Anoatok was built in 1896-97 for Dr. Elizabeth Dennistoun Wood Kane as a residence for her and two of her three sons, Dr. Evan O'Neill Kane and Dr. Thomas L. Kane, and their families. In terms of its architectural style, history, and physical location, it is the most prominent residence in Kane.
The design of Anoatok is marked by its ornate yet functional style and reflects the humanitarian lifestyles of the mansion's occupants. Cope and Stewardson, prominent Philadelphia architects, one of the leading architectural firms of the East, and relatives of the Kane family, designed the Georgian Colonial Revival style mansion. Only two homes were designed by Cope and Stewardson in Western Pennsylvania: Anoatok and Dr. 'Ihomas L. Kane's home in 1910. It was a Georgian Colonial Revival, but on a smaller scale. These are the only architectural style homes of their kind in the Kane area.
In the early 1900s, Anoatok became the private residence of Dr. Evan O'Neill Kane, the first doctor to perform self-surgery. His doctor's office was located on the first floor, where his mother had her office in years past. In the mid-1930s, Anoatok was converted into an·operating wayside inn, and interior changes were made. It remains an inn today (Kane Manor Inn).
General Thomas L. Kane, Dr. Elizabeth's husband and the founder of Kane, was a Philadelphian descended from some of the oldest pre-Revolutionary families of the northern colonies. The construction of Anoatok in 1896, thirteen years after the General's death, was undertaken following the destruction by fire in the same year of the "Old Homestead", the original family home in Kane. Walter Cope of the distinguished Philadelphia architectural firm, Cope and Stewardson, married Eliza Middletown Kane, General Kane's cousin, in 1893, and was assigned to design Dr. Elizabeth's new home.
Cope was born and raised in Philadelphia, attended the finest private schools in Philadelphia, and spent two years training in the architectural office of Theophilus Parsons Chandler. In 1885, he established the firm of Cope and Stewardson (John Stewardson, architect and artist, graduated from Harvard and studied four years in Paris at the École des Beaux Arts, and later was a draftsman for T. P. Chandler) and had a highly versatile practice encompassing collegiate, medical, and residential projects. Stewardson was credited with the taste for English Gothic Revival, which the firm used in their collegiate buildings.
The firm's first commission to design Radner Hall (1886) at. Pembroke and Denbigh Halls, the Library, and the Gymnasium followed Bryn Mawr College successively. In designing these buildings, Cope and Stewardson chose the English Gothic style (an innovation in this country), adapting it freely to the needs of modern universities. With that achievement, the firm's reputation as specialists in college architecture was firmly established. Many other academic buildings -were designed at the University of Pennsylvania, (the firm later became the architects for the University), Princeton University, and Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.
Walter Cope was a founding member of the T-Square Club in 1883, active in the Philadelphia Chapter of the AIA as treasurer and executive committee member, Fellow in the national AIA, and a member of the Philadelphia Sketch Club. He served on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania Department of Architecture (1892-1902) and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (1902). He was also the manager of the John Stewardson Manorial Travel Scholarship (founded by his partner), which enabled graduate and working architects to travel and study in Europe. Following Cope's death in 1902, the T-Square Club established the Walter Cope Memorial prize, awarded annually to the winner of a competition in municipal improvement or landscape architecture.
Dr. Elizabeth named her new residence Anoatok, an Eskimo word meaning "the wind loved spot." She was influenced to name her residence because of the General's brother, Elisha Kent Kane, a noted Arctic explorer closely associated with the Eskimo language and culture. Many of the family's possessions and articles were saved from the fire and remain at Anoatok.
These family artifacts have a bearing on many significant events in American history and include drawings by Elisha Kent Kane during his Arctic expeditions, original correspondence with prominent figures of the Revolutionary War era, Civil War relics and artifacts, correspondence between Brigham Young and General Kane, library collection, and furniture. Dr. Elizabeth was one of the first women practicing physicians in northwest Pennsylvania. She graduated 1883 from the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Her daughter, Dr. Harriet A. Kane, graduated from the same Medical College in 1885. Both were registered in 1885 with the McKean County Medical Association and practiced medicine in Kane.
Harriet died in 1896 before Anoatok was completed. Elizabeth had her private office located on the first floor. The first hospital in Kane was organized by Elizabeth and built by her son, Dr. Evan O'Neill, on the old Smethport Road (Biddle Street) as a cottage hospital. General Kane influenced this concept of a cottage hospital because it was his experience that wounds healed marvelously in the Kane air. Later, the cottage hospital was moved behind the Thomson House hotel, and they donated a large expanse of family-owned land in the borough, known as the Park, which included the Thomson House, to the local hospital Association for the operation of a larger, expanded facility. This remained the site of the Kane Summit Hospital until the mid-1930s.
In addition to her medical practice, Elizabeth was one of the principal stockholders of the Kane Gas Light and Heating Company and the Spring Water Company. Elizabeth died in 1909 and was buried in the family cemetery behind Anoatok, Piney Woods. Evan O'Neill and Thanas remained at Anoatok until Thanas built his home at 107 Edgar Street (east of the Summit Hospital) in 1910. Cope and Stewardson designed his home.
Evan became entrusted with Anoatok and had his private off ice where his mother!s had been. Evan was the chief surgeon of Kane Summit Hospital and was the first to perform self-surgery; in 1919, he amputated one of his fingers, in 1921, at the age of 60, he removed his appendix, and in 1932, he performed surgery on his inguinal hernia. His main goal of self-surgery was to demonstrate that major surgery could be performed as painlessly with local anesthesia as with ether and much more safely. Evan was also the first physician in western Pennsylvania to start the Authenticate School of ~ses. Many of Evan's medical books are still located at Anoatok.
In the mid-1930s, Elisha Kent Kane, Evans's son, took control of Anoatok and converted it into a wayside inn. Some of the doorways between bedrooms and bathrooms were changed, and the kitchen was equipped with modern ventilation equipment. In i983, Anoatok was sold for the first time away from the Kane family. It remains, however, a country inn.
