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The Wayside Inn (Sudbury)

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Coordinates: 42°21′28″N 71°28′5″W / 42.35778°N 71.46806°W / 42.35778; -71.46806
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Not to be confused with The Wayside.
The Wayside Inn
The inn in 2009
Map
Former namesHowe's Tavern
General information
Architectural styleAmerican colonial
LocationSudbury, Massachusetts, U.S.
Address72 Wayside Inn Road
Sudbury, Massachusetts 01776
Coordinates42°21′28″N 71°28′5″W / 42.35778°N 71.46806°W / 42.35778; -71.46806
Completed1686 (338 years ago) (1686)
Other information
ParkingYes
Website
www.wayside.org

The Wayside Inn is a historic inn in Sudbury, Massachusetts, included on the National Register of Historic Places as part of the listed Wayside Inn Historic District.[1] It became an inn called Howe's Tavern in 1716, making it one of the oldest continuously operating inns in the United States.[2] The Beekman Arms Inn and others make various claims towards being "continuously operating", resulting from The Wayside Inn's closure period of 1861–1897 after the death of Lyman Howe.[3]

History

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The inn's archive has documents from 1686 onward, including the official inn license granted to innkeeper David Howe in 1716.[4] His son Ezekiel was the next innkeeper and fought in the American Revolutionary War with the Sudbury Minutemen.[5]

Two slaves are known to have lived at the inn: a man named "Portsmouth" and an unnamed girl were purchased in 1773 and 1779, respectively, by Ezekiel Howe.[6]

Lyman Howe, a fifth-generation owner of the property, died unmarried and without children in 1861.[3]

Poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow visited the inn in 1862 with his publisher James T. Fields, shortly after it had become the Red Horse Tavern. He noted that it was "a rambling, tumble-down building, two hundred years old; and till now in the family of the Howes".[3] He set his compilation of poems Tales of a Wayside Inn at this inn and originally considered titling it Sudbury Tales. The book was published in 1863 and presented as a series of stories told by several guests at the inn. It included the poem "Paul Revere's Ride" as "The Landlord's Tale".

In 1893, Homer Rogers and S. Herbert Howe took over ownership of the inn. Rogers was the first person outside of the Howe family to own the inn, which was built after King Philip's War. Howe and Rogers spent a considerable amount of money renovating and improving it.[7] In 1897, the tavern was purchased by Edward R. Lemon, who again converted it into an inn.[3]

Henry Ford was the last private owner of the inn. He purchased it in 1923 from Cora Lemon. The following year,[8] he purchased 3,000 acres (12 km2) surrounding the inn from John Duncan Pearmain,[9] with the aim of developing it into a historically oriented village and museum. "He fell in love with it at first sight," said John W. Burke, the Ford family chauffeur of 42 years.[10]

Ford's aims were not accomplished at the Wayside, but he did establish the non-profit institution that now operates the inn and associated museum, watermill, and archives. He also established the Wayside Inn Boys School, a trade school which operated from 1928 to 1947, aiming to demonstrate his belief that "the only way to really learn is by doing."[11] Ford claimed to have invested $1,616,956.11 to the project.[12] He sold the Wayside property in 1945, ultimately fulfilling his desires to create such a museum at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan.[13]

The inn was gutted by a fire on the night of December 22 and 23, 1955, full of antiques collected by Ford in the 1920s.[14] It was restored to the way that it had appeared when Longfellow stayed there using many original beams and pieces of furniture, with a $500,000 grant from the Ford Foundation.[15] The inn re-opened June 7, 1958 with an open house and picnics on the lawn of the property's Martha-Mary Chapel and gristmill.[16]

In 2019, the Inn's volunteer board of trustees took the name "The Wayside Inn Foundation," as they worked to develop more research and outreach for a property that includes the Inn and other historic buildings on its "over 100 acres of fields and forests."[17] It is still in operation as a restaurant, offering historically accurate guest rooms and hosting for small receptions. A guest book was kept for many years, including observations of famous people who stayed or dined at the inn, entries written by the guests, and newspaper clippings for context.[18]

