page_title: Diana's Baths
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Diana's Baths / History
context_page_description: Diana's Baths is a series of small waterfalls located in the southeastern corner of the town of Bartlett, New Hampshire, near the village of North Conway in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, United States. This historic site is within the White Mountain National Forest. The stream that flows into this waterfall is called Lucy Brook. The waterfalls were once the location of an old sawmill operation in the 1800s. After the sawmill was abandoned by the Lucy family in the 1940s, it was turned into a historic site that would be protected by the U.S. Forest Service. The total drop of the waterfalls is 75 feet, and the hike to the base of the waterfall is about 0.6 miles. Diana's Baths is now a popular family destination.
  The intensity of the stream is related to the season; the stream flow is most intense in the springtime because of runoff from the winter snowmelt. Insect repellent is an essential from spring to fall.
context_section_description: In 1863, George Lucy bought five acres (2.0 ha) of land on the site of Diana's Baths. The Lucy family had built a sawmill in the middle of the cascading waterfalls. During the year 1890, the owner George Lucy began to notice that his property was attracting tourists. In response to this new flow of tourists he built a boarding house that was three stories tall. His business was not as successful as he thought it would be, because of the other major hotels in the surrounding area. In the 1930s the family moved from having a sawmill to having a concrete dam with turbines. The family abandoned the site when the invention of portable mills was introduced and they could now use it when they moved from timber harvest site to the next. Mrs. Hattie C. Lucy owned the property and operated a gift shop beside the falls through the 1940s with an ice house behind the store to cool the soda that was sold to tourists. Mrs. Lucy and her son David lived in the home through the late 1950s until she sold the house. Mr. DeSimone purchased the home and remaining land and eventually sold it to the government. This is when the land became National Forest land and the remaining buildings were torn down.
caption: Diana's Baths, stereoscopic, photograph by John P. Soule (1827–1904)
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