Perched on the rocks overlooking Gloucester Harbor, Beauport was built by Henry Davis Sleeper (1878-1934), a prominent collector and interior designer of the 1920s and 1930s. Construction began in 1907 for a modest summer retreat, which Sleeper designed in collaboration with a local architect, Halfdan M. Hanson. Over the next 27 years, the house evolved into some 40 rooms filled with vast collections of American and European objects, arranged by Sleeper into compositions of color, light, and evocative meaning. After Sleeper's death, Beauport was purchased by Charles and Helena McCann. Recognizing the importance of Sleeper's singular achievement, they preserved intact nearly all of his decorative screens and arrangements of objects. In 1942 the McCann heirs gave Beauport to SPNEA as a museum for the benefit of the public.
