This church, schoolhouse, and cemetery sit together on a small rise, surrounded by overgrown farmland and forest. Like many of my favorite haunts, we first became acquainted when I was out riding my horse as a teenager. Though it's fortunately not abandoned, and gets regular maintenance, it's been disused for decades, and remains beautifully frozen in the early 20th century.
The schoolhouse was built in 1800...
and the church in 1818.
I. Church
Grand
cathedrals are always a pleasure for an art history
major like myself, but the quiet simplicity and clean lines here really
appeal to me as a Vermonter. It's quintessential Old New England with
its sparse honest looks; no frills here. And while churches like these
are a common sight throughout the region, few are as organically preserved as
this one, which appears to have had its last decorating job done
sometime around 1890.
Let's take a closer look at those velvet Victorian Eastlake chairs behind the pulpit:
An alternative view of the schoolhouse, as glimpsed on the waver of some very early glass panes.
In the front end:
It's all about the wall colors and that splendid bench.
II. Cemetery
The little cemetery contains graves from the Civil War through
the present day; not as old as the nearby Blanchard cemetery, but still
an interesting plot with some beautiful old headstones. I was
especially taken with the lovely little gates.
Just
beyond the split-rail, I found this old metal fencepost (above, to my
right). In the church's busier days, I figure there must have been some
kind of Victorian wrought-iron thing fencing the cemetery. Probably
where the gates came from, too.
III. Schoolhouse
Location: Guilford, VT
