DARK ISLAND, N.Y. -- Almost every week in the summer, thousands of people visit Singer Castle on Dark Island. It's a majestic building with scenery to match.
But when people come, either for a short tour or an overnight stay, their host says it's the authenticity, that taste of 100 years ago, that matters.
"There are a few things here right now that are modern from the previous owners, and even the current owners have brought things in, but to have the original, I'd say 90 percent of everything in this castle now is original," Singer Castle Caretaker Scott Garris said.
Since taking over 14 years ago and opening the castle up to the public, Dark Island Tours has seen that number get so high thanks to those people with either a past connection or who have been on that tour.
"Little by little, people have been making donations to the castle," Dark Island Tours President Tom Weldon said, "most notably the sewing machines that have come through the past decade or so. Machines that would have been on the market when Frederick Bourne was the fifth president of the Singer Sewing Machine company."
That's what makes the experience so real, the little things. That includes some of Bourne's personal effects. Just recently, an old pipe box that bears his initials was brought back, as was a sterling silver Tiffany cigar box, engraved Dark Island. Weldon says it was brought back this summer by one of Frederick Bourne's great-grandsons.
"People not only take pride in coming here and viewing the castle, but if they don't have a home for some historic piece that they have, they ask us if we want to put it on display," Weldon said.
That includes a detailed chess set that the castle's former minister thought would end up stolen. He took it off the island and years later found it again in storage. He brought it back.
"It's nice to see everything come back to the castle that belongs here. I'm really grateful that it's just not all over the place," Garris said.
Items could sell for hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars. It's a castle fortunate that not everyone puts a price on history.