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 Captain Henry Stowell of Vergennes and of Troy, NY, was one of the originals in this neighborhood. He had first come to the Jolly Club Camp by Cedar Beach, and had been a boarder at the Field's farm, and a renter in the Ovette Stone place in 1887. In a diary he recorded shooting squirrels at Thompson's Point in 1880, and an entry had his daughter Julie rowing to Thompson's Point from the Jolly Club in August of 1877. In 1890 he took up two lots and on the farther of them he built the cozy cottage which was occupied by his daughter until past the mid-century. It is still in the family and was enjoyed by grandson William V.N. Carroll throughout his long life. "Bill" Carroll was a great source of Thompson's Point history until his passing in December of 1997.
After Henry Stowell built in 1890 on lot 29, he turned lot 28 over to his son William, who, much to the disgust of his father, built the present Bedford Cottage in 1914.
In 1921, a Captain Goodsell developed a ferry to Essex and Westport from the foot of the bay and a jerry-built dock at the site where Pete LaBerge and subsequent caretakers have floated our boats into service. Goodsell lived in a shack on the "Public Lot" between the Stowells and the Enos. After a minor disaster or two the ferry and the dock were damaged, and when winter ice took out the dock the ferry service ceased. In 1923 Mark Jane Stowell, Bill's grandmother, leased lot 30 to prevent further intrusions on placid summer life.
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