The old chicken house in Blue Hill that once played a lasting role in the cultural life of the region under ownership of a member of the folk band Peter, Paul and Mary is for sale.
Noel Paul Stookey, the Paul of 1960s folk band Peter, Paul and Mary, moved to the Blue Hill peninsula with his family in the mid-1970s and renovated the abandoned four-story building, known as the Henhouse. It went on to house recording and animation studios, a local community radio station, parts of a regional film archive, artists and more in the following years.
The building, which the Stookeys sold close to 30 years ago, supported numerous projects that are still big parts of life in and around the Blue Hill peninsula. It’s also unique as a multi-unit apartment building in an area with a pronounced shortage of rental units.
“A lot of important cultural activities really started there and kept going,” said Jill Knowles, who first listed the property last year.
She was involved at the Henhouse with her husband, Grammy-winning pianist and composer Paul Sullivan. Their record label, River Music, produced more than a dozen albums at the Henhouse that sold around the world.
The building has had a series of heydays and brought together interesting people, she said, and she’s excited to see what its next stage may hold.
The 7,700-square foot building at 515 Falls Bridge Road in South Blue Hill is listed for $1.125 million. Originally built in 1958, it sits on about two acres with views of Blue Hill Bay.
Few visible clues remain in listing photos of the building’s past. It housed a range of artistic endeavors over the years spanning from new Stookey recordings to a troupe of mimes, according to Bangor Daily News archives.
Stookey encouraged and recorded new artists there, including David Mallett and Stookey’s own Bodyworks band, according to his website.
The Henhouse was the first broadcasting location for local community radio station WERU in 1988 and served as its studio until the station moved into its own building in East Orland nine years later.
It also housed collections for Northeast Historic Film, which collects, preserves and shares filmed material about northern New England. That nonprofit is now housed at the Alamo Theater on Bucksport’s main street.
The Henhouse has been primarily a residential and rental property under two other owners for the past several decades, according to current listing agent Molly Dwyer, who said it’s for sale because the current owner is moving out of state.
“There’s a very select group [of people] that this is going to work for,” she said — likely those interested in starting an artistic retreat or center, or purchasing it as an investment property for apartment rentals.
The building provides flexible options for either of those potential uses.
It currently has five units across four floors and could fit up to eight, Dwyer said, as the first two stories are currently larger single units with potential to be divided. Personally, she said she’d like to see it become affordable housing in an area that sorely needs it.
The property’s location in between the two lively small towns of Blue Hill and Brooklin is another bonus, she said.
Stookey and his family still live in Blue Hill. He and co-writer Jeanne Finley are working on a memoir about the spiritual journey that brought him to Maine and formed his work after leaving the folk trio.
