MADCAP DOROTHIES

The "Madcap Dorothies" saved the Hyland House from demolition in 1916, restored it, and opened it as a living museum of Guilford History. The photo below shows members of the society pouring tea in the west parlor, circa 1926.

It might be an exaggeration to call them madcap, but the "original Dorothies," as the founding ladies of the Dorothy Whitfield Historic Society are affectionately known, were certainly high-spirited.       In 1916, when the stilted social graces of the time permeated their afternoon teas, the Dorothies discovered a common cause and displayed a wonderful sense of fun and adventure to save an important piece of Guilford history.       When it was brought to the society's attention that a deteriorating, 250-year-old house on Boston Street was about to be torn down, the Dorothies sprang into action. They had no money to speak of as an organization, but they set out to buy the house anyway before it was reduced to rubble and carted off into obscurity. Those civic-minded ladies had a sense of history and an abiding confidence that they would find a way to raise the funds to purchase the house. And they did -- with a madcap zeal. With an enterprising spirit, they bought and preserved the circa 1690-1710 structure, which serves the community today as a tangible link to the past and a living museum for the children of the town.        The Dorothies had help in rescuing the house. They might not have been able to buy it at all if a former governor of Connecticut and Guilford resident, Rollin S. Woodruff, hadn't advanced them a substantial personal loan of $600, later repaid by the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. But it was the Dorothies' initiative that saved the house and restored it as accurately as possible to its original condition.        Articles in the Shore Line Times and minutes of the society's meetings provide a fascinating glimpse of early 20th century society in Guilford. The founding members of the historical society were eager for some purpose beyond their afternoon socials at which they sipped tea, referred to one another by the courtesy titles of Miss or Mrs., and often recited poetry. When the worthy causeof preserving a centuries-old saltbox presented itself, they seized upon it in madcap fashion. They held a series of lively open houses that raised far more than the $400 they needed to secure the mortgage. Six hundred people attended one of the events at Governor Woodruff's "Rollwood" estate and contributed $500, an enormous sum for the time. It was a rollicking show according to the Shore Line Times, complete with "exhibition dancing in costume, a gypsy dance, a waiter's drill in costume, a famous boy soprano, a Japanese song and dance by a dozen maids from the Flowery Island, and palmists to tell all fates."        When the Dorothies had amassed enough money from the affair at Rollwood and others like it, they finalized the purchase of the Hyland House, hired preservationist Norman Isham to supervise restoration and opened it to the public in 1918 as a museum of colonial life and architecture. More than eight decades later, the DWHS and the townsfolk of Guilford are indeed grateful to those "Madcap Dorothies."        "Fair women, handsomely gowned and jeweled, welcomed the guests at Cranbrook, the home of Mr. and Mrs. Simeon B. Chittenden, last Saturday ... when one of the finest private collections of antiques in the state was on exhibition for benefit of the house fund of the Dorothy Whitfield Historic Society."       -- The Shore Line Times, 1916

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