The old white farmhouse in Arundel catches Carol Eddy’s eye every time she takes Route 111 from her home in Springvale to visit family in Old Orchard Beach.
When she sees the date above its front door — 1795 — she considers the history of an edifice erected in the aftermath of the American Revolution that remains standing today, albeit 6 feet higher than it did last month.
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The Burnham farmhouse has been lifted onto wooden supports. Eddy could walk under it without bumping her head.
“I love that house,” Eddy said, “and I would hate to see it go.”
Fear not. After 216 years in the spot chosen by Nathaniel Currier to build a home that would stay in his family for two centuries, the Burnham farmhouse is being prepared to travel half a mile west. If all goes according to an ambitious Arundel Historical Society plan, workers will move another 18th-century farmhouse east the same distance to share a 3-acre parcel on the south side of Route 111 — also known as the Alfred Road — that will include a historic barn and a new structure to house the society, its artifacts and archives.
The Lunt farmhouse dates back to 1798. The new site, on the south side of Alfred Road near the intersection with Limerick Road, borders the Lunt family cemetery and is easily visible from the main road.
“We have had the two old farmhouses donated to the society,” said Donna der Kinderen, who serves on the historical society’s board of directors. “In both cases, they have to be moved because there’s other things going on the property.”
A private residence is planned for the Lunt parcel. The Burnham parcel will be the new home for Kate’s Homemade Butter, which since its 1981 inception has been operating in an Old Orchard Beach neighborhood.
“We starting searching about five years ago for a new site,” said Dan Patry, whose parents founded the company and named it after his cousin Kate, now 33. “The town of Arundel approached us and we found a nice parcel (of 40 acres). We’ve got plans to have dairy cows in there.”
Site work for the new production facility began this spring and Patry said construction should begin soon and be completed before winter. Modeled after a dairy barn, the facility will include silos for cream storage, and eventually a retail store where visitors can buy cheese, buttermilk and ice cream in addition to butter.
No longer will Patry need to bring a cow when he visits schools in Arundel, Old Orchard Beach and Saco to demonstrate milking and butter-making. “We’ll do that right in the facility,” he said.
Donating the farmhouse to Arundel’s historical society seemed the neighborly thing to do, Patry said.
Restoration plans for both farmhouses are in the works, but the immediate need is to get them to their new location before the snow flies.
The society drew up a budget of $210,400 for Phase I of what it calls the Burnham-Lunt Preservation Project. Efforts to raise the necessary funds continue Saturday morning with a yard sale at the Lunt farmhouse.
“Financial donations have been slow, but a number of folks have stepped forward and generously donated services,” der Kinderen said. “We’re really looking for people who are interested in saving these two old houses and establishing a community center. This is going to take some significant time, but we have a very clear vision of what we want to do and how it’s going to look when we’re done.”
That vision includes a semicircle of the restored farmhouses, an old English-style barn (with double doors on the side instead of the gabled end) in the process of being disassembled on the Burnham parcel, and a community center modeled after the North Chapel Church that once stood nearby. There, the society can hold meetings and display its historical treasures, currently distributed among the homes of the seven board members.
“Arundel is amazing,” der Kinderen said, “in that it’s a relatively small, peaceful, quiet town that has a tremendously rich history.”
Eddy is pleased to know such history won’t disappear.
“This little house just can’t vanish from the scene after all these years,” she said. “It encompassed all our (country’s) history from our founding to our latest tragedy (of Sept. 11, 2001). I’m so glad it’s going to a good home.”
Staff Writer Glenn Jordan can be contacted at 791-6425 or at:
gjordan@pressherald.com
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