Tag: NY Historical Sites

National Baseball Hall of Fame & Museum 25 Main Street Cooperstown, NY 13326

National Baseball Hall of Fame & Museum

25 Main Street

Cooperstown, NY 13326

(607) 547-7200

Open: Sunday-Saturday 9:00am-5:00pm

Fee: Adults $30.00/Seniors (65+) $20.00/Veterans $18.00/Children 7-12 $15.00/Active Military-Children under 6-Members Free

My review on TripAdvisor:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g47529-d102933-Reviews-National_Baseball_Hall_of_Fame_and_Museum-Cooperstown_Otsego_New_York.html?m=19905

The National Baseball Hall of Fame at 25 Main Street

When visiting the National Baseball Hall of Fame be prepared to spend over two hours in the museum because there is so much to see. When I visited the museum recently they had just inducted Derek Jeter as one of its newer members so a lot of Yankee fans were swarming around the picture and the display.

Derek “The Captain” Jeter being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame

The museum can be overwhelming if you don’t break it down to the part of the visit. I wanted to see the Hall of Fame plaques so I started there. All the players of the past were memorialized by the pictures on plaques with a small blurb about their careers and what team they wanted to be remembered by when they were inducted in.

My hero, Reggie Jackson ‘Mr. October’

I was looking for Reggie Jackson, because I remember when “Mr. October” entered he said with pride that he was coming in as a Yankee. He was one of my hero’s of the 1970’s.

The Hall of Fame Plaque Wall

The Hall of Fame Gallery

The second floor is loaded with all sorts of baseball memorabilia from Hank Aaron’s uniforms, pictures and stats to a complete display of all of Babe Ruth’s career history from uniforms, stats, recordings, pictures and even his locker.

Babe Ruth display

The Babe Ruth exhibit

The Babe Ruth panel

Each display case represented the history of baseball and how it has progressed over the years. From the early Egyptians playing a similar sport with a bat and ball to the progression of cricket in the British Territories to modern day stickball in the cities, baseball keeps morphing and changing to modern times.

The history of Baseball

The CC Sabathia exhibit on his coming into the Hall of Fame

Many famous players have donated their entire collections to the museum so it was interesting to see their progression from the time they were young to the time of their retirement.

The Japanese baseball history

There are also collections of baseball cards, recordings and films, modern day artworks and even Hollywood’s take on baseball with posters like the “Field of Dreams” and “The Bad News Bears”. I was surprised how the lines between reality and the truth begin to blur in a museum like this.

What I was grateful to was the amount of items donated by the fans, wanting to part with something so valuable to them to share it with other fans.

The NY Yankee dynasty

I have to say that the museum can be a little overwhelming at time since there is so much to see so plan on spending at least over two hours and break the visit into two days to really experience the museum especially if you are a true baseball fan at heart.

It is an amazing experience.

The Women’s League history

The outfits for Women’s Baseball League

History of the National Baseball Hall of Fame:

(From the museum website)

The Village is pure Americana, a one-stoplight town nestled between the Adirondacks and the Catskills in Central New York. It drew from the family of James Fenimore Cooper, whose father, William, founded the village, whose works of literature have become American standards.

And yet Cooperstown has become a synonym for “baseball”, thanks to a story about a Civil War general and the country’s love for a timeless game. By the last half of the 19th Century, baseball had become the National Pastime. The United States was a little more than 100 years old and baseball had evolved with the country. But there was no definitive answer as to the birth of the game.

Enter the Spalding Commission, a board created by sporting goods magnate and former player A. G. Spalding to establish the genesis of baseball. And after a few years of searching, they found their answer.

A plaque commemorating Major General Abner Doubleday was installed prior to the Hall of Fame’s opening on June 12th, 1939.(Homer Osterhoudt/National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum).

The Abner Doubleday display

Abner Graves, a mining engineer, proclaimed that Abner Doubleday, a decorated Union Army officer who fired the first shot of defense of Fort Sumter at the start of the Civil War and later served at the Battle of Gettysburg, invented baseball in 1839 in Cooperstown. That was good enough for the Spalding Commission, which came to its conclusion in 1907.

Three decades later, Cooperstown philanthropist Stephen C. Clark, seeking a way to celebrate and protect the National Pastime as well as an economic engine for Cooperstown, asked National League president Ford C. Frick if he would support the establishment of a Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. The idea was welcomed and in 1936 the inaugural Hall of Fame class of Ty Cobb, Walter Johnson, Christy Mathewson, Babe Ruth and Honus Wagner was elected.

