There are places in New England that seem to belong to another time.
Gillette Castle is one of them.
On a warm August evening, we took a drive to East Haddam, Connecticut and wandered the grounds of the castle just as the sun was beginning to drop over the Connecticut River. The stone walls were catching that beautiful late-summer golden light, the gardens were a little wild around the edges, and from high above the river you could see the hills stretching out in every direction.
It was one of those simple summer evenings that reminds me how much history is tucked into the little corners of New England.
And Gillette Castle has quite a story.
The Man Behind the Castle
The castle was the home of William Hooker Gillette, an actor, playwright and director born in Hartford in 1853. Although his name may not be immediately familiar today, his version of Sherlock Holmes certainly is.
Gillette became famous for portraying Holmes on stage, performing the role more than a thousand times over the course of his career. Many of the little things we now associate with Sherlock Holmes were helped along by Gillette's portrayal of the character.
But perhaps the most interesting thing he created wasn't on a stage at all.
It was here, on a hill overlooking the Connecticut River.
Gillette began building his home in 1914 on the southernmost of a series of hills known as the Seven Sisters. Twenty men worked for five years to complete the main structure. Built primarily of local fieldstone over a steel framework, the finished home contained 24 rooms and approximately 14,000 square feet.
Calling it a castle makes it sound far more formal than it actually feels.
It is wonderfully strange.
Gillette designed the house himself, along with much of what went inside it. There are hand-carved wooden light switches, built-in couches, unusual locking mechanisms, a table that moves on tracks and 47 doors, each one designed differently.
It wasn't someone trying to recreate an authentic medieval castle.
It was one very imaginative man building exactly the house he wanted.
And I think that's what I like most about it.
A Little World of His Own
Gillette didn't stop with the house.
His estate eventually included a three-mile, quarter-scale railroad that wound through the property. He used the little train to carry guests around the grounds, through the woods, across trestles and through a tunnel.
Parts of today's walking trails still follow the old railroad bed.
He also owned a houseboat called the Aunt Polly, and the estate was filled with the sorts of personal touches that make history feel less like something behind museum glass and more like someone's actual life.
Standing there more than a century later, you get the feeling that Gillette wasn't particularly interested in doing things the conventional way.
I can appreciate that.
The Castle Above the River
The location may be the best part of all.
Gillette chose a hill roughly 200 feet above the Connecticut River, and when you walk out toward the stone walls at the edge of the property, the river suddenly opens below you.
We happened to be there at just the right time.
The rocks along the wall turned orange in the setting sun. The river became silvery blue. Boats moved quietly below us while the hills on the opposite bank began slipping into shadow.
For a few minutes we just stood there looking out over it.
There are grander landscapes in the world, I'm sure.
But there is something about the Connecticut River winding between those old green New England hills that feels like home.
Preserving Something Irreplaceable
William Gillette died in 1937.
He apparently understood that this place was something special, because his will included a rather memorable request that his home not end up in the hands of someone who had no appreciation for where he was or what surrounded him.
Thankfully, it didn't.
Connecticut acquired the castle and surrounding property in 1943, preserving it as what is now Gillette Castle State Park.
Today the castle sits among 184 acres of woodland, with trails winding through the former estate and along portions of Gillette's old railroad route.
And generations later, we can still climb those stone paths, walk beneath the old trees and stand at the same overlook above the Connecticut River.
I'm grateful places like this were saved.