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Brick Store Museum (Visit this link)
William Lord was born at Kennebunk Landing in 1799, the third son of Tobias
and Hephzibah Conant Lord. As a merchant, ship owner and ship builder, Lord
became one of Kennebunk’s most important patriarchs and citizens. In 1820 he
married Sarah Cleaves of Biddeford, and they lived in what was then the Jonas
Clark house at 20 Summer Street. It sits high on the hill and is now known as
the William Lord Mansion. It was here that Lord and his wife raised their large
family of 10 children.
In 1825, William Lord began constructing a brick dry goods store on Main Street
in Kennebunk—the very building that is today the focal point of The Brick Store
Museum. The exterior of the building remains more or less unchanged. The
interior has been altered significantly, but evidence of the building’s past as
a store still remains upstairs; a windlass or pulley system used to hoist heavy
goods is visible through a skylight.
At the time of William Lord’s death in 1873, he was considered the wealthiest
man in Kennebunk. His grave site is located across the street from the Museum at
Hope Cemetery. Lord’s great granddaughter Edith Cleaves Barry inherited the
building and began the Museum on the second floor in 1936. The initial core of
the Museum’s collections came from the Lords and related families, but the
Museum today is a regional history and archives center.
http://www.brickstoremuseum.org