Hartness House Trip

The Hartness House is a historic Vermont Bed and Breakfast and country inn offering 43 rooms, all with private baths, modern amenities, and a fine dining restaurant in a beautifully restored 1904 country mansion and estate belonging to former governor of Vermont James Hartness.

Skyscrapers members arrive at Hildene, the summer home for 21 years of Robert Todd Lincoln, son of President Abraham Lincoln.

As a young man, Robert Lincoln became interested in mathematical computations and science, resulting in his interest in astronomy. Soon after arriving at Hildene, he surveyed and selected a high point of land for his observatory. Within 80 yards, northeast of the house, it offered a clear and unobstructed celestial view. The dome was constructed on a concrete base, fourteen feet in diameter and six inches thick. The original canvas covered wood dome was constructed by the Eagle Square Company in nearby Shaftsbury, VT. The cost in June of 1908 was $182.16.

$The original telescope soon proved inadequate for Mr. Lincoln's needs, and he commissioned the building of a larger, six inch refracting telescope by the Warner and Swasey Company of Cleveland Ohio with the optics being ground by the John A. Brashear Company off Pittsburgh Pennsylvania for a total cost of $1,920.00. When it arrived at Hildene in the summer of 1909, several courses of brick had to be added to the observatory walls to accommodate the larger instrument.$

$Two years after Mr. Lincoln's death in 1926, Mary Harlan Lincoln donated the telescope to Burr & Burton Seminary, the local secondary school. Hildene's empty observatory was then used as a smokehouse and storage facility for several decades before falling into disrepair. In 1984 a challenge grant was awarded to Friends of Hildene, Inc. for the observatory's restoration. The goal was exceeded in less than a month. In 1992 Lincoln's six inch Brashear refractor was returned to Hildene along with the original observing chair.$

$The refractor was fully restored in 2002 and has a 6$

Doug Harrigan of the Hildene Astronomy Club was our gracious host.

Skyscrapers in front of Robert Todd Lincoln's observatory

Robert Todd Lincoln's observatory at Hildene

The gardens of Hildene - note the observatory to the right of the mansion.

Hartness House telescope with the moon overhead

Hartness House telescope is accessed from a tunnel that leads from the house to the telescope. The observer sits in a completely enclosed room protected from the elements. The objective lens is a 10

L-R: Rick Lynch, Sue Hubbard, and Ray Kenison

Improvements continue to be made to the Inn by the new owners Alex and Alla. This is the the main entrance and staircase in the original house.

Tea time for Skyscrapers at Hartness House Inn