The Trustees of Reservations | Ashintully Gardens

This post begins a new series! I took a trip to the Berkshires in western Massachusetts during mid July 2023 and visited many historic places along the way. My first stop was Ashintully Gardens in Tyringham, MA, ruins of a grand estate currently preserved by The Trustees of Reservations. According to the official website of the Trustees, this organization “is here to protect and share the Massachusetts places people love for their exceptional scenic, historic, and ecological value”. I have visited several parks managed by the Trustees, many of which will appear in future blog posts.

Ashintully Gardens began in 1904 when Robb de Peyster Tytus, who held the seemingly unrelated careers of Egyptologist and state representative, bought somewhere between 1,000 and 1,500 acres of land (depending on the source) to create his estate. This was the equivalent to four family farms. Tytus was only thirty-five years old at the time, but as the only child of wealthy Edward Jefferson Tytus and Charlotte Mathilda Davies Tytus, he had money to spare. According to local newspaper, The Berkshire Eagle, Tytus was a New York intellectual who attended Yale, graduating in 1897 at twenty-one years old. He rose to public prominence due to his association with Percy Edward Newberry and Howard Carter and was part of the team to excavate the tomb not of famous Tutankhamun but his grandfather, Amenhotep III. Tytus’ wife, Grace Seeley Henop, whom he married in 1903, also loved Egypt and lived with him in Cairo. However, during their honeymoon, the couple visited Tyringham and decided this was the place to build their future mansion.

After their older daughter, Mildred, was born in Cairo, the couple settled in Massachusetts to run a gentleman farm while Tytus started his political career. Soon, the young couple had a second child, Victoria. The regular farmhouse was not good enough for the growing family, so they hired Providence, RI based architect Francis L. V. Hoppin to build a grand mansion. Hoppin himself was a member of the New England elite. He had gone to Harvard and MIT before studying in Paris. While many of his public buildings are in Providence, he did build notable residences in Connecticut, New York, and Massachusetts, including The Mount for author Edith Warton in nearby Lenox, MA. (More about The Mount to come in a future post!) Construction of this mansion began in 1910 and completed in 1912. The most striking feature of the house were the four Doric columns at the front, making the building look like a Greek temple despite being a Georgian inspired mansion. The Tytus family moved in soon after.

Unfortunately, Tytus did not live in the house for long. He died suddenly of tuberculosis in 1913 at age thirty-seven, leading to a rumor that he was cursed for disturbing the grave of Amenhotep III. Only a year later, Grace Tytus became Grace McLennan, married a Canadian senator, John S. McLennan, Sr. The marriage was rocky, and not long after Grace gave birth to John S. McLennan, Jr. in 1915, the couple divorced. Many years later, when McLennan Jr. owned the estate and was in the process of selling it, the mansion burned down after an accident with a trash incinerator. This massive fire destroyed about 600 acres of farmland and added fuel to the rumor that the family suffered from a curse.

Today, the Trustees maintain a garden and walking trail through 120 acres of the original estate. The path runs along the old carriage road and cuts through a mowed meadow along the side of Round Mountain. Visitors must hike uphill about 600 feet (180 meters) with an elevation increase of about 130 feet (40 meters) to see the ruins of the mansion, giving the trail an elevation grade of about 22%. While the path is accessible only to athletic visitors, the view from the top is indescribably stunning and eerie. I have visited many ruins, but the combination of weather and location gave this place a unique ambiance. The four Doric columns stood alone amid a forest near an overground foundation and cellar hole. I visited on a cloudy day, and turning the corner at the top of the steep trail to see the ruins felt post-apocalyptic. The trail then disappeared back into the woods, and the walk was ordinary the rest of the way. The entire loop was about half a mile in length but felt longer due to the rapid changes in elevation.

Ashintully Gardens is free and open to the public during the regular season from April to November between sunrise and sunset. Plenty of parking on the lawn is available. A map of the loop trail is available online and on a pair of prominent kiosks. No dogs or picnics are allowed on this property. Professional photographers hoping to conduct portrait photoshoots must contact The Trustees and become members of the organization. I highly encourage anyone who enjoys hiking to visit this secluded site.

Abby Epplett’s Rating System

Experience: 9/10

Accessibility: 3/10