Birch Island

Birch Island boat house, built 1892. Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 89 Mr. and Mrs Anson Phelps Stokes playing cards in camp. Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 89 Birch Island sitting room, built 1887. Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 98 Birch Island boat landing 1883. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 228 Birch Island, camp life, 1883. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 228 Birch Island, original dining room, 1883. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 228; also in Camp Chronicles, p. 28. Birch Island, original kitchen, 1883. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 228 Birch Island, Mildred, Ethel, Caroline, 1886. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 228 Birch Island from breakwater, 1884. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 230 Birch Island, 1884. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 230; also in Camp Chronicles, p. 35. Mrs. Hooker captioned it: "Mother, Ethel, and Carrie on the platform of the tent which burned. Note Newton's cabin still facing the lake." Birch Island landing, 1884. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 230 One of the original Birch Island log cabins, Ethel, Mildred, Carrie, 1884. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 230; also in Camp Chronicles, p. 30, where Mrs. Hooker calls it "Our First 'Main Cabin'." Birch Island Camp 1886. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 230 Birch Island boat landing 1886. Stokes Records, vol I, after p. 230; also in Camp Chronicles, p. 38. Birch Island dining room 1906. Mr. Stokes, Carol, Anson, Rose, Graham, S.B. Thorne, Mildred, Mrs. Stokes, John, Ethel, Harold, Helen, Carrie, Newton, Edith. Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 128 Birch Island living room (undated). Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 126 Birch Island main cabin (undated). Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 126 Birch Island main cabin (undated). Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 126 Birch Island main cabin porch (undated). Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 126 Birch Island, 1904. Anson, Newton, John Hoyt, Helen, Graham, Robert Hunter, Harold Carol, Edith, Ethel, Mrs. Stokes, Mr. Stokes, Sarah, Carrie, Mildred Helen Hoyt, Sherman Hoyt, Anson Hoyt, and Robert Hunter, Jr. Stokes Records, vol III, after p. 114
Birch Island, in Upper St. Regis Lake, was the site of the summer camp of the Stokes family; built in 1876, it was the first of what would become a small colony of summer camps of the wealthy and powerful, who had been drawn to the area by Paul Smith's Hotel, on Lower St. Regis Lake. Countess Alicia Spaulding Paolozzi spent many summers there in her youth. ¹

Malone Palladium, May 7, 1906

Several new buildings are in the course of construction at the camp of Anson Phelps Stokes on the Upper St. Regis Lake. A new heating system will be installed, and it is proposed to make the camp suitable for occupancy occasionally in the winter.

Adirondack Daily Enterprise, July 1, 1954

Telephone Service Restored on Island

Through the good offices of R. J. Longtin, president of the Paul Smith's Electric Light and Power and Railroad Company, telephone service has been restored to one of the two old Stokes camps on islands in Upper St. Regis Lake after an interruption of more than 60 years.

In 1884 the late I. N. Phelps Stokes, Phelps Smith and Joe Baker ran a telephone line from Paul Smith's Hotel to Birch Island, at that time the summer home of Mr. Stokes' father, the late Anson Phelps Stokes. They laid a cable on the bottom of the lake to carry the line to the island, now owned by William S. Spaulding Jr.

The old cable was later abandoned. A new one, a quarter of a mile long, was laid last week by Albert Claremont, one of the company's foremen, and Morris Harrigan of Lake Clear. This time the line was laid from the Upper St Regis Boat Landing to Pearl Island, the present summer home of Mr. Stokes' son Harold Phelps Stokes.

External links:

• Anson Phelps Stokes, ''Stokes Records'', in four volumes, privately printed, 1910.