(The following is from the Camden Herald dated October 18, 2007)

South Hope's only hotel burned 100 years ago

SOUTH HOPE - One hundred years ago today, Oct. 18, 1907, the Fiske House, South Hope's only hotel burned to the ground.

Shortly after midnight the landlord's wife, Mrs. Cyrus Packard, heard a crackling of fire coming from the hotel's woodshed, according to Cynthia DellaPenna, who grew up in Hope, but now lives in Raleigh, N.C. She owns the land where the hotel stood. The hotel sat next to Fish Pond on Route 17, across from where Schooner Bay Towing is now planning to build a garage.

The Fiske House was a two and-a-half story frame hotel, famous for 30 years or more as a place for social gatherings, according to the Oct. 25, 1907, Herald.

Bill Jones, a member of the Hope Historical Society, thinks it was mostly known as a tavern. He said the hotel was the last place the members of the Hope Masonic Lodge used to meet. The members met over the years at about five different locations, one of which, Jones said, was at their own lodge at the north end of town. But in those days people walked, and they ended up holding the meetings back at the Fiske House because they did not want to walk so far.

The Herald stated the dozen hotel residents were unharmed in the fire, and actually had time to save a portion of the furniture. But the hotel, dance hall, large stable. and ice house were all consumed.

South Hope had no fire department at that time, DellaPenna said, therefore the village had to await a hand-tub and 20 volunteers who came up from West Rockport. They were able to save the nearby home of Marcellus F. Taylor and his general store just beyond.

The hotel's cellar hole and the foundation pins for its veranda are still visible today near Route 17.

The Fiske House derived its name from its first proprietor, Decator E. Fiske, who purchased the property in 1882.

He was born in South Hope in 1856, trained as a blacksmith, and became a hotel manager by the mid 1880s. He is believed to have been the original manager of Bay Point Hotel in Rockland in 1889, later called the Samoset, which also burned down.

Selinda Henderson purchased Fiske House in 1897, and her culinary expertise was widely known. A sampling of notes written during 1907 in The Courier-Gazette provide the following:

Feb. 12 - "Although it snowed all day Sunday there were 41 to dinner at the Fiske House, including 35 Rockland people." July 13 - "Allen Henderson of Boston arrived Monday to spend his usual summer vacation at the Fiske house. The Automobile Club met at the Fiske house Sunday and the following dinner was served: Chicken and tomato soup, boiled halibut, egg sauce; cucumbers; roast chicken and lamb, brown gravy; green peas, spinach, mashed potatoes; rhubarb, apple, lemon and custard pie; vanilla ice cream and strawberries; tea and coffee."

July 16 - "Hotel Fiske did a rushing business Sunday. Amongst those who took dinner there was Governor Cobb and party."

Indeed, 1907 had been a good year; The Courier- Gazette ran the following news item on Sept. 7, "From Aug. 25 to Sept. 1 inclusive there were 123 transients at Fiske Hotel. This does not include the regular boarders. It has been a very busy place at the hotel all summer and will probably continue until late in the fall as people like to enjoy the cool air and beautiful foliage of late fall."

South Hope has not seen another hotel, for the proposed replacement hotel was never constructed. Marcellus Taylor's house succumbed to fire in 1967, but his general store, known today as A&I's, still operates as a general store and across the street is the fire house built in the 1970s.