ABC Wednesday -H

Hammond Castle located on Hesperus Ave. in the Magnolia section of Glouster Massachusetts, was constructed between 1926 and 1929. It was the home and laboratory of John Hays Hammond Jr.

Mr. Hammond was an inventor who was a pioneer in remote control and held over four hundred patents. The building is a collection of 15th, 16th, and 18th century architectural elements and sits on a hill overlooking the Atlantic ocean.

 Hammond holds the second largest number of invention patents next to Thomas Edison. He was a very wealthy man. His fascination with historical European culture led him to include many artifacts from old Europe in the furnishings - he even incorporated ancient tombstones inscribed in Latin and had them made parts of the walls.

There are many ghost stories about Hammond Castle. Some think that Hammond brought spirits into the house along with the artifacts he collected. Others think that Hammond and his Wife summoned the spirits through their experiments with Spiritualism.

When I lived closer to the Massachusetts border, we would drive over to the area close to halloween. We would visit the Salem Witch Museum and then head over to Hammond Castle which was transformed into a haunted house as a fundraiser for the Jaycees. 

I remember an episode of "Bewitched" that was filmed at the Hammond Castle and other sites in Glouster and Salem. It was the season 7 Salem saga filmed in 1970.

Hesperus Avenue is named after "the Wreck of the Hesperus" by Longfellow. The Cambridge, MA poet liked using local history and lore in his poems like "Paul Revere's Ride".

The "Wreck of the Hesperus" (1839) is based on two local shipwrecks, an actual shipwreck at Norman's Woe where a dead body was found (like the one in the poem) and the actual wreck of the Hesperus which occured near Boston. Hammond Castle is on Hesperus Ave. near the site of the shipwreck at Norman's Woe.