CARLETON ISLAND
This is the second story in a series written by staff reporter, Kim Lunman, for the Brockville Recorder and Times. The series was entitled " Island Treasures". The newspaper has given Thousand Islands Life permission to publish these articles. We hope you will join us our appreciation to Kim and her paper.
On the tip of an island where Lake Ontario flows into the St. Lawrence River stands a piece of history slowly crumbling into so many yesterdays when it was once the grandest estate in the Thousand Islands.
More than a century ago, before the famous Boldt Castle and Singer Castle were built on islands that have now become international tourist attractions, there was Carleton Villa.
Carleton Villa has not been inhabited for more than six decades, but its fading facade remains majestic even set behind a fence and barbed wire, its towering turrets covered in cobwebs, its once stately walls the victim of vandals despite the 'Keep Out' signs posted around the property.
Photo by Kim Lunman © Recorder and Times
Boaters get a closer look at Carleton Villa on Carleton Island near Cape Vincent, N.Y. located across from Wolfe Island. The historic villa, listed for sale for $495,000 US, was one of the first grand properties built in the Thousand Islands. It was constructed in the 1890s by William O. Wyckoff, who made his fortune marketing Remington typewriters. He died on his first night in the mansion in 1895. No one has lived in the estate for six decades.
Graffiti graces a main entrance on the ground floor where someone has written: 'Pablo was here.' The words 'Help Me' are scrawled on a ceiling of the villa's top storey near a window overlooking the sprawling waterfront estate built in 1894 as a summer retreat for a New York tycoon.
Now the villa is all but a ghost of a gilded age on an untamed island near Cape Vincent, N.Y., not open to the general public.
"It seems the only people that know about it are those that pass it in their boats," said Mike Franklin, a historical property specialist with Saratoga Sotheby's International Realty.
Franklin, who started raising public awareness to save Carleton Villa along with the late Syracuse architect and Thousand Islands author Paul Malo who featured the once-grand estate on the cover of one of his books, is hopeful the building can be preserved.
It is currently listed for sale at US$495,000 but would require millions more to restore. It has been listed for sale for years now by the current owners who have a cottage next door to the decaying villa.
"Every winter, it gets worse," said Franklin. "Someone needs to get in there and stabilize it."
Carleton Villa was built in 1894 by William O. Wyckoff, who made his fortune selling a new invention of the era: the Remington typewriter.
Photo by Kim Lunman © Recorder and Times
Mike Franklin, a historical property specialist from Syracuse N.Y. with Saratoga Sotheby's International Realty, has been raising awareness about historic Fort Haldiman and Carleton Villa on Carleton Island and hopes the once-palatial estate can be preserved.
But Wyckoff never got to live at his villa designed by architect William Miller, known for his work at Cornell University.
Wyckoff is reported to have died his first night in the mansion on July 7, 1895, of a heart attack at the age of 60.
"It's a tragedy," said Franklin. "His wife (Francis) died of cancer a month before he moved in and then he died of a heart attack. They never got to enjoy it."
Wyckoff had two sons. The youngest, Clarence Wyckoff, acquired Carleton Villa after his father died.
The mansion is perched on a rugged point of the island with sweeping vistas overlooking Cape Vincent and Wolfe Island, the largest Thousand Island on the Canadian side, with Kingston in the distance.
The realtor who has listed Carleton Villa said he has been trying to sell the prime waterfront property for years. It is listed on historicproperties.com.
"Over the past years, I've had many people interested," said James Wiley, of Bowes Realty in Clayton, New York. "I have two or three inquiries on that property once every week."
Wiley said he's had potential buyers from as far away as Australia and England and all over the U.S. express interest in purchasing Carleton Villa. "I get inquiries about it from all over the world."
Carleton Island is rich in history predating its once-opulent villa. It was a British military fort during the American Revolution. More than two centuries later, that history is still evident. Remains of barrack chimneys from Fort Haldiman can be seen in meadows of wild grass where deer roam among rows of lilac trees. The British warship HMS Ontario, discovered by divers last month in Lake Ontario, was built and launched from Carleton Island in 1780 - the same year it sank.
Photo by Kim Lunman © Recorder and Times
These converted silos on old farm property on Carleton Island give the property's residents a unique view.
Today, 54 landowners and 34 residences spread over the 1,800-acre island make up its summer community. Once settled as a farm community with a schoolhouse, now silos on one private property have been converted into residential suites overlooking the water. Snorkelers explore the island's bays along with curious boaters while kayakers paddle along its rugged shores.
Summer residents rely on all-terrain vehicles to get around the island. "This is Carleton Island traffic," said Franklin, steering a John Deere Gator along the unspoiled surface of the middle of the island as two boys rumble past in their ATVs. "Most people don't see the island this way."
The island was subdivided by a developer in the 1980s and its dozens of summer residents are mostly Americans. Vince Williams, of Syracuse, makes his Carleton cottage his summer home with wife Traganka, son Steele, 6, and daughter Navada, 4.
Photo by Kim Lunman © Recorder and Times
Carleton Island 'traffic.
"The history of the island is pretty fascinating," said Williams, enjoying a sunny day repairing his dock as a ship glided past in the channel.
"The kids love it," said Traganka. "They can't wait to come here."
The Thousand Island Land Trust in Clayton, N.Y., has owned seven acres of land on the island, including the ruins of Fort Haldiman, since 1986.
"That landscape is unique to the river," said Aaron Vogel, executive director of the non-profit conservation agency. "It's this open grassland.It's like being in another world."
But the future of Carleton Villa remains as unsteady as the harsh winds off this forgotten Thousand Island.
The mansion has survived vandals - some even shot some of its stonework off the entrance with rifles - and a brush with demolition after the General Electric Company acquired the property in the early 1930s intending to build a corporate retreat. Its tower, deemed a hazard, was toppled. General Electric sold the estate during the Second World War and it has been empty ever since.
Carleton Island's military history attracts archeologists to the area in search of artifacts while others are hoping the villa can be preserved as a legacy to the region's golden age.
"It's worthy of preservation," said Vogel of the landmark estate. "It's an interesting mix of natural and cultural histories. It's a beautiful island."
by Kim Lunman KimLunman@ThousandIslandsLife.com
Kim Lunman is an award-winning Canadian journalist whose work has appeared in The Globe and Mail, The National Post, Reader's Digest, The Calgary Herald and other newspapers. She has returned to her hometown of Brockville, "City of the 1000 Islands," where she is a staff writer and photographer for the Recorder and Times. She recently finished a series on the Thousand Islands called Island Treasures to be reprinted by the Recorder and Times as a souvenir magazine Sept. 29.