Three years later, the Hall of Fame building officially opened in Cooperstown as all of baseball paused to honor what was called “Baseball’s Centennial” and as the first four Hall of Fame classes were inducted.

To mark the occasion, Time Magazine wrote: “The world will little note nor long remember what (Doubleday) did at Gettysburg but it can never forget what he did at Cooperstown.”

In the years since, The Doubleday Myth has been refuted. Doubleday himself was at West Point in 1839. Yet the Myth has become strong enough that the facts alone do not deter the spirit of Cooperstown.

The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum surely the most well-known sports shrine in the world, continues to thrive in the town where baseball’s pulse beats the strongest.

But in the following the opening of the Hall of Fame on June 12th, 1939, the Museum has become much more than just home to baseball’s biggest stars. The Hall of Fame is the keeper of the game.

The Hall of Fame’s collections contain more than 40,000 three demensional artifacts, such as bats, balls, gloves and uniforms donated by players and fans who want to see history preserved. The museum’s curators use the artifacts, whose number grows by about 400 a year, to tell the story of the National Pastime through exhibits.

The Museum itself is a melding of five buildings sewn together via several renovation and expansion programs. Today, the Museum easily accommodates more than 3000 visitors per day during the peak season.

The artifact collection is housed in climate-controlled rooms to protect the delicate, fabric and wood materials used in baseball. The Museum promises, in exchange for the donation of an artifact, to care for an item in perpetuity, which means the effects of temperature and humidity must be constantly regulated. The Museum’s first accessioned item was the “Doubleday Baseball”, which was discovered in a farmhouse in nearby Fly Creek, NY in 1935 and dates to the 19th Century.

Then in 1937, Cy Young, elected to the Hall of Fame that year in the second year of voting, generously donated several artifacts, including the 1908 ball from his 500th win and the 1911 uniform he wore with the Boston Braves. Young’s donations generated new offers from other players as well as fans.

Thousands of fans attended the opening of the Hall of Fame on June 12th, 1939 and that same year another Cooperstown tradition was started with the launch of the annual Hall of Fame game. For 70 years, the Hall of Fame game became an annual celebration of the game as two Major League Baseball teams played an annual exhibition contest at Doubleday Field in Cooperstown.

Though the game was discontinued in 2008, the legends live on with the advent of the Hall of Fame Classic, an annual event over Memorial Day Weekend featuring Hall of Famers and former major leaguers at historic Doubleday Field.

The field itself dates back to 1920 and the first grandstand was built in 1924. Thanks to Works Progress Administration money during the Great Depression, Doubleday Field was expanded again in 1934. Today, the field is occupied non-stop during the spring, summer and fall as high school athletes, collegiate summer league stars and recreational players savor the chance to play on hallowed ground.

The A. Bartlett Giamatti research Center is also part of the Museum experience and the Center’s Library contains more than three million documents on the history of baseball, ranging from reference books to the “Green Light Letter” sent by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis in January of 1942, urging Landis to keep baseball going during World War II. The National Baseball Hall of Fame Library also contains more than 250,00 baseball photographs and images.

As an educational institution, the Museum offers outreach programs for audiences of all ages. Through virtual classroom technology, Cooperstown is transported to school across the country with video-conference lessons featuring any one of 16 learning modules.

The Joe Di Maggie award

Mission of the Museum:

Preserving History, Honoring Excellence and Connecting Generations.

The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is an independent, non-profit educational institution dedicated to fostering an appreciation of the historical development of baseball and its impact on our culture by collecting, preserving, exhibiting and interpreting its collection for a global audience as well as honoring those who have made outstanding contributions to our national pastime.

The Yogi Berra panel

The Hall of Fame’s mission is to preserve the sport’s history, honor excellence within the game and make a connection between the generations of people who enjoy baseball. Likewise the institution functions as three entities under one roof with a museum, the actual Hall of Fame and a research library. With these parts working together, the Museum is committed to fulfilling its mission by:

Collecting, through donations, baseball artifacts, works of art, literature, photgraphs, memorabilia and related materials which focus on the history of the game over time, its players and those elected to the Hall of Fame.

Preserving the collections by adhering to professional museum standards with respect to conservation and maintaining a permanent record of holdings through documentation, study, research, cataloging and publication.

