DUNGENESS WALKING TOUR
STOP 9: THE SERVICE VILLAGE
While William Page was certainly an employee, living in The Grange set him apart from the rest of the hired help. Farther down the road is the true service area of Dungeness, where, depending on the year, between 100 and 300 employees, most of them farm hands, lived and worked. It is staggering to imagine the wealth of a family that could pay, feed, and house up to 300 people just so they could live on an island without having to do any work themselves.
As you walk through the Service Village you will find many restored buildings and a few ruins. None of the buildings are open to the public because nearly all are being used by the National Park Service as dorms, offices, and maintenance facilities, exactly what the Carnegies used them for. The actual sign for the stop on the Cell Phone Audio Tour is in front of a very large white building, the Carriage House, but before getting there you will pass a few other buildings and foundations.
The first structure after The Grange is some sort of foundation situated on the opposite side of the road. I am not exactly sure what this is, but based on a map from 1916 it could be the former chicken houses or the poultry manager’s house (that’s just a guess).
A little farther down the road are a few picnic tables and a small building that was once the laundry facility (ca. 1900). Today the building serves as a restroom and has drinkable water. In addition, a few pieces of antique laundry cleaning equipment are on display inside, including a boiler, stove, and a press to wring out wet clothing.
Roller for wringing wet laundry on display inside the Dungeness Laundry Building on Cumberland Island
On the opposite corner from the laundry building is the Carriage House and Stable, one of the largest service buildings on the property. It was built around 1900. Inside were stalls for sixty horses in the lower southern wing, while the upstairs had rooms for the grooms and storage areas for hay. The National Park Service renovated the building in 1975 and today uses it as a maintenance facility. It is here where you will find the sign for a stop on the Cell Phone Audio Tour.
Directly across from the Carriage House is the massive foundation of a coal-fired AC power plant that was also built around 1900. A manager and three engineers had living quarters in the building. An ice making plant was also part of the complex. The large, circular-shaped structure located near the power plant is a cistern.
It is at this point that the road forks, and depending on where you are ultimately heading—the beach or back to one of the ferry docks—your route through the Service Village will vary. Keeping straight leads to Dungeness Beach and Tour Stop 10, the Greene-Miller Cemetery, but there are plenty of service buildings to the left. If you are going to the beach and then continuing north along the shore all the way to Sea Camp Beach, take a left at the fork and see the service buildings. The buildings are along a loop road that circles back and comes out just a short ways farther down the road. From there you can continue to the beach, stopping at the cemetery on the way.
If you are heading to the beach but returning this same way, stay straight to see the cemetery first and catch the service buildings on the way back from the beach. I was planning to hike all the way to Sea Camp Beach, so I took a left and walked the service building road in a clockwise direction.
Once making a left and walking down what is technically Coleman Road, you will find four large houses, three on your right and one on the left. Unless noted, all were built around 1900 and renovated in the 1970s. The houses to your right were originally, in order, a white male workers’ dormitory, the dairy manager’s house, and another white male workers’ dormitory (ca. 1890). The building on the left, towards the end of the road, was the dining hall, though I am not sure if this was for the white or black workers. There were originally two dining halls and a recreation building, but only ruins remain today.
The road comes to a T-intersection at the far end of the loop. Take a left to get back to the Dungeness or Sea Camp ferry docks; take a right to continue around the service building loop road. A long building sits to your right. This was the black male workers’ dormitory. From the road all you can see is its side, so feel free to roam the grounds for a better view. If you are wondering why there are no female dorms, females were house servants and would have lived in the servants’ quarters inside one of the Carnegie mansions.
As you round the corner to make your way back to where you started, you will find a building originally used as the carpentry shop. It is still used today for similar purposes by the National Park Service. Walk around the rear to see antique equipment that has never been discarded. Near the woods is a chimney that was once part of another maintenance building. There also used to be a lumber shed next to the carpentry shop, but that no longer exists.
Antique equipment at the back of the Carpenter’s shop in the Dungeness Service Village on Cumberland Island
You won’t find any more buildings until you return to the road leading to the beach. On the corner is a reconstruction of the Carnegie’s wagon shed. This was built in 1975 on the foundation of the original shed and constructed to look like the original. It is now used to house tractors and other maintenance equipment.
Once back to the beach road, take a left to arrive at the last stop on the tour, the Green-Miller Cemetery.
Next Stop: Greene-Miller Cemetery | Previous Stop: The Grange | Tour Introduction
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Last updated on July 31, 2024