When the Hut and the Lodge were built, this spot was a "frontier," says Tom.  The only way to get to Summer Haven was by boat, and the mail boat came just once a week.  A bridge wasn't built until 1927.  While homes dot the land across the river now, vestiges of the area's wild past remain.  Gopher tortoises burrow in the yard, where yucca, palmetto, sable palms, gaillardia, and the beach grasses grow freely.  Sea turtles nest on the beach, and right whales can be spotted offshore.

Preserving both the memories and the buildings here comes naturally to Tom, who spent 21 years as director of Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater, a house museum in western Pennsylvania.  Maintaining the Lodge's integrity was key to a renovation of the classic dogtrot cottage in 2002.  Five small bedrooms and two baths lie off the breezeway, long enclosed as a living area.  A few steps away is the detached kitchen.

Built of first-growth Florida pine, the Lodge has withstood the ocean's punishment for more than a century.  In the renovation, Tom and Susan swapped concrete posts for cypress, replaced the roof, and did some foundation work, but for the most part, the house was sturdy.

Original details predominate: double-hung, six-over-six windows; heart-pine floors; hand-rubbed wood walls and ceilings; wooden pegs on the bedroom walls that serve as closets.  Bowing to the needs of renters, the Schmidts reluctantly added central air conditioning, but with unobtrusive ducts.  The Lodge boasts antiques from the early 1900s including English ironstone plates that belonged to Tom's grandmother, a quilt crafted by his great-aunts, and his grandfather's barometer.