W. W. Durant

William West Durant (1850–1934) was a designer and developer of camps in the Adirondack Great Camp style, including Camp Uncas, Camp Pine Knot and Sagamore Camp which are National Historic Landmarks. He was the son of Thomas C. Durant, the financier and railroad promoter who was behind the Crédit Mobilier scandal.

William West Durant was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1850. He attended Twickenham School in England and Bonn University in Germany, and traveled extensively as a youth in Europe and Africa. At 24, his father summoned him home from Egypt to help develop the central Adirondacks for tourism.

While working to complete the eastern half of the First Transcontinental Railroad in 1869 as vice-president of the Union Pacific, Dr. Thomas C. Durant formed the Adirondack Company in 1863 from the remains of the Sackets Harbor and Saratoga Railroad Company, which owned 500,000 acres (200,000 ha) of the central Adirondacks. His goal was to cross the Adirondacks to Canada and the Saint Lawrence River. By 1871, tracks had been laid from Saratoga to North Creek, New York, at which point, financial problems caused the project to stall.

In 1876, Durant built a rustic compound on Long Point in Raquette Lake in the center of the Adirondacks to entertain potential investors in the railroad and in his land development schemes. William had first seen Raquette Lake the summer before, and spent the following winter living there in a tent. This group of simple cabins would become Camp Pine Knot, which would be hugely influential in the development of the Great Camp style. William had a hand in its development from the start, but especially after 1879, when tourism to the area exploded following the publication of WHH Murray's Adventures in the Wilderness. William opened a stagecoach line from North Creek to Raquette Lake, dammed the Marion River to allow steamboat travel from Blue Mountain Lake through to Eagle and Utowana Lakes, and built steamboats Killoquah and Toowahloondah on Raquette and Blue Mountain Lakes, respectively. He also arranged for the construction of the Church of the Good Shepherd on St. Hubert's Isle, and created a telegraph company to provide service through to Raquette Lake.

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