Vassalboro’s Leach, or Leach-Overlock, House is on Maine Preservation’s 2025 list of most endangered historic properties.
The house is on Bog Road, the next building west of the Vassalboro Public Library. It was built around 1805, has been on the National Register of Historic Places since Oct. 20, 1983, and was owned by artist Trudy Overlock until her death in July 2023.
The Maine Preservation notice says the Federal style Cape was built for “local lawyer and postmaster Philip Leach.” It used to have a porch (removed in 1953) and a longer ell connecting a barn; the barn burned in 1960, the notice says.
The Leach house’s outstanding feature is its stenciled interior walls and painted parlor floor, said to have been done by “itinerant folk art stenciler Moses Eaton Jr., of New Hampshire.”
Eaton was born Aug. 3, 1796, in Hancock, New Hampshire, and died Nov 16, 1886, in Dublin, New Hampshire. Trained by his father and later working on his own, he decorated buildings in New Hampshire and Maine in the 1820s and 1830s.
Maine Preservation’s writer described the Leach House work: “The stenciling was completed in bright primary green, red, and yellow, with recurring motifs of a pineapple, a maple leaf within a wreath, a red starburst, and a red bird on a willow. Above the mantlepiece is a unique motif of a yellow bird on a basket of flowers.”
The writer says Overlock bought the house in 1983 and started remodeling. After taking off five layers of wallpaper in the parlor, she found – and appreciated – the stencil work.
“She painstakingly unveiled the stenciling throughout the entire parlor then successfully nominated the house to the National Register of Historic Places,” the notice says.
When she died, Overlock left neither siblings nor children, and no “transition plan” for the house. A family member notified Maine Preservation, whose officials realized they could arrange for the building’s future only by having a personal representative appointed. This person “would need to coordinate all 19 potential heirs from across the country, in addition to addressing outstanding medical debts, back taxes, and a house in worsening condition.”
Maine Preservation hopes to be appointed personal representative. The organization would make repairs and sell the house for a residence, with a “preservation easement” in the deed protecting the stencils.
Meanwhile, the house continues to deteriorate. Maine Preservation officials worry about damage to exterior details, the aging roof and especially effects of cold winters and dampness on the stencils.
The notice thanks the Vassalboro Historical Society and the Center for Painted Wall Preservation for research, and the 1772 Foundation for a grant. It concludes with an appeal for funds, because “resolving this legal matter will continue to require significant staff hours and expensive counsel.”
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