Bogie Cottage, 2009
Address: 25 Franklin Avenue
Old Address: 59 Franklin Street
Other Names: Bogie Cottage (1911), Ward Cottage (1912), Wooster Cottage (1928), O'Brien Cottage (1948), Lewis (1949); DIS
Year built: 1908
Architects: Coulter and Westhoff
February 1989 NRHP photograph from the West
Historic Saranac LakeThe Bogie Cottage is a Craftsman-inspired cure cottage that was once registered as a private sanatorium, operated as a boarding cottage.
The following has been adapted from an article by Bruce Harvey published in the Adirondack Daily Enterprise, January 21, 1995.
February 1989 NRHP photograph from the East
Historic Saranac LakeThe house stands on Helen Hill, which was the first residential subdivision in Saranac Lake. The first houses to appear there in the 1890s looked like saplings on this barren rise, but more arrived quickly. At first, Franklin Avenue housed a mix of local laborers and professionals. By 1920, the area was a haven for private commercial sanatoria, capped by the grand Reception Hospital, now the Prescott House, at 5 Franklin Avenue.
Dr. S. Lustgarten was the first brief resident at 59 Franklin Ave, in 1908. The house has remained largely intact since then, with a granite and fieldstone cellar/foundation, wood and clapboard siding, and two cobblestone chimneys. The house is named for a later resident, a Mrs. E.M. Bogie, who was living there by 1915. In the 1920s, the house acquired a new porch on the south (downhill) side, and by 1931 it sported a practical, if ungainly, metal fire escape on the southwest corner. The front of the house is the least distinguished, with a small cure porch on the top floor resting on the roof of the full front porch, supported by plain square columns. The sides, though, bring the house alive. The rooflines in particular are notable, with their random assortment of dormers and porches and various types of roots.
It is an unpretentious house that reflects the turn-of-the century Craftsman style. It greatest visual influence came from its use and surroundings. Two things are striking. The first is its size: from the front, the house seems like a compact cottage. But looks can be deceiving for houses built on hills— from the downhill side, one can see just how large and sprawling the two-and one-half story house really is. The true first floor, hidden from the street view, was originally used for servant quarters. The second noticeable element is the porches. Like other houses in the village where tuberculosis patients sought a cure, this one is fairly "bristling with porches," as local cure cottage expert and author Phil Gallos put it. Five porches dominate this house, that looks so small from the front. The porches appear randomly placed from the outside, but from the inside, they all make good sense, as each runs off a bedroom. Patients taking the rest cure sat in these porches in all types of weather, breathing the invigorating Adirondack air.
With its complexity of porches and its size, this is one of those structures that can't be understood in one glance.
See also: Ward Cottages
February 1989 NRHP photograph
Historic Saranac Lake
February 1989 NRHP photograph
Historic Saranac Lake
February 1989 NRHP photograph
Historic Saranac Lake
February 1989 NRHP photograph
Historic Saranac Lake
February 1989 NRHP photograph
Historic Saranac Lake
Note: This house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The nomination form is on file in the office of Historic Saranac Lake.