The Mariano Rivera plaque

Exhibiting material in permanent gallery space, organizing on-site changing exhibitions on various themes, with works from the Hall of Fame collectins or other sources, working with other individuals or organizations to exhibit loaned material of significance to baseball and providing related research facilities.

Interpreting artifacts its exhibition and education programs to enhance awareness, understanding and appreciation of the game fora diverse audience.

The Mike Mussina plaque

Honoring, by enshrinement, those individuals who had exceptional careers and recognizing others for their significant achievements.

Castle Williams Governors Island New York, NY 10004

Castle Williams

Governors Island

New York, NY 10004

(212) 825-3054

Open: Check the website. It varies by season

https://www.nps.gov/gois/learn/historyculture/castle-williams.htm

https://www.nps.gov/gois/planyourvisit/explore-castle-williams.htm

My review on TripAdvisor:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g60763-d6952984-Reviews-Castle_Williams-New_York_City_New_York.html?m=19905

My trip to Governors Island on MywalkinManhattan.com in 2018 and 2024:

https://wordpress.com/post/mywalkinmanhattan.com/7658

Castle Williams Fort as you enter from the main walkway

I have toured Castle Williams several times when visiting Governors Island over the last two years. The fort sits at a strategic site on the island facing Manhattan. The fort was originally built to protect New York City from the British during the War of 1812. The British knowing that the City had been fortified for battle never attacked New York.

The historic plaque

The tour takes place twice a day for about an hour and you tour the first two levels of the fort. There are all sorts of signs around to show the history of the fort and its uses over the years. The one thing they don’t like is you touching the walls as the fort is still pretty fragile.

The entrance to this historic fort.

The nicest part of the tour is the observation deck at the top of the fort and the views of the Lower Manhattan skyline. It is a spectacular view of the harbor. You can see by the view why the fort was built where it was built and for its purpose before the War of 1812.

The sign welcoming you to the fort.

It really is a treat to see how fortifications mattered for cities in this time of history in this country.

The History of Castle Williams:

The model of Castle Williams inside the fort.

Castle Williams is a circular defensive work of red sandstone on the west point of Governors Island in New York Harbor. It was designed and erected between 1807 and 1811. It was designed by the Chief Engineer of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Lieutenant Colonial Jonathan Williams for whom the fort was named after. It was considered a prototype for new forms of coastal fortification.

The fort from the outside

The castle was one component of a larger defensive system for the inner harbor that included Fort Jay and the South Battery on Governors Island, Castle Clinton at the tip of Manhattan, Fort Gibson at Ellis Island and Fort Wood, which is now the base of the Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island. This system of forts came to be known as the Second American System of coastal defense and existed to protect harbors like the one in New York from British interference with American Shipping.

The inside courtyard of the fort.

Its usefulness as a fort began to end in the 1830’s, so Castle Williams subsequently served as barracks for the island’s garrison and new and transient troops. The castle was then remodeled by the U.S. Army for use as a prison in various forms during the Civil War and through the first half of the 20th Century.

In 1901, Secretary of War Elihu Root, who worked hard to modernize the Army, made a commitment to preserve the castle and overruled army leaders who wanted to demolish both it and Fort Jay. By 1903, the castle was fitted up as a model, state of art prison facility. In 1947, extensive renovations were carried out with the wooden catwalks replaced by concrete enclosed walk ways, hiding the beautiful stone arches on the third level and resulting in the industrial appearance of the courtyard today. Castle Williams ceased operations as a military prison in 1965 just before the U.S. Army left Governors Island.

The inside of the prison cell.

The Castle again faced a demolition challenge as Coast Guard officials in Washington DC, who took control of Governors Island in 1966, wanted to demolish it. Instead, the castle was remodeled as a youth community center with a nursery, meeting rooms for Scouts and clubs, a woodworking shop, art studios, a photography laboratory and a museum. By the late 1970’s, the community center moved to another location and the fort became the grounds-keeping shop for the Coast Guard base.

Over time, the roof failed and broken windows allowed serious water damage to occur inside the castle. In the mid-1990s, the roof was replaced and new windows stopped further water damage to the structure but the interior remains closed until it can be made safe for public access. The National Park Service proposes to stabilize and restore the castle and eventually provide access to the roof, allowing the public to admire the harbor and the modern skyline of the great city (this has since opened on my last visit).

The view from the top of the hill on Governor’s Island.

