Grey Towers NHS- Mildford, PA

Travelling via Interstate 84 to Massachusetts from Ohio became a regular event for me in 2020 and 2021. Driving that lonely, mountainous route was not the most convenient or safe undertaking, but it was incredibly scenic, and the only real option due to Covid. That said, the route did introduced me to the Poconos, the magnificent Settler’s Inn, and a grand Gilded Age mansion called Grey Towers, for which I will be forever grateful.

Grey Towers was commissioned in 1884 by New York City businessman and philanthropist James Pinchot, who made his fortune importing and manufacturing Victorian wallpaper. Known as a great supporter of the arts, with a large group of influential friends, Pinchot turned to one them, Richard Morris Hunt, to design his summer house in Milford, Pennsylvania.

Completed in 1886, Hunt delivered an impressive French Chateauesque style mansion, modeled after the Marquis de Lafayette’s LaGrange, a nod to Pinchot’s Gallic heritage. Built largely from local materials, including hemlock timbers, bluestone and slate, the house cost $19,000 to construct, which curiously was less than he spent to furnish the house, reportedly a hefty $24,000.

Strikingly beautiful, with views for days, the Pinchot family summered at the estate for almost twenty years. During this time, James Pinchot witnessed the vast deforestation of surrounding land, prompting him to encourage his son Gifford to pursue a career in forestry and conservation.

As no formal programs existed at that time, Gifford forged his own path, first at Yale, then at France’s Ecole Nationale Forestiere. By 1905, he was named Chief Forester of the United States Forest Service by President Theodore Roosevelt.

James Pinchot died in 1908, followed by his wife in 1914. Gifford Pinchot then inherited the grand house, which he and his wife almost immediately remodeled. Several rooms on the first floor of the mansion were merged to create a large entertaining space; outside, a substantial playhouse coined the Bait Box was built for their son, as well as a pool, a dining terrace, and an archive building.

The property certainly suited Pinchot, who would go on to serve two terms as Governor of Pennsylvania. Pinchot died in 1946, followed by his wife Cornelia in 1960. In 1963, their son donated the property to the U.S. Forest Service.

In 1963, The Pinchot Institute, a conservation organization, was dedicated on the site by President John F. Kennedy, who gave a speech on the grand lawn. Later that year, the property became one of the first sites declared a National Historic Landmark by the Secretary of the Interior.

I returned to Grey Towers several times after discovering the property in 2020, hoping against all odds that the mansion would reopen for interior tours. That never happened. Regardless, the grounds are absolutely magnificent, and the views breathtaking- no doubt more impressive than what remains inside after such a long tenure as office space- or so I tell myself.

I no longer take this route, but should I find myself back in this part of the world after Covid, I will absolutely stop in and find out.