I contacted this guys father a couple years ago about buying this house to convert into a bed and breakfast/banquet hall. He said there was no way he'd ever sell. I guess his kids don't feel the same way!


Old stone house awaits an owner with cash for repairs
After years of neglect, building is up for sale but needs some work
By Thomas J. Prohaska - NEWS NIAGARA BUREAU
Updated: 08/13/08 8:42 AM



Charles Lewis/Buffalo News
Raymond E. Ruhlmann III stands in front of a house in his familys estate that has been empty for decades because it was bought only for its land.
LOCKPORT For decades, local residents have driven past the old stone house on Summit Street near State Road and wondered why the massive edifice stood idle, with boarded-up windows and no signs of life.

The reason was simple, according to the current owner, Raymond E. Ruhlmann III: His father and grandfather already had a house down the street and bought the property only because they wanted the surrounding farmland. No one has lived in the house since the mid-1940s.

The house was an unintended benefit of [my grandfathers] acquisition. He just wanted to work the land, Ruhlmann said.

Now Ruhlmann, an attorney, has placed the 5,400-square-foot house on the market. It can be yours for $200,000, and you can have as much of the surrounding land as you want. The catch, of course, is that you have to be able to come up with enough money to make the place livable.

Ruhlmann estimated that might be $500,000 or more.

It would have to be a labor of love. Its got to be someone who loves the house and has the resources to do it up right. Otherwise, it will continue to slowly deteriorate, he said. There are several other stone homes. Im not sure there are any quite on the scale of 5,400 square feet. . . . It is definitely not a weekender project. It needs somebody with vision, somebody with the proper resources.

The house appears to be structurally sound. The roof was repaired fairly recently, floors are intact, and there is almost no water damage inside. But the house, especially the basement and first floor, is filled with junk, not all of which seems to have come from the original furnishings. Ruhlmann speculated that was piled up to discourage burglars.

The second floor and the huge attic, whose ceiling is at least 12 feet high, are cleaner, and Ruhlmann said the layout appears to have been five or six bedrooms.

Its got great bones. To recreate this structure today, it would probably be three-quarters of a million dollars just to put the stone together, Ruhlmann said.

On a tour Tuesday, Ruhlmann tried to debunk the legends that have grown up around the house.

He derided reports that it is haunted or that it has a secret tunnel connecting it to the Erie Canal some 100 feet away.

The house was built in 1834 by Francis Hitchens, who had been a contractor on the canal, and it was constructed entirely of Lockport dolomite, the type of stone blasted out of the way to allow for the placement of the canal locks.

I would make the inference from that, that if hes a canal contractor, he has access to the very best craftsmen, Ruhlmann said. If you look at the construction of these walls and compare them to the Lockport locks, youll see the same kind of construction techniques.

In the Ruhlmann family, this was always known as the Rogers house, because my grandfather bought it from the Rogers estate. The bottom line was, an estate worth a million dollars or so went into litigation in the teens and spent decades in legal costs to the point where, when it was finally settled, theyd run through the entire remainder of the estate.

From the 1920s through the 1940s, it was a rental house, with one of the attorneys from the probate case collecting rent.

I think its a regional treasure, and I just want to let people know it exists, Ruhlmann said. If someone has the wherewithal, theyre welcome to take it on. In an 1851 map, this structure was known as Mount Providence. I like that name.

When Hitchens lived there, he became involved in an incident that has connected the house with the Underground Railroad, the secret system for smuggling slaves to freedom in the North or Canada before and during the Civil War.

A black man, a free New York resident, who had worked for Hitchens, visited Kentucky and was forced into slavery. Hitchens heard about it, traveled to Kentucky and freed the man.

I think its a fair historical evaluation to say that Hitchens was absolutely an abolitionist, Ruhlmann said.

Its hard to prove any house was a station on the Underground Railroad, but theres circumstantial evidence that might suggest it, said Ann Marie Linnabery, assistant director of the History Center of Niagara.

Ruhlmann said, I hate to debunk rumors that people have loved for years, but there is no tunnel. I asked my dad [who died in January 2007] that very question. He said there was not. If you think about it, what would the advantage of a tunnel be? The ground here is solid rock, so youd have to bore through 100-plus yards of solid dolomite to get yourself over to the canal. Or you could just bring the guy in at night.

Linnabery said there is a Web site that asserts there was a slave massacre at the house in 1840. The only problem with that, she said, was that New York abolished slavery in 1827, so there wouldnt have been any slaves to massacre.

Ruhlmann said, Some people believe the house is haunted. I had a guy tell me just last year that a Civil War soldier was looking out the front window where theres a gap on the top [in the boards covering the hole]. That gap on the top has only been there the last three or four years, so I guess that Civil War soldier ghost arrived recently and found a place to look out.

He said the legends grew up because people see a big empty house and need to come up with explanations.

My grandfather was interested in farming the land. Its as simple as that, Ruhlmann said.

Theres a For Sale by Owner sign in front of the house. A house like this doesnt lend itself to the Multiple Listing Service, he said.

tprohaska@buffnews.com