AUBURN — The Knight House has survived more than 200 years of harsh Maine weather. It has withstood the uncertainty of urban renewal and no fewer than a dozen changes of ownership. It has been moved six times and yet it stands, the little red house overlooking the falls.

If the Knight House can endure all of that, the people who love it weren’t about to let a little drizzle keep them from celebrating a new chapter.

At an afternoon ceremony at West Pitch, more than two dozen people stood in the rain as responsibility for the Knight House was formally transferred to the Androscoggin Historical Society.

The society takes over from Auburn Heritage, which looked after the old house for 40 years. To make it official — at least symbolically — Historical Society President Betty Young took possession of a big brass key, promising to treat the house with care and respect.

City leaders, several of them in attendance, hope the move will renew interest in the historic site, which sits in an area that’s easy to overlook.

“I’m hoping more and more people will find their way through this building,” Auburn Mayor Jonathan LaBonte said. “There’s a lot of history to be learned.”

The house has been all over the place, according to Russ Burbank, who researched and wrote the history. Originally on Cross Street, nearly a mile away, the house arrived at its current location in the 1970s after it was taken over from the Auburn Urban Renewal Authority.

Among its long-term owners and residents was the Knight family; hence, its designation as the Knight House. It is the oldest frame house in the Goff Corner area and is furnished as of the late 1800s. It is accompanied by the one-room Downing Shoe Shop, a small cobbler’s work shed built in the 1790s that shows tools and methods of the 19th century.

For many years, the house and shop have been cared for and tours arranged by Auburn Heritage Inc. However, when membership dwindled, President Marilyn Wilkinson approached the Androscoggin Historical Society, which agreed to take over the responsibility for the contents and programming of these historic, city-owned buildings.

David A. Garcelon, former chairman of the AHS Collections Committee, worked with attorney Richard A. Trafton to accomplish the transfer. Androscoggin Historical Society board member David Colby Young served as a contact with Auburn city government. The Auburn Department of Public Works will continue to maintain the grounds and buildings.

“This acquisition expands significantly the role of the Androscoggin Historical Society,” society President Betty Young said. “We are pleased to be able to help preserve this part of our local history and to expand our programs. We look forward to working with the community on this.”

The society is inviting volunteers to step forward to learn about the Knight House and to serve as tour guides occasionally at their convenience. Contact the society at 786-0584 for more information.

Knight House history primer

by Russ Burbank

The Knight House dates back to 1796, and is the oldest frame house in the Goff Corner area, which is downtown Auburn.

The oldest house title probably would go to a building in the Danville or South Auburn part of the city. Those neighborhoods, with the present New Auburn, were once part of the town of Danville, which was first settled in 1762.

The Knight House is of Cape Cod design — small, square and plain. Ralph Skinner, then the Auburn city historian, said in 1969: “. . . It is the similarity in dimensions and design that distinguishes the very old houses in Auburn. Most of them were built in accordance with specifications required in the deeds given by the land proprietors to the early settlers. . . The Knight House, built in 1796, is typical and provides another reason for its selection as an historic shrine in the center of the city.”

Records indicate that the house has had 12 owners and was moved six times.

It originally was on Cross Street near North River Road, nearly a mile upriver from the present West Pitch site. It probably was built on a 100-acre tract by settler Caleb Lincoln, a Revolutionary War veteran who soon conveyed it to Hezekiah Wyman of Bath.

The next owner was James S. Nash Sr. of Gray, who held most of the acreage until his death in 1852. His son, James S. Nash Jr., sold it to his sister Esther and her husband, Daniel B. Morrill, in 1860. They sold it in 1861 to David and Jennie Carl, who sold it to Nathaniel Knight in 1864. Knight had it moved to growing Goff’s Corner village, which began near what is now the corner of Court and Main Streets.

The Knight family had lived in Auburn for more than 10 years. Mercy Sawyer Knight, a widow, had come to Auburn from Westbrook after the death of her husband in 1849. With her were a daughter and two sons: Ruth, 31 years old, Nathaniel, 30, and John, 25.

Nathaniel had set up a business as a meat dealer soon after arriving in Auburn. Ruth was a seamstress until her mother died in 1870, after which she kept house for Nathaniel. John worked with Nathaniel for a time but then sought adventure in places such as New York and London, England. None of the three children ever married.

“Nat” Knight, as Nathaniel was known, was an industrious developer of real estate and business in early Auburn. At one time, he and others were engaged in land development in Lewiston, and had a part in the organization of an ice-harvesting business in Auburn.

Skinner said Knight’s first slaughterhouse was on the present location of South Goff Street. Later, Knight built a slaughterhouse in the low area between Turner Street and the Androscoggin River, and by eventually selling much of that land to Ferdinand Penley in 1884, provided a start to the great Penley packing plant that existed for some 70 years.

Skinner said of Nathaniel Knight’s early career as a butcher, “There were actually not enough people in Auburn at that time to support such a shop. But what helped its trade at the start were the food needs of the workmen who were extending eastward through Lewiston the Androscoggin and Kennebec Railroad, which had been lain from Danville Junction, or thereabouts, into Auburn a year and a half before. Otherwise, there was a brief opening of the store during forenoons. . . .”

Skinner also noted that the Knights were apt to “take in” people. The list included Mr. and Mrs. Amos Knight Sawyer, a recently married young couple to whom Mrs. Sawyer was related. “These visitors remained for some time, and their first child, Edward Milton Sawyer, was born in the house. . . . (He) was to become the father of Hon. Charles Sawyer, who was Secretary of Commerce in the Franklin Roosevelt and Truman administrations and later Ambassador to Belgium.”

Skinner told a story of how Manson Hume, a seafaring relative of the Knights, gave the Knights money toward purchase of their home after winning $3,000 in a Louisiana lottery because he wanted something tangible to show for his money.

Nathaniel Knight died in 1901, leaving the house to his sister, Ruth, who died in the house in 1913 at the age of 94. John died in the house in 1918, when he was 93.

A story in the Lewiston Sun on June 30, 1996, said: “. . . Other families occupied the house until 1969, the year of Auburn’s 100th anniversary as a city. That year, the Auburn Heritage Society took over the house from the Urban Renewal Authority, determined to preserve the oldest frame house in Auburn’s civic center.

“Central Maine Power Company provided a site for it on land next to West Pitch Park at the Auburn end of the Great Falls. It stands there now, next to and in contrast with the modern Great Falls Plaza, which was built as part of the Urban Renewal project.”

— Based on information from the Androscoggin Historical Society archives:

“The Knight House People,” an address delivered by Ralph B. Skinner, Auburn city historian, in front of the Androscoggin Historical Society, February 24, 1970.

“Old House is a Survivor,” Lewiston Journal, August 9, 1986

“Historic Auburn House,” the Lewiston Sun, June 30, 1996

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