Anna Newman was widely considered the strangest woman in the Adirondacks in her time, and her obituary was headlined as such. But was she that strange? By our standards today, she might be somewhat less odd than she was considered in 1872, when she moved to Lake Placid. 

Anna grew up in a wealthy family in Philadelphia, and she was well educated and possessed a variety of artistic talents. She likely could have been a big deal in Philadelphia society had she remained there, between her money, her family’s connections and her drawing and musical skills. 

She started visiting the Adirondacks in 1866, however, and that would end up changing her life. She visited the farm of Harvey Holt, in Keene Valley, for several years in a row. Much of what has been written about Anna seems to tend more toward conjecture about her intentions rather than fact, but most pieces credit Anna’s desire to draw landscapes as the reason she ventured here in the first place. 

It didn’t take long before she got more interested in hiking and fishing and the general Adirondack lifestyle, though. And once Harvey Holt bought a new plot of land, about 1,000 acres that comprised the Hinckley Farm in North Elba, which would eventually become known as Heaven Hill Farm, Anna visited it and she fell in love with it. She decided she must have it, so she bought it from Harvey a few years later, then moved there and made it her home for the remaining 43 years of her life. 

Much of the lore of Anna’s strangeness lies in her so-called hatred for men. As the story goes, the first time she arrived in Keene Valley, a local guide tried to help her down from the stage coach she traveled in on. She recoiled, though, stating loudly, “I never allow a man to touch me,” or “Go away. I’ll accept nothing from the hands of a man,” or something like that. Her exact words are probably long lost to time, but the idea remains: She wasn’t exactly fond of dudes. 

She never married, and she lived alone for her many years, though she had hired help on and off, and she was very involved in the local church and usually had a protege from the congregation following her around and helping her. 

The idea that she never allowed a man to touch her, though, turns out to be BS. Several guides insisted that when they took her hiking — she hiked even the highest of High Peaks, Mount Marcy — they held her hand or even picked her up to help her through or over difficult stretches of trail. In most of those cases, she didn’t say a word to protest. 

Some say Anna had a romance that went sour, and that’s why she escaped to the Adirondacks and didn’t bother to date or marry. Another storyline that seems plausible and corroborated, though, is that her mother died young and when her father remarried (a very young woman) against her wishes, Anna became uncomfortable at home and not have interest in staying in Philadelphia. 

Today, it’s not that unusual to see a fiercely independent woman living alone in the Adirondacks, not interested in finding a man to keep at home. But there’s another aspect to Anna that might be beyond comprehension to many in today’s luxury-loving society. 

Anna’s father was very successful in trade and the family had plenty of money. Anna, however, was not interested in the luxuries she could afford. She could easily have paid a housekeeper, a butler, a maid and any other amount of household help, but instead she often did her household chores on her own. She had plenty of money that would have allowed her to knock down the old farmhouse and erect a lavish home. Instead, she barely even maintained the farmhouse as it was; she only did house maintenance when it became absolutely necessary. 

Her wealth did allow her to maintain some of her more odd traits, though. She would go into town, round up a crew and pay them to work her farm for a week, then after letting them work for a day, she would discharge them. The next day, she would go out and hire another crew, sometime made up of the same workers as before. 

And the farm, which featured some of the highest arable land in the state, was not terribly successful. Anna seemed to be interested in pouring as much money into the farm as possible without actually producing anything. As Alfred L. Donaldson wrote in “A History of the Adirondacks”:

“She knew nothing about farming, and was not burdened with the desire to learn. She committed not only the errors of inexperience but the follies of inanity. She would prepare the ground of seeds and never plant them; or plant them and never harvest them. One year she planted many acres of potatoes, then failed to have them hoed.” 

She was also a fan of horses, and would pay well for the best horses. When a horse showed even the slightest whimsy or defect, though, she would immediately order it shot and killed despite the fact that she could have easily sold it for a good price. She couldn’t bear to watch the horses be killed, so sometimes her farm hands would lead the horse away into the woods, fire off a gun so Anna believed it to be dead, then take the horse home and use it on their own land. At least one time, Anna found out about this and sued the man, but in general she was unaware of such doings. 

Despite Anna’s quirks, she was loved by her neighbors because she was unfailingly generous to those in need. More than once, she paid for families to get back on their feet after fire demolished their homes and all their belongings. She also funded the church she was heavily involved in, and she taught Sunday school there weekly and helped the families she got to know there. The local people appreciated her philanthropy so much that a portion of what is now Lake Placid was named Newman in her honor when a post office was built near the train station. 

Anna’s oddities lead to her demise. She never bothered to put a railing around her porch, and one day she fell over the edge, breaking her leg. She refused to the doctor to set the leg immediately, sending him away when he tried to help. He had dealt with Anna before, though, and so he remained on the property, knowing that eventually the pain would get the better of her. It did, and she sent for him again a little while later. The leg never healed properly, though, and she wasn’t able to do the work she had always done. She died in early May 1915. 

After Anna’s passing, Henry Uihlein bought the farm and added some land to it from the Lake Placid Club, making it his family’s permanent residence in 1941. From Uihlein’s obituary that ran in the New York Times in 1997:

“Over the succeeding decades, Mr. Uihlein developed a blue ribbon pure-breed Jersey cattle herd, a prize maple syrup operation, and a first class seed potato farm. Stock from his Jersey herd consistently took top prizes at American Jersey Club Shows. Several years ago, the Jersey herd was donated to the Miner Institute of Chazy, NY, where they continue breeding under the Heaven Hill name. Also several years ago, the maple syrup and potato operations were donated to the College of Agriculture of Cornell University under which auspices they continue to be operated as demonstration and research facilities (and in the case of the potato operation, as a disease-free source of seed potatos.)”

Heaven Hill Farm has been used as a resource for nonprofits and community organizations since the establishment of the Henry II and Mildred A. Uihlein Foundation. The Adirondack Foundation now operates in a cottage on the property, and many other organizations make use of the farmhouse for various events and meetings. And it’s still one of the most beautiful properties in North Elba. 

As far as Anna goes, she may be pretty strange, but strangest? That's a stretch. What do you think?