Beth Livingston :: Susanna of Beaver Lodge

#Historical Christian #Children's Fiction

Susanna of Beaver Lodge

#Historical Christian #Children's Fiction

Thump. Bump. Crash.

Something rolled in the kitchen below. Susanna was terrified. The drunk tramp who had rescued them from the blizzard was ruining Beaver Lodge. And Christmas was only one week away.

Prohibition whiskey is still in the cellar when Susanna's family moves into Beaver Lodge in 1939. Her plan to get rid of it as a Christmas surprise for her parents is spoiled by a blizzard, one-year-old twin sisters, and a tramp loose in the house.

This is the first book in the Beaver Lodge Legacy Series based on my mother and her four sisters growing up in the 1940's in a wonderful country home called Beaver Lodge with wrap-around porches both upstairs and down.

Look below to see pictures of Beaver Lodge.

BUY ON AMAZON

Susanna of Beaver Lodge Gallery

Susanna of Beaver Lodge is a fictionalized story based on the lives of my mother and her four younger sisters growing up in the beautiful home of Beaver Lodge in Ransomville, New York. I wove their memories and stories into my fictionalized plot.

Beaver Lodge was built by a wealthy banker named E.A. Skinner for his son Bert and his bride Georgia, who were married on June 2,1910. They lived at Beaver Lodge with their first child until selling Beaver Lodge in 1913. Illegal whiskey was made in the cellar when it became a dancehall and speakeasy during Prohibition, 1919-1933.

When my grandparents, bought Beaver Lodge in November, 1939 from the Federal Land Bank after the speakeasy was shut down, the illegal whiskey was still in the cellar. They carted it out to the barn where they smashed it under the floor.

Beaver Lodge was my favorite place with its wrap-around porches and happy family memories. My grandparents sold it when I was thirteen.

Beaver Lodge - The House

Beaver Lodge with a dusting of snow

View of the living room turret, the well house, the barn, and the chicken coop

The back of Beaver Lodge from the barn

View from the front porch

The front porch

Half of the 30'x23' living room (1960's). Notice the round turret in the corner

The back end of the living room. The portrait over the piano is me when I was 6 years old painted by my aunt(...)

The living room staircase and fireplace as they appear today with Cox family decor.

The fireplace

My drawing of the floor plan

Beaver Lodge - The Characters

Susanna

Susanna, Christina, Debbie, and Diana with the sled Daddy made

Daddy, Mama, Susanna, Christina, and the twins

Beaver Lodge - Ransomville

Burlingame's General Store, the best place to buy penny candy

Burlingame's has been demolished, but the counter has been preserved in the Ransomville Historical Museum

An old postcard of Ransomville. Burlingame's is on the right

The Railroad Tracks

The railroad tracks. The depot is gone and the railroad tracks where the girls walked to school have been torn up, but a path is still there, a little past Curtiss Avenue on the left. You can walk where the tracks would have been from Main Street to New Road.

Where the tramp camped

The tracks today

Beaver Lodge today

Susanna of Beaver Lodge

"Real Places Brought to Life"

Susanna of Beaver Lodge

Thump. Bump. Crash. Something rolled in the kitchen below. Susanna was terrified. The drunk tramp who had rescued them from the blizzard was ruining Beaver Lodge. And Christmas was only one week away.

Susanna of Beaver Lodge Gallery

Beaver Lodge - The House

Beaver Lodge - The Characters

Beaver Lodge - Ransomville

The Railroad Tracks

Thump. Bump. Crash.

Something rolled in the kitchen below. Susanna was terrified. The drunk tramp who had rescued them from the blizzard was ruining Beaver Lodge. And Christmas was only one week away.