Castle Williams was individually listed in the National Register of Historic Placed on July 31, 1972. It was recorded by the Historical American Buildings Survey in 1983. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1985 and the New York City Landmarks Historic District in 1996. It has been part of the Governors Island National Monument by Presidential Proclamations signed in 2001 and 2003.

(This information was provided by the National Park System Division of Cultural Affairs).

The lawn of Governor’s Island overlooking Lower Manhattan.

Mesier Homestead & Museum-Wappinger’s Falls Historical Society 2 Spring Street Wappinger’s Falls, NY 12590

The Mesier Homestead & Museum-Wappinger’s Falls Historical Society

2 Spring Street

Wappinger’s Falls, NY 12590

(845) 632-1281

Open: Sunday 1:00pm-4:00pm/Check website for special events

Fee: Adult $10.00/Seniors $7.00/Children 7-18 $5.00/Members Free

https://www.wappingershistoricalsociety.org/

My review on TripAdvisor:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g48799-d16919924-Reviews-Mesier_Homestead_and_Museum-Wappingers_Falls_New_York.html?m=19905

The entrance to Mesier Park where the Homestead is located

The plaque outside the home

I visited the Mesier Homestead recently and toured the home with a local docent. Home to four generations of the Mesier family, the house has been added onto since it was built in the mid-1700’s. The rooms are decorated with furnishings from the Victorian era and shows life as it may have been in the late 1880’s at the height of the Victorian era.

The Mesier Homestead in the summer months

The tour of the rooms shows how the home was added onto to meet the increased demands of a growing family and one of increasing affluence. The original home was added onto from the back to add service areas and work areas for the household.

The entrance to the Mesier Homestead

A portrait of Mrs. Mesier in the hallway

When you enter the foyer from the front door, there are reproductions of family portraits hallway that had served as the parlor of the original house. As the house expanded, this area became the formal entrance to the home. To the right of the foyer, there is the Living Room, where the Historical Society has uncovered one of the two fireplaces from the original home that once heated the rooms.

The reproductions of Mr. and Mrs. Mesier in the Living Room

During the late 1800’s, the son of the owner heightened the ceilings to get rid of the railroad ties that once decorated the ceiling. This gave the room a more modern look and showed the affluence of the family that could heat a home with heigh ceilings.

The Mesier Homestead Living Room

Another view of the Living Room

The room furnishings included family paintings, a then modern Victrola, ornated furniture and diagram of the family tree. The small steps led to a small office off the Living Room that was added onto with more family objects.

The Library and Office off the Living Room at the Mesier Homestead

When you entered the room from the kitchen and the Butler’s Pantry where food was finished and readied to be served, a formally set Dining Room for dinner showed the family’s status in the community.

The Dining Room at the Mesier Homestead

The sideboard and the Dining Room table

An ornate china set from England enhanced the table with fine linens that the family would have owned. A newly opened fireplace that had once heated the dining room was shown by a heating unit that would have been used in the Victorian age. All sorts of fine decorative objects lined the tables and shelves.

The Dining Room table is set for a fine dinner at the Mesier home

By the amount of space available for living and entertaining with the separate rooms for use in the home it showed how times were changing with the affluence of that time. The family would show off their fine things to show their status in the community.

The Fan Collection from Victorian times

The second-floor tour is a view of the slave/then servants’ quarters and the two-family bedrooms. What I thought was interesting on the tour is how the family had to co-mingle in the bedrooms because of the number of children in the family and how mom and dad were not always alone. The rooms had to be expanded so that there was plenty of room for the growing family.

The Children’s bedroom on the second floor

There were many family items in the house like clothing, children’s toys and playthings and items for recreation like bikes, ice skates and musical instruments of a time before TV, movies and radio. There were also items for spinning and making clothes.

Children’s toys during the Victorian Age reflected imagination and preparation for adulthood with blocks, dolls, kitchen items and other playthings to stimulate the mind.

Bicycles and Native American art on the second floor

During Victorian times, the way people shopped and carried themselves changed after the Civil War with the rise of department stores and the merchant class. Instead of making your clothes, you bought them at the store and there was protocol on how Victorians behaved and handled themselves in society regardless of class.

The care of grooming a Victorian woman had in her bedroom

Clothing and accessories for the Victorian woman for dressing for the day

One of the rooms was also set up like a small school with original children’s desks and blackboards. There is even a Civil War era flag that was found in one of the local homes hanging in the room.

