Dunes Club added to National Register of Historic Places

THE NATIONAL Park Service has added the Dunes Club, a private beach club, to the National Register of Historic Places. / COURTESY R.I. HISTORICAL PRESERVATION & HERITAGE COMMISSION
THE NATIONAL Park Service has added the Dunes Club, a private beach club, to the National Register of Historic Places. / COURTESY R.I. HISTORICAL PRESERVATION & HERITAGE COMMISSION

NARRAGANSETT – The National Park Service has added the Dunes Club, a private beach club, to the National Register of Historic Places, according to Edward F. Sanderson, executive director of the R.I. Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission.
The National Register is the Federal Government’s official list of properties throughout the country whose historical and architectural significance makes them worthy of preservation.
The Dunes Club serves as an example of the history of Narragansett as a resort community as well as early 20th century beach club architecture.
The Dunes Club is a recreational complex occupying 32 acres fronting the ocean, with an eastern entrance to the Pettaquamscutt River (or Narrow River).
The Dunes Club opened in 1929 during a time when recreational activities for the Narragansett wealthy had shifted away from resort hotels toward summer colonies comprised of private residences. Membership-only clubs provided facilities for summer residents to socialize.
New York architect and Dunes Club member Kenneth M. Murchison (1872-1938) designed the hipped-roof, stucco Mediterranean-style gatehouse (1928) that stands at the entrance from Boston Neck Road, as well as a clubhouse, a series of cabanas and a saltwater swimming pool. Murchison combined elements of Norman and Spanish architecture in keeping with the beach club design of the period.
Nearly the entire complex was destroyed by the Hurricane of 1938. In the aftermath, the club installed a steel sheet bulkhead to protect the site, and held a juried competition to select a new architect to redesign the clubhouse. The winning design was submitted by Philadelphia architect Thomas Pym Cope, whose design reflected conservative post-Depression austerity with New England design vernacular. Using local pine and oak felled by the recent hurricane (known as “hurricane pine”), and for comparatively little money, the building could be erected quickly. The new facilities were built within six months at a cost of approximately $125,000 in 1939 dollars; in contrast to the 1928 Murchison-designed clubhouse which had cost $250,000.
The redesigned complex included a large clubhouse, a series of wood-frame bathhouses, four cabana circles and a gable-roofed staff housing complex that also incorporated the swimming pool and gatehouse that had survived the hurricane. In terms of style, Cope’s design was vastly different from Murchison’s. Cope’s redesigned clubhouse was a low, solid Colonial Revival-style building constructed of heavy timber, restrained with a barn-like form, cross-gable roof with cupola, and weathered exterior wood siding. Cope’s design includes nautical decorative motifs, expansive wood decks and many windows, with a clubhouse layout designed to take advantage of views to the ocean.
Since its construction, the 1939 complex has been altered only minimally. In 1993, the staff housing complex was expanded to include a fourth building that enclosed the eastern courtyard. There have been repairs made to the bathhouses and cabana circles after the hurricane damage; the cabana circles were rebuilt in 1955 to their original form with a slightly simpler design. Copes incorporated new tennis courts and a private house into his 1939 plan.

Sanderson said, “Generations of Narragansett families have kept the tradition of summer by the sea at the Dunes Club. Now the Club complex has been recognized as part of Rhode Island’s mid-20th-century architectural heritage.”
In addition to honoring a property for its contribution to local, state, or national history, listing on the National Register results in special consideration during the planning of Federal or federally assisted projects and makes properties eligible for Federal and R.I. tax benefits for historic rehabilitation projects. Owners of private property listed on the National Register are free to maintain, manage or dispose of their property as they choose. As the state office for historic preservation, the Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission is responsible for reviewing and submitting R.I. nominations to the National Register.

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