Maryhill Museum
Location picture
The Green Guide
The Michelin Guide's review
Dubbed "the loneliest museum in the world" by Time magazine when it opened in 1940, Maryhill overlooks the river from a remote bluff 100mi east of Portland. Seattle lawyer and millionaire Samuel Hill purchased 7,000 acres of land along the arid slopes of the Columbia River in 1907 with the dream of establishing an agricultural colony for a Quaker sect here. He named the settlement Maryhill, after his wife and daughter. Construction of the poured concrete and steel chateau (no structural wood was used) began in 1914. The design recalls Marie Antoinette's Petit Trianon at Versailles outside Paris. What Hill referred to as his "ranch house" mushroomed into a monumental three-story manse with 3ft-thick concrete walls-where Sam and his family never lived. Unfortunately, Maryhill never got off the ground as a Quaker community. After his interest in Maryhill waned, Hill was convinced to convert the mansion into an art museum by his friend, famed Folies-Bergère dancer Loie Fuller of Chicago. Today Maryhill draws over 85,000 visitors a year. A pacifist, Sam Hill also built a memorial for the soldiers from Klickitat County who died in World War I. The monument (4.4mi east of Maryhill off Rte. 14), located on the original Maryhill townsite, consists of a full-scale concrete replica of England's Stonehenge. Hill's grave is just south of the memorial.
Practical information
+1 509-773-3733
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