Hammond Castle-Part 1

Hi everyone. Happy end of another work  week to you.

Today I am joining Nicole for her Friday Face Off   challenge and also linking up to Gillena's Friday Lunch Break.

Back in late September, a couple of friends and I took a mini-road trip down to Gloucester, Massachusetts to visit Hammond Castle. We had a fun day out, and I thought today I would share some face photos from the day.

Yes Hammond Castle is actually a castle. Or looks like one. The man who built the castle was John Hays Hammond Jr.. He wanted the inside to  have all of the modern state of the art items, at least the items that were state of the art in 1926 when the construction of the Castle began. This building may look like it is ancient, but it isn't truly a medieval castle. 

 Hammond was a prolific inventor. One of his biggest inventions was radio control, which is the forerunner of modern remote controlled devices such as those used in military missiles and in other unmanned devices. He had over 400 patents for items he developed; here's a list of a few that I copied off of Hammond's Wikipedia page. (And I'm not certain what the numbers after each patent are for-perhaps that is the patent number.)

10/21/1919 – System of Teledynamic Control (1,275,741)
5/20/1922 – System for Radio Control of Moving Bodies (1,420,258)
11/6/1928 – Submarine sound transmission (1,500,243)
3/18/1929 – Multi-channel radio system (1,717,662)
12/29/1931 – Secret Radio Communication (1,838,762)
5/19/1931 – Paravane Torpedo (1,806,346)
12/14/1936 – Gaseous Detector of Radiant Energy (1,610,371)
5/27/1941 – Variable Pitch Propeller Control (2,243,095)
7/11/1944 – Radio Alarm System (2,343,499)

Hammond was also well traveled and an admirer of art. His wife was actually an artist, and it was she, after Hammond died in 1965, who helped maintain the castle as a landmark and opened it for tours and special events.

Here's one of the 2 fierce faces that meet you at the bridge over the water-free moat.

(I thought of you Iris.)

After entering through those gorgeous front doors, you enter into this great hall. Most items in this hall were brought from Europe (by Hammond) to make this room  feel more authentic. 

Here's a few more faces for you. I'm not exactly sure who the people in the photos are, but I am guessing maybe Hammond or his family.

The woman in the next photo  was our guide. You could tour the castle on your own, but we decided it was worth getting the back stories the guide had to offer.

If you look above the guide you can see some more faces on the wall.

In some photos it was hard not to get other people who were touring the castle also.

In the next photo you can see the pipes of a giant organ Hammond built. It is one of the largest organs in the world as it has 8,400 pipes (according to what I found on the internet). Hammond also had several patents for organ development also.

And here's the organ. If you look carefully you can see a few more faces in the framed pieces on it.

And here's a few more views around the great hall.

That's the photos for this Friday.

I'll share more of the castle and more faces next week. Have a great start to your weekend.

And as always, thanks for visiting.