The farmhouse at 844 Pool Street is a witness to the history of Fortunes Rocks, being one of a few hard-scrabble coastal farms whose family recast their future with the appearance of the summer colony that sprouted there in 1873. With the arrival of genteel vacationers discovering relief from urban summers, its young owners, Marshall Curtis (1841-1888) and Sarah Hutchins Curtis (1847-1912), turned from life as ‘farmers’ (census of 1860, 1870) to life as ‘proprietors’ (census of 1880). Their Curtis forebears farmed the coastal land from Little River to the beaches of Fortunes Rocks from before the time of the Massachusetts’ court decree for road maintenance along the coast to Falmouth ME, 1654. My guess is that Marshall Curtis created the farmhouse from family land in the 1860s. (One town reference of uncertain origin puts the date at 1872. A published map of Biddeford, 1872, shows the farmstead of Marshall Curtis and his nearest neighbor, John Thomas.

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Construction of the house frame is post and beam, with roman numerals to match mortises with tenons. Treenails pin the roof joists. A now-removed living room mantel, of modest appearance, matches a mantel from a Kennebunkport home built in 1865.

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