The Potter Mansion was located on the corner of South Main Street and Ward Street in North Brookfield, Massachusetts. You can see through this 1830’s map where the location of the house is labeled as “C. Potter”, likely for Cheney Potter, Captain John Potter’s son. You can see in this other map where street names have been applied and can use it to compare the 1830’s map to a modern day map to see where streets line up together.

In the Potter Mansion specifically, we know that Captain John Potter did not build his house all in one go. Captain Potter was building his house “on top of another house.” Essentially, Captain Potter was expanding an older house, salvaging the parts that did work and taking down the parts that didn’t. Captain Potter also fought in the Revolutionary War, and during his wartime travels, he would have encountered houses with much higher ceilings. Once he returned home from war, he was able to complete his house, and likely took inspiration from the houses he saw to build his house. Those three factors contributed to the different ceiling heights. Something that is also important to remember was that ceilings were also kept lower to conserve heat—so some rooms may have been left with a lower ceiling to aid in lowering heating costs.

Today, we are very lucky that we have TVs, sports, and the internet to keep us busy! Back in the 18th and 19th centuries, they did not have such luxuries. They had much more time on their hands, and would have had to learn very different skills than we have to learn today to keep their household running from day to day. We don’t know who taught Captain John Potter his skills, unfortunately. Accumulating the wealth during the period that John Potter lived in was likely similar to accumulating that much wealth today. With questions like this, there isn’t a straight answer—much like today, people were different and would have reacted differently to accumulating wealth. Captain John Potter chose to be philanthropic with his wealth and helped out the town as much as he could, from building a clock on the top of his house to offering lessons to the town children.

The cat statues are replicas! On the bottom of the cat it says, “Replicas of Early American Chalkware Liberty Workshop”. They were made in Great Neck, NY and are vintage. We don’t have an exact year that they were produced.

The machine on the floor with a hand crank is another version of a butter churn. These were invented in 18th century Europe using barrels, and the hand crank turned paddles within the barrel.

The molds filled with wax would have been dipped into hot water for a few moments- just enough to release the candles from the molds without melting them!

We can't give you an exact address, but according to our records, the Gilbert Homestead was originally on Snow Road to the north of Wickaboag Lake.

The metal tongs underneath the pipe box were used to grab tobacco for pipes.

The Carriage House was constructed in 1984, replacing the Stagecoach Barn that was there prior. When it was constructed, it contained up to date banquet facilities. Today, it is a part of Storrowton Tavern, and hosts a variety of functions. To learn more about how to reserve the Carriage House for a function call Storrowton Tavern at (413) 732-4188.

The Carriage House was built in 1984, to replace the Stagecoach Barn that was there prior. Today, it and the rest of the grounds are maintained by the Eastern States Exposition Operations Department.