Tom, Molly, and Kathy (age 2) first came to St. John in March 1966 and stayed on one of the cabins at Cinnamon Bay.  We toured the island with Miss Lucy and took a boat trip around the island, stopping in Coral Bay. I remember vividly how all the goats and school children surrounded on the school house playground.  None of the houses in this area were built at that time and my guess is that were few white children at this end of the island in 1966.  Electricity and competition of the paving of the roads also came later.

We fell in love with St. John on that trip and returned in 1968 (with Paul who had been born in 1967) and again in 1969 when we bought this lot.  The beginning of the original Spyglass Hill began in May 1970, and our first renters came in March, 1971.  The name Spyglass Hill comes from Robert Lewis Stevenson's Treasure Island, which Tom was reading to Kathy and Paul at the time we named the house.  We both rented the house and came frequently ourselves until tom's death in the Summer of 1973.  St. John was a place he loved and a haven for him during his years of illness.

From 1973 we continued to rent the house and to come ourselves about once a year. In 1983 Don Robinson and I were Married.  Don and I taught (now retired), both at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts.  Our children are now all grown and have children of their own.  As of February 2006, Katherine is a doctor in St. Louis, Paul is a the environmental field in Massachusetts, and John Robinson is Executive Director of the Santa Barbara Symphony,  and David Robinson is an architect in Houston.

Then on September 17th., 1989 Hurricane Hugo swept through the islands causing terrible damage in some places.  St. Croix was devastated as were many parts of other islands. St. John did not fair to badly as with about 20% of the housing loosing roofs or sustaining substantial damage and only about 5% being completely destroyed.  Sadly, ours was completely destroyed. As winds reaching 200 mile per hour cut a swath across this part of the island, the corner of our house with the gorgeous view but weak construction (two large sliding glass doors which met in the corner) caved in, and the roof blew off.

Half the roof ended up in the neighbor's while the other half went over the house across the road and ended up down the hill somewhere.  Essentially all of the exterior walls blew out; the interior paneling came off; and while some of the interior walls went down, some remained standing , though twisted and mangled.

One positive inspect of this experience is that although everything from the house sat out in the open or under unlocked cover for six weeks, not a thing was taken or disturbed. 

There have been many wonderful years of visits to Spyglass Hill by our family plus many others.  We look forward to more of these visits in the years to come!

Contact Information

phone: 413-628-3361

or

email:  info@spygalsshill-stjohn.com