FROM THE NEWSLETTER

Hotel Coolidge Mural Tells the Story of Vermont

By Scott Fletcher, September-October, 2022
Photos by Molly Drummond

One of the first things August L. Zollicofer did upon becoming proprietor of the Hotel Coolidge was to decorate one of the hotel’s rooms in the style of his native Switzerland. The Swiss Tavern opened at 8 p.m. on February 27, 1946. A newspaper reported that the Swiss Tavern was, “A cocktail lounge in authentic Swiss design. It promises to be a novel and interesting spot for an hour of leisure and quiet enjoyment.” (The Informer of VT, NH, and ME)

In March, the Hotel Coolidge advertised that the dining room next to the Swiss Tavern would be open for dinner on Sundays. Zollicofer’s new restaurant featured northern Italian food, which attracted a loyal following including Dartmouth artist-in-residence Paul Sample and Dartmouth professor Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy. Zollicofer became so popular with Dartmouth faculty that he was eventually invited to manage the dining room at the Hanover Inn on Sundays during the summer when his own restaurant was closed.

In 1950, Paul Sample and Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy introduced Zollicofer to a young painter named Peter Michael Gish who had graduated from Dartmouth in 1949. Gish showed Zollicofer drawings based on his research into the history of Vermont and described how he could transform the hotel dining room with a new stone fireplace on one wall and an epic mural on the other three walls. Zollicofer agreed and Gish set to work in exchange for room, board, and a stipend of $1,000.

Fireplace built by Peter Michael Gish. — Peter Michael Gish built a stone fireplace in the Hotel Coolidge dining room.

Gish covered wooden panels with canvas, mounted them around the room, and secured them with molding. He then told the story of Vermont’s settlement, beginning with a ghostly Iroquois mask in the clouds on the far left recalling indigenous inhabitants. Moving to the right, bold images show Mount Ascutney, settlers building log cabins, a woman giving birth and men erecting barns, stacking hay, plowing fields, and going to war. Gish completed the room by building a rugged stone fireplace with a hand-hewn wooden mantle.

In Zollicofer’s cocktail lounge off the hotel lobby, Gish mounted more panels to a wall and painted a barn dance scene featuring himself twirling a woman wearing a red dress. Peter Michael Gish completed the project in about six months. He was twenty-three years old. Gish is now 96 years old and lives in Rhode Island where he continues to paint.

The History of Vermont mural, though faded, remains powerful and the fireplace is still functional. David Briggs enjoys explaining the mural’s imagery to guests and recalling some of the notable people who dined in the room. Today, the lobby of the Hotel Coolidge is known as the Zollicofer Gallery.

First scene of the Hotel Coolidge mural. — Caption: The first scene in the 1950 mural by Peter Michael Gish features Mount Ascutney, which the Abenaki called Monadnock meaning, “Mountain rises with no foothills.” The Connecticut River is prominent because it was how white settlers began moving to Vermont after the French and Indian War. In the sky, what looks like a ghost is an Iroquois mask as a nod to Vermont’s indigenous people. To the right, the mural shows pioneers building shelter and facing harsh weather. The man swinging the axe is a friend of the painter named Bob O’Brien who was a student of Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy at Dartmouth. The young couple to the right depicts Peter Michael Gish and his girlfriend Elsie. In the corner is Mount Mansfield.

Wall two in the Hotel Coolidge mural. — Caption: The next wall begins with a woman who has just given birth while a man sits helplessly by her side. Then, a lone rifleman heads off to the Battle of Bennington, symbolized by the Bennington Monument in the distance. The Battle of Bennington weakened the army of British General John Burgoyne and contributed to his defeat at the Battle of Saratoga in the fall of 1777. The next image is a communal barn raising. David Briggs, proprietor of the Hotel Coolidge, notes that the face is that of Elwyn Phillips who was once the business partner of his father, Fred Briggs. The biceps, however, were those of Bob O’Brien. Over the double door is Lake Champlain, thoroughfare from Montreal to New York City. Then, John Coolidge, father of Calvin and namesake of the Hotel Coolidge, leans against a wall in idyllic Plymouth Notch. To the right, farmers pile hay on a wagon and a train arrives in White River Junction.

Wall three of the Hotel Coolidge mural. — Caption: On the final wall, an abandoned farm suggests the lure of the American frontier during the California gold rush and the westward expansion of the 1800s. Gish then depicts the Morgan horse, which was compact and elegant enough to be a saddle horse, yet strong enough to pull a plow. The mural then features a herd of increasingly abstract horses galloping toward images of wartime destruction and headstones modeled after the cemetery at Plymouth Notch where the Coolidge family rests. Finally, there is a faceless figure standing erect on barren soil as if waiting for whatever an uncertain future may bring.

The barn dance scene was painted in a Hotel Coolidge tavern. — Caption: After Peter Michael Gish completed murals on three walls in a Hotel Coolidge dining room, he painted this barn dance scene in a hotel cocktail lounge. David Briggs, current proprietor of the Hotel Coolidge, calls it the culmination of Gish’s work. The painter himself is dancing with woman in the red dress who was the sister of his girlfriend Elsie who has her back to us in the plaid shirt. Elsie’s other sister is in the yellow dress, and her brother is in the white shirt to the left. Briggs says that the man in the lower right with an ale bottle in his pocket was a hotel maintenance man. “The barn dance scene shows people living it up and having a good time,” says David Briggs. “His word to us is that no matter how difficult and painful Vermont life may have been, we seem to have the energy and determination to celebrate, kick back, and be together.”

Hartford Historical Society
1461 Maple St.
Hartford, VT 05047
(802) 296-3132
info@hartfordhistory.org