The Ames Family on Lake Kansatka
- October 1, 1881 - Roland D. Green of Cambridge, Mass. bought a parcel of land in Moultonboro, NH from Mrs. Almira D. Lewis for $2,035.00.
“The property was at or near the “Neck Road” so
called, and on Westerly side of Stage Road leading from Moultonboro
Corner to Center Harbor and containing One
Hundred and Thirty acres, more or less,
bounded as follows:
Southerly by
land of Ezekial Haith, Mrs. Lizzie
A. Moulton and Alvin S. Moulton South Easterly by said Stage Road,
North Easterly by land of Olive Durgin and William H. Varney and Red
Hill Road, North Westerly by land of Mrs. Chris Hurd and South
Westerly by “Long Pond.” (as worded in the deed)
Click on photo to enlarge
- Roland Green and his wife, Nancy Ellison (Aunt Nan) built a summer boarding house and called it the Cambridge House. (Today on Ames Rd.) The original house later burned in the late 1800s and was rebuilt as the New Cambridge House around 1900.
- Most of the guest at Cambridge house were policemen and their families from Cambridge. A favorite swimming spot, located at the northwest end of the property on Lake Kanasatka was named “L” Street Beach, after a famous beach in the Boston area. (where the “L” St. Brownies take a traditional New Year’s Day dip in the ocean.) This beach is now owned by Ruth Rammage, wife of the late Arthur Rammage.
- “Aunt” Nan’s sister, Martha (Mattie) married David B. Ames in Nov. 1869. They had a son, Fred, to whom Aunt Nan and Uncle Rol left the property “for as long as he should live.”
- Fred married Maude (Mattie) Folsom in Dec. 1896 and they had a son, Harold about 1900.
- Harold married Charlotte Wakefield McCormack in Nov. 1928. They had three sons, Rolland (1929), William (1931) and Richard (1933). Rolland passed away last year, William Ames Sr. is a local builder, and Richie is a retired doctor, living in Maine.
- Upon Fred Ames’ death (about 1940) the property passed to Harold, at which time he and Charlotte moved their moved into the Cambridge House.
- Harold died of pneumonia in 1945 and Charlotte continued to run the boarding house for a number of years.
- She added 6 housekeeping cottages on the southwesterly end of the lake front to supplement income from the boarding house - called Kanasatka Cabins.
- With Rolland and William helping, she built 4 of the 6 cottages. Two were, in part, made of halves of a former chicken house!
- A resourceful woman of many talents, Charlotte was a carpenter, worked at a lumber mill, worked at Scott & Williams (knitting machine manufacturers in Lakeport and Laconia), drove a school bus, was a barber and did wallpapering.
- In the late 1950s she started painting - Rather than sell her paintings, she perferred to give them away to friends and family.
- In the late 1940s & early 1950s, Charlotte sold a number of parcels of lakefront property - and made a LOT of people very happy who had stayed on the Lake as campers at various locations.
- In 1978 (or 79) Charlotte divided her remaining property, including the cottages on the lake, between her three sons. They discontinued the housekeeping cottage rentals and built their own homes on the lake.