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Mrs. Dudley
The man who built Hill House. Hugh Crain delighted in creating a place which did not subscribe to traditional rules of design and architecture, seemingly hoping to make the house as disorienting as possible. Hugh Crain’s wife died on her way up to visit the completed manor for the first time, leaving Crain to care for their two daughters on his own. Little is known about how he raised the girls, but Luke Sanderson finds evidence—in the form of a scrapbook which cobbles together Bible verses, art, etchings, and disturbing illustrations—that Crain was, in all likelihood, deranged, controlling, and even abusive. It is unclear whether Crain’s influence on Hill House has made it the evil entity it is today, or whether it is the house which corrupted him.
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Hugh Crain Character Timeline in The Haunting of Hill House
The timeline below shows where the character Hugh Crain appears in The Haunting of Hill House. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 3
...He explains that it was built over eighty years ago by a wealthy man named Hugh Crain as a home for his family. The house though, seemed to have been cursed from...
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After Hugh Crain died, the house was left to the two sisters, who were by then young ladies....
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Chapter 4
...they cannot. The doctor explains that Hill House has been designed to disorient its inhabitants— Hugh Crain wanted the house to be a “showplace,” a marvel of design, but organized the whole...
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Chapter 6
...group with a book he has found in the library—a book made by hand by Hugh Crain for his eldest daughter. It is a kind of scrapbook which Luke feels has been...
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