significant role in shaping the formula of the popular Western genre.- Plot in a paragraph :...
the following year, his bestselling novel. With the proceeds from the latter work, he designed the study wing. It was built by a neighbor, Gottlieb Kuhn, in 1912.
He continued writing novels there for six more years until the nascent film industry beckoned. He and his wife moved to Altadena, California
Altadena, California
Altadena is an unincorporated area and census-designated place in Los Angeles County, California, United States, approximately from the downtown Los Angeles Civic Center, and directly north of the city of Pasadena, California...
, where they eventually purchased an estate
Zane Grey Estate
The Zane Grey Estate is a National Register of Historic Places structure in Altadena, California. It was placed on the Register in 2002 for its association with author Zane Grey....
as he became even more commercially successful as a film producer as well. He remained in California until his 1939 death, but retained the Lackawaxen house for visits east. Both he and his wife are buried in Union Cemetery, not far from the house.
In 1945, Grey's widow sold the house to a friend, who operated it as an inn for 25 years. During that time, in 1955, the building suffered some serious flood damage, tearing off the roof of the first front porch. In 1973, they converted it into the museum, which they sold to the Park Service in 1989.
Floods in the summer of 2006 left 6 to 8 ft (1.8 to 2.4 ) of water in the basement. The Park Service was able to get the collection to safety, but it was necessary to thoroughly dehumidify
Dehumidifier
A dehumidifier is typically a household appliance that reduces the level of humidity in the air, usually for health reasons. Humid air can cause mold and mildew to grow inside homes, which pose various health risks. Very humid climates or air make some people extremely uncomfortable, causing...
the space before reopening the museum.
See also
- National Register of Historic Places listings in Pike County, PennsylvaniaNational Register of Historic Places listings in Pike County, PennsylvaniaThis is a list of the National Register of Historic Places listings in Pike County, Pennsylvania.This is intended to be a complete list of the properties and districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Pike County, Pennsylvania, United States...
- Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational RiverUpper Delaware Scenic and Recreational RiverThe Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River is located near Narrowsburg, New York, and Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania, on the Delaware River. It includes parts of five counties along this section of the river: Delaware, Orange, and Sullivan in New York, and Pike and Wayne in Pennsylvania.The site...