Robert Louis Stevenson and the Saranac Connection
The Episcopal Church of St. Luke the Beloved Physician is seen soon after its completion in 1879. At far left is the Cooper residence, where Robert Louis Stevenson met Mrs. âLibbyâ Custer.
(Provided photo)
Mrs. Margaret Isabella Balfour Stevenson, or “Maggie,” was the daughter of a high-ranking official in the Scottish Presbyterian Church, the Rev. Dr. Lewis Balfour. Consequently, churchgoing was in Maggie’s blood, and in 1887, there was only one legitimate outlet in Saranac Lake to satisfy that urge St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, established 1879. And so it was that the mother of Robert Louis Stevenson joined that congregation for the duration of the layover in these mountains by the Stevenson expedition: a group of five travelers comprised of Maggie and her son with the newly famous initials RLS, his wife Mrs. Fanny Stevenson, her son Lloyd Osbourne and their maid Valentine Roch; and temporarily Sport, a good