Gillette Castle was built by the actor and playwright William Gillette. Born in Hartford in 1853, William Hooker Gillette was the son of Senator Francis Gillette and the nephew of John Hooker and Isabella Beecher Hooker. He grew up in Hartford’s Nook Farm neighborhood and made his debut in Mark Twain‘s Gilded Age in 1877. Gillette became most famous for his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes on the stage. He also wrote plays and a work of theory celled The Illusion of the First Time in Acting (1915). Gillette built his castle, in East Haddam, on the southernmost hill of a chain called the Seven Sisters. Modeled on the ruins of Medieval German fortress on the Rhine, Gillette’s Castle was built between 1914 and 1919 of local fieldstone supported by a steel framework. He supervised the construction of the distinctive building, which was surrounded by Gillette‘s eighty-four acre estate on the Connecticut River. He also had his own steam train. Gillette, who died in 1937, stated in his will that he did not want his property to going to “some blithering saphead who has no conception of where he is or with what surrounded.” The home and estate was purchased by the State in 1943 to become the Gillette Castle State Park. Recently restored, the castle is open to the public for tours.
I remember going to this place when I was young it was a magical castle, it had that effect on me, and I was positively giddy that day.