Postscript

William West Durant did more to develop and popularize the Adirondacks than virtually any other man of the nineteenth century. More importantly, he set the standard for what development might be. The rustic architectural style of his four great camps, Pine Knot, Uncas, Sagamore, and Kill Kare established a vision of construction rooted in nature, an esthetic sharply at variance with the prevailing Victorian style. Describing Pine Knot in 1881, Seneca Ray Stoddard said, “Men took a circuitous route in order to gain a glimpse of it, and to have been a guest within its timbered walls and among its woodland fancies was to wear the hallmark of the envied.”

But, for all his vision, Durant was no great businessman. He built on faith, on the self-assured conviction that others would share his vision, if only they could be exposed to it. Rarely, if ever, did he actually see a profit from any of his ventures. He invested heavily and entertained lavishly. He built a huge, 191-foot, steam-powered sailing yacht, in order to be better accepted by the class of society he wished to woo.

Princes of Europe and captains of industry took to the waves with William. In the end, it yielded him nothing and only hastened the end.

William’s biggest mistake was to deny his sister her share of their father’s estate. Taking over from Thomas Durant after his death, William considered it his duty and prerogative to carry on and shepherd the family’s business ventures as he saw fit. Unlike his views on architecture, these values were deeply rooted in his Victorian upbringing. He resented her demands and her questioning of his judgment.

Perhaps he intended to give her more when his investments paid off. But his investments never did pay, and Ella became increasingly demanding. She finally brought suit, but it was delayed until 1899. By then his properties were heavily mortgaged, his great camp Uncas sold to J. P. Morgan for far less than it cost to build. Ella Durant finally won her suit in 1901, when the court ordered William to pay her $753,931. Ella never saw a dime of it.

William West Durant died in 1934 at the age of eighty-three. After losing his empire in the Adirondacks, he tried his hand at a number of business ventures, including hotel manager, mushroom farming, and surveyor, and he often worked on lands he’d once owned. He never lost his aristocratic bearing or his taste for a well-cut suit.

On August 12, 1936, his widow unveiled a stone and bronze marker dedicated to him, opposite a newly formed lake created by the Civilian Conservation Corps. It was christened Lake Durant. The bronze plaque credits William with “developing the Adirondacks and making known their beauty.” That marker stands just two miles from the hamlet of Blue Mountain Lake. William was interred in the family’s mausoleum in Green Wood Cemetery. Ella was not to have a place there.

Mitchell Sabattis continued to guide sporadically for special clients over the following years. Tom and Mike would come sometimes in summer, sometimes in fall, spending days with the old man hunting and fishing. They were always sad to leave.

On April 17, 1906, Tom got a telegram from one of Mitchell’s eight sons saying that Mitchell had died the day before.

A pure-blooded Abanaki Indian, Mitchell Sabattis was the son of Captain Peter Sabattis, who served in both the Revolutionary War and War of 1812. Mitchell was a founder of the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Long Lake, a builder of fine boats, and one of the greatest guides ever to walk the north woods. A recreational park in Long Lake bears his name.

The Prospect House went into a long, slow decline. Recurring deficits forced Frederick Durant to mortgage the property, and in 1898 his brother Howard foreclosed and took over the hotel. The short Adirondack tourist season made it nearly impossible to turn a profit on such a grand establishment, especially in light of less-expensive competitors across the lake and elsewhere.

In 1903 two guests came down with typhoid. In the fall of that year it closed its doors forever. It stood empty until 1915, a grand, ghostly presence, an echoing reflection of the gilded age of Adirondack development. It was finally dismantled, the lumber and furnishings sold.

The white buck, which was kept penned beside the lake since it was a fawn, survived for only four years. One winter, while corralled inside the barn, it got into a bin of oats and ate itself to death.