The tour guide also noted the drafts in the house before insulation was put in and the conditions of the time with weather effecting living conditions inside with drafts in the winter and heat in the summer through the roof plyboards. This was modern living at the time. The heat would radiate from the lower level of the house and the Dutch doors would let fresh air in the warmer months. These were modern in comparison to our modern homes. This was the interesting part of the home.

When I asked why the back rooms had not been renovated like the front of the house, our tour guide explained that the Meiser’s were a very devout family and even though they were affluent for the times, they were restrained and not showy like you would see in places like the Vanderbilt mansion. They would not have entertained like that on a grand scale. It was an interesting perspective that those things did not mean that much to these older families.

The original section of the homestead from 1742 is currently being renovated. This is the original hearth and oven of the kitchen.

The tour takes about an hour and is a fascinating step back in history of the way these families lived.

Recently the house was decorated for the Christmas holidays with garland, holly and fragrant oranges that once masked the household smells. They also gave the house a festive fragrance. These popular tours last through the holiday season.

Please check their website for a list of their activities.

The History of the Mesier Homestead:

The Mesier Homestead and surrounding property was sold to the Village of Wappinger’s Falls in 1891 with the understanding that it forever be known as Mesier Homestead and Mesier Park. The Wappinger’s Historical Society acquired full custodianship of the Homestead in 2007 and through ongoing fundraising efforts has been able to restore the Homestead to its present appearance.

The Mesier Homestead at Christmastime:

Christmas time at the Mesier Homestead is a festive and elegant affair of decorations and the home being set for a Christmas in the Revolutionary War era. The only difference is the the home has a Christmas tree which did not come into existence until the Victorian era.

the outside of the home decorated with wreaths and garland

The Front Porch

The front door with wreaths and garland

Entering the main hallway of the Mesier Home

The other end of the Hallway

Even the doors were festive with wreaths

The family portraits in the hallway were adorned with garland

The Living Room was the centerpoint of the house on Christmas morning with children coming downstairs to see what Santa had left them in the later part of the 1890’s into the early 1900’s. The tree would have been the centerpiece of the room sparkling in Christmas morning and a place for the family to gather for the day. Nothing has changed in this tradition except electronics.

The Living Room was decorated for both a Victorian and Revolutionary Christmas

The Victorian Christmas tree was lit brightly for the holidays and added a festive touch to the room

The rest of the Living Room was set with flowers and garland

The Library was set with flowers and wreaths and made for a very welcoming environment. This would have been a quiet place on Christmas morning for the family with festivities all through the house.

The Library was simple decorated and elegant

The comfortable Library

Even so, the house was beautifully set with garland all over the mantels and doorways and the Dining Room was set for a formal Christmas lunch which would have been eaten after church. The concept of gift giving on the holidays also did not come about until the Victorian era as well. Still Christmas lunch had been part of the holiday tradition for years.

The Dining Room was set for an elegant Victorian Christmas lunch

Victorian china adorns the festive Christmas dinner table

The mantel in the Dining Room was adorned with garland and oranges which gave the room a wonderful fragrance of pine and citrus

The family portrait in the Dining Room got special attention

Mesier Homestead decorated for the Christmas holiday season

The Wappinger’s Falls Christmas tree is just outside the house

The bandstand outside the house was decorated to the hilt.

The History of the house:

The house itself is part of the ‘Rombout Patent’ of land that had been bought by the Dutch from the local Indian tribes by three prominent Dutch families. This section of the property was bought by Nicholas and Adolphus Brewer and contained 750 acres of land around the Falls area, and they built the first stone house in the village near present Mill Street. In 1742, the Brewers built a mill on the east side of Wappinger Creek.

Nicholas Brewer built the Mesier Homestead in 1741, which he sold in 1777 to Matthew Van Benschoten who in turn sold it to Peter Mesier, a merchant from New York City. In May 1777, soldiers and local residents attacked Peter Meiser’s house in Wappinger’s Falls, disputing the price of tea for sale in a small store inside the home. Mesier was a merchant from New York City and a Loyalist. The angry mob struck Mesier, beat his slaves and drank wine stored in the cellar. They also took the tea and left a small amount of money behind. The house was in the possession of the family for the next four generations (Wiki).

The organization’s goal for 2020 and beyond is to restore the original 1741 building so it can be a showcase of our Colonial history. Your membership, gifts and in-kind donations will help us maintain and restore this jewel of Wappinger’s Falls.

The Wappingers Historical Society Native American Collection:

The Wappingers Historical Society is the curator of an extensive collection of Native American artifