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Chapter 7 - Thousand Islands

Boldt Castle, Alexandria Bay, NY

                 

All sites in this chapter:
  : County Courthouse, Oswego
  : City Hall, Oswego
  : Richardson-Bates House, Oswego
  : Flower Memorial Library, Watertown
  : La Duchesse Houseboat, Clayton
  : Antique Boat Museum, Clayton
  : Thousand Island Park: Library, Wellesley Island
  : Thousand Island Park: Boat Livery and Public
       Docks, Wellesley Island
  : George C. Boldt Castle, Alexandria Bay
  : Boldt Yacht House, Wellesley Island
 

G eorge C. Boldt (1852-1916) was the owner of the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in Philadelphia and the proprietor of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City. He purchased a five-acre island in the St. Lawrence River, reconfigured the island into a more perfect heart shape by constructing a 500-foot gently curving lagoon, called it Heart Island, and began the construction of a complex of buildings including a 120-room mansion––all to express his love and devotion to his wife, Louise. The estate was designed in a mixture of medieval and Victorian styles by the Philadelphia architectural firm of W.D. Hewitt and G.W. Hewitt. Boldt engaged 300 stonemasons, carpenters, and artists to construct the grandiose six-story stone residence, reminiscent of Rhineland castles in his native Germany, with towers, spires, turrets, steep gables, candle-snuffer roofs, crenellations, finials, and massive chimneys. The complex included 10 additional ornate medieval buildings, as well as tunnels, drawbridge, dovecote, and Italian gardens. A huge, 64-foot-high yacht house was erected on neighboring Wellesley Island. When work was 90 percent complete in 1904, Louise suddenly died. Heartbroken, Boldt abandoned the project and never returned to Heart Island. He died in 1916, a shattered man. The Thousand Islands Bridge Authority acquired the estate in 1977 and undertook a restoration that has so far cost $12 million. An entry hall with a grand staircase receives daylight from a skylighted central dome four stories above. A number of meticulously renovated rooms are open to the public, including the reception room, billiard room, and dining room. These rooms display elaborate plasterwork and fine oak paneling, marble fireplaces, Louis XV-style furniture, and Boldt family china and silverware.