One of two gate lodges (the other being the Jordan Pond Gate Lodge) built for John D. Rockefeller Jr. to serve as entry points to his system of carriage roads and to guard against the entry of automobiles.
The Brown Mountain Gate Lodge is the larger of the two, with a small complex consisting of a gate house, carriage house, and a care taker's house. The carriage road no longer passes through the grand gate.
The two lodges were designed by Grosvenor Atterbury, a New York architect who had previously designed the Congregational Church in Seal Harbor. Atterbury shared Rockefeller's dedication to philanthropy and was one of the few architects to study and use light and ventilation in tenement buildings. These lodges allowed Atterbury to design for the aesthetics of a grand estate and the purpose of housing the working class families that cared for the carriage roads.
The gate lodges were subsequently given to Acadia National Park along with the system of carriage roads. In the years since, they have served as housing for park employees. While they are no longer necessary to guard against the entry of automobiles, they serve as a reminder of this long tradition and as architectural gems within the Park.
