Hildene

Description:

• When you first drive up the gravel road to this estate, you may not realize that you're face to face with both U.S. history and natural history. Robert Todd Lincoln, son of the tragically assassinated U.S. president, summered in this stately 24-room Georgian Revival mansion between 1905 and 1926, and delighted in showing off its remarkable features; they include a sweeping staircase and a 1908 Aeolian organ with 1,000 pipes (you can hear it played on the house tour). This place is more regal than ostentatious, and it was built with an eye toward quality. Lincoln also had formal gardens designed after the patterns in a stained-glass window and planted on a gentle promontory outside with outstanding views of the flanking mountains -- today, that view is one of the southern Vermont's most popular wedding spots each summer and fall. The home and lovely, expansive grounds can be viewed on group tours that start at an informative visitor center; allow time following the tour to explore those grounds. In summer, there are fun wagon rides to the Hildene farm for $1 extra, and cross-country skiing and snowshoeing are allowed with admission to the grounds in winter.

  Vermont's Honest Abe Connection -- Robert Todd Lincoln was the only son of Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln to survive to maturity -- Robert's three brothers all died very young, and only one of them even lived to his 18th birthday. Robert earned millions working as a corporate attorney, and served as Secretary of War and an ambassador to Britain under three presidents. All that, not to mention his stepping in as president of the Pullman Company -- makers of those famously deluxe train cars -- from 1897 until 1911, following the death of founder George Pullman. (He also infamously committed his mother to an insane asylum after his father's assassination, and she's said to have never forgiven him that.) So what did a successful fellow do with an extra million bucks to burn? Build lavish summer homes, for the most part -- and Lincoln, whose father had grown up in notoriously modest circumstances, was no exception. The result was Hildene.

• © Frommer's 2012

Awards:

Frommer's

•  Highly Recommended 2010