Replica

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Jesse Winburn built a replica of the inn in Rye, New York, in the late 1920s at the cost of $250,000. It was his final project before he died in 1929, aged 58.[19][20]

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  • A marker announcing George Washington's passing through in 1775
    A marker announcing George Washington's passing through in 1775
  • 1865 oil painting of the inn
    1865 oil painting of the inn
  • Scanned image from King's Hand-book of the United States (1891)
    Scanned image from King's Hand-book of the United States (1891)
  • Boston Society of Architects meeting at the Wayside Inn (c. 1908)
    Boston Society of Architects meeting at the Wayside Inn (c. 1908)
  • Wayside Inn coach house, drawn by WPA artist sometime between 1935 and 1943
    Wayside Inn coach house, drawn by WPA artist sometime between 1935 and 1943
  • The main entrance of the inn, 2007
    The main entrance of the inn, 2007
  • The inn's tavern, on the eastern side of the building, 2010
    The inn's tavern, on the eastern side of the building, 2010

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Wayside Inn Historic District – National Park Service
  2. ^ History of Cooperative Soybean Processing in the United States (1923–2008), William Shurtleff and Akiko Aoyagi (2008), p. 167 ISBN 9781928914167
  3. ^ a b c d Gale, Robert L. A Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Companion. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2003: 258. ISBN 0-313-32350-X
  4. ^ Historic Homes and Genealogical memoirs of Early New England pg 281–283 publ 1909 by Ellery Bicknell Crane
  5. ^ Harris, Patricia; Lyon, David (2005-12-11). "Sudbury inn's cocktail of history and comfort". Boston.com. Retrieved 2020-06-22.
  6. ^ Plumb, Brian E. (2011-11-04). A History of Longfellow's Wayside Inn. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 978-1-61423-848-5.
  7. ^ "The Old Wayside Inn: The House Made Famous by Longfellow Sold to a Boston Man". The New York Times. January 24, 1897.
  8. ^ "Ford Buys Sudbury Land" – New York Times, March 16, 1924, p. 59
  9. ^ of 1913, Harvard College (1780-) Class (1917). Secretary's Second Report. Plimpton Press.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  10. ^ "Chauffeur Relates Tales of Wayside Inn When Henry Ford Became Its Landlord"] – New York Times, March 29, 1956, p. 17
  11. ^ Henry Ford's Boys: the story of the Wayside Inn Boys School, Curtis F. Garfield and Alison R. Ridley, Porcupine Enterprises, 1998, page 1
  12. ^ Gale, Robert L. A Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Companion. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2003: 259. ISBN 0-313-32350-X
  13. ^ Wayside Inn History. Retrieved May 2008.
  14. ^ New York Times, December 23, 1955
  15. ^ "THE WAYSIDE INN; Hostelry Made Famous by Longfellow Being Restored and Preserved". The New York Times. September 9, 1957. Retrieved January 14, 2024. Examination of the underlying structure after the fire disclosed many traces of the earliest building, and it was decided to restore the Inn as it looked in the early Sixties when Longfellow was a guest there and writing the famous "Tales."
  16. ^ "2000 attend reopening of historic Wayside Inn". Boston Globe. June 8, 1958. Retrieved January 14, 2024. a parade of antique vehicles, headed by a Colonial stage coach and carrying officials of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Ford Foundation, and the inn itself, rolled up to the handsome front door.
  17. ^ "A new name for Longfellow's Wayside Inn". Boston Globe. October 3, 2019. Archived from the original on October 6, 2019. the Wayside property includes not just the restaurant (and 10 rooms for overnight guests) but the Grist Mill — "the same one depicted on the Pepperidge Farm logo, because for years this is where they got their flour from" — the Martha-Mary Chapel, the Redstone Schoolhouse, and over 100 acres of fields and forests. The inn was designated a Massachusetts Landmark in 1970, and the property was first listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.
  18. ^ Wayside Inn (Sudbury, Mass ) (1929). Wayside Inn front door diaries. Longfellow's Wayside Inn.
  19. ^ "Ashlanders Recall Fierce Little Philanthropist Who Gave Much to City" – The Oregonian, December 25, 1963
  20. ^ Duplicate Of Wayside Inn As Home" – New York Times, December 13, 1926
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