314 Dane Road, Center Harbor, NH 03226

The Sturtevant Farm was built on land on Sunset Hill by Joseph Sturtevant in 1820. The Sturtevant Family was a Mayflower descendant and settled in Center Harbor from Halifax, MA. Over its lifetime, the Greek Revival home has taken on many roles, from a Tavern to a boarding House for summer travelers, which included poet John Greenleaf Whittier. Whittier composed “The Wood Giant” here, inspired by a large pine tree on the property, which would later be called the “Whittier Pine”. In the early 1900s the property was sold and used as Pinelands School for girls, which was the first girls’ camp on Squam. In the 1950s the property was used as Camp Cardinal Newman and owned by The Newman School in Boston, MA. Today, the main home still stands along with several older outbuildings and camps, which guide you down the driving trail on 40 acres to the Main Lodge. The Lodge sits about halfway down on the property and rests next to the new “wood giant” which grew in the exact spot of the Whittier … read more …