Getting to the front door of the Lilac Inn in Glovertown involves walking along a footpath, crossing a small, arched bridge, and stepping up onto a veranda that sweeps across the front of the property.
The footpath and veranda date from 1921 when the house was built on Burry's Point - Now called Pinetree Road - by Capt. Baxter Burry and his second wife, Mary (Currie). The captain, a well-known seaman and businessman, engaged an American contractor, Norman Crewe, to construct the house in 1918-19. It was finished in 1921, complete with electrical wiring.
While the veranda on the second storey looks original, it was, in fact, added in 1999 by present owners Dough and Linda Churchill. The Churchills - He's originally from Bay Roberts, she's a Roach from Coley's Point - bought the property in 1994. Two years later, they opened it as a year round bed and breakfast with four guest suites. Every bed in the B&B has a handmade quilt, and the overall feeling is homey and welcoming.
Lilac Inn, with it's character fully intact, combines charm and elegance. The spacious foyer is lit by sunlight which filters through stained glass in the entrance door and a window on the first-floor landing. The intriguing alcove with an oval window at the front of the landing used to be a telephone room with a door for privacy.
The foyer has original plank flooring and a door, just five feet tall and 18 inches wide, which is located under the stairs and leads to the basement.
The front room is separated from the dining room by sliding pocket doors. Walls in both rooms are made of beaverboard and the floors are spruce something the Churchills discovered after peeling away layers of carpet, linoleum, tile and newspapers dating back to the 1920s. The front room has two windows and a fireplace set against an angled wall.
In the dining room, a huge bay window fills one wall and the view is of Alexander Bay. In Capt. burry's time the view would have included his sawmill and shipyard on the edge of the bay, at the tip of Burry's Point.
The large kitchen off the dining room has been modernized, and an addition at the rear contains one guest suite. On the second floor, four bedrooms have been turned into three guest suites. Two rooms are named after members of the house's second owners, Darius and Edith Taite.
The former master bedroom is named after Edith. A second suite is named after Sarah Taite, known as Aunt Sally.
The third room is named after Susie Inder of Gambo. Known as Aunt Susie, she was a maid who was with the Taite family up until her death at age 95. Susie slept in the attic and every night she would climb the narrow, twisting stairs with her lantern in had. Linda named the suite in Susie's honour because she felt Susie deserved it.
The attic has sloping walls and all of the windows, including a distinctive eyebrow window, are at floor level. A skylight once opened to a rooftop widow's walk.
On June 17, 1946, when a disastrous fire swept through Glovertown, the Burrys and their neighbours sought shelter on fishing schooners moored offshore. Next day, peering through smoke, they saw the widow's walk and knew their house was among those spared.
The fire which almost destroyed Glovertown started on June 11, 1946, near Maccles Lake, where the railway crossed Maccles Brook. The fire started from a spark which shot out from the freight train and was one of dozens started by the train in the same period.
The so-called Great Fire, which was extinguished by rain on July 7, 1946, wreaked havoc in the Alexander Bay area during the 26 days it raged. More than 17,000 acres were burnt and 51 dwellings, as well as schools, shops, sawmills, two motor cars and two trucks were destroyed. One estimate put the total damage at a quarter of a million dollars.
Capt. Baxter Burry, the man who built what is now the Lilac Inn, was born in Greenspond, Bonavista Bay, in 1872. According to the writings of his daughter, Louise Sparkes, who died at her home in Sibley's Cove in 1995 at age 84, Baxter was the eldest of 14 children and became the family breadwinner at age 19 when his father died.
In 1901, he married Elizabeth Mary Burden, daughter of a well-off family from Salvage. The couple settled in Glovertown and, by 1910, were parents of three sons, James, Max and Otto.
In March of 1911, nine -month-old Otto died of whooping chough. Six months later, in September, Elizabeth herself died shortly after giving birth to Louise. Baxter, who was away fishing on the Labrador, knew nothing about his wife's death until he sailed into Alexander Bay and saw flags flying at half mast.
More than two years after Elizabeth's death, a mutual friend of Baxter and the Currie family of Britannia on Random Island arranged a "marriage of convenience" between him and Marry Currie. Mary, mother of a 13 year-old daughter, was the widow of William Currie, one of the partners of the slate quarry venture on Random Island.
| Mary and Baxter were married on Dec 9, 1913, after only seeing each other twice. | 
Capt. Burry and Mary (Currie) |
Louise lived with her maternal grandparents in Salvage until 1916, when her father and stepmother brought her to Glovertown. She recalls in 1918-19 her stepmother grew tired of the family's old house and wanted a new, modern home. American contractor Norman Crewe was engaged to build the house, and everything put in to it was of the latest and finest quality. The house was completed in 1921.
The year 1921 was also when a young Dutch boy became a member of the Burry household. During the winter of 1921, Baxter had approximately 200 men employed in the forests cutting pit-props for use in British coal mines. In the spring, when the contract was completed, a Dutch cargo ship was chartered to take the wood to its destination. Among those on board when the ship sailed into Alexander Bay was an unhappy 15-year-old Dutch boy named Aart Lighthart. Disheartened about his mother's death and his father's decision to remarry, the boy had signed on as cooks helper. On arrival in Alexander Bay he wanted to stay, and the captain asked Baxter if he could find a home for him. Baxter and Mary took the boy in, and he fished with Baxter in Labrador and worked in his stores until 1929 when he returned to Holland, after marrying a girl from Glovertown.
Tucked among their memorabilia about the Lilac Inn, the Churchills have a copy of a letter from Myrtle and Aart Lighthart of the Netherlands, and an accompanying picture of Aart on his 90th birthday.
In the letter, Myrtle introduces herself as Dorothy Myrtle Dewey, daughter of John and Jemina Dewey of Glovertown, where she was born and raised. She goes on to write about meeting and marrying Aart.
"In 1923, when I was a girl of 15, I met a little Dutch boy. He got off a ship when he was 15 and stayed for eight years in Glovertown. When I was 20, I married him and went to Holland."
