Born: September 20, 1828
Died: October 29, 1894
Married: Nellie Vosburgh, born 1840 or August 18, 1841; died March 24, 1913.
Children: Mary, born 1859; Mamie Vosburgh Evans (adopted)
Lucius "Lute" Evans was a well-known guide. The 1875 New York State Census located him in the Town of Harrietstown. The 1896 Chellis survey shows him at approximately 65 Main Street. His wife ran a boarding house on Main Street. Dr. Edward L. Trudeau, describing Saranac Lake in the 1870s, wrote "The two best houses were owned by "Lute" Evans, an old guide, where Mr. Edgar, Dr. Loomis' patient, boarded; and opposite was a fairly comfortable little clapboarded house owned by Reuben Reynolds, also a guide."
The Evans cottage, operated by Mrs. Nellie Vosburgh Evans, was located on Main Street approximately where Sears is now. It was perhaps the first boarding house in Saranac Lake that accepted TB patients, though Donaldson stated that a patient named Dennis McMahon "spent the winter of 1875 at Ensine Miller's." Dr. Trudeau rented Reuben Reynolds' house for his own family the following winter, and moved to Mrs. Evans's for seven winters after that. It became the common pattern of life for Dr. Trudeau, and for other patients as well, to spend winters in the village and summers at hotels or camp sites in the region. Nearly a decade before Dr. Trudeau opened his Adirondack Cottage Sanitarium, the use of the village as a winter health resort was set. Saranac Lake prospered so much from this growing business that these original settlers' houses on Main Street were replaced by commercial buildings in later years. 1
Sources: Phil Gallos' card file, referencing the sources mentioned above.
The Evanses are buried in Pine Ridge Cemetery.
From the Plattsburgh Sentinel, August 1, 1879 (see Snippets)
Among the experienced guides, we had the pleasure of meeting an old schoolmate, Lute Evans, who has been engaged in this business for twenty-five years. He is an honor to his profession. Though a man of "infinite jest," who will never allow time to drag heavily when he is in camp, he is also a man of excellent principles, and occupies an honorable position in the enterprising village of Saranac Lakes, a mile distance, where he has a pleasant residence.
Footnotes
1. Hotaling, Mary B., "Edgar was the first TB patient", Adirondack Daily Enterprise, March 29, 1997. See Edward Edgar.
