Thousand Island Park Historic District (Additional Documentation)

Thousand Island Park is a planned summer colony covering 145 acres at the southwest end of Wellesley Island in the St. Lawrence River. Founded in 1875 by Rev. John Ferdinand Dayan as a Methodist camp association, it began as a settlement of tents and quickly became a village of frame cottages. Today 305 structures remain, nearly all summer residences with open verandas, set on narrow lots along walkways and around a village green. Styles run from 1870s Gothic cottages with Eastlake detail, such as the Sweetheart Cottage and the metal-sided Iron Cottage, to larger Queen Anne houses and early twentieth century Neoclassical and Colonial Revival buildings, including a Georgian-style library. The park grew to nearly 600 cottages and 7,000 summer residents by 1890. Visitors included Swami Vivekananda in 1894, as well as Carrie Nation and Frances Willard. It is listed as the region's largest and best preserved religious colony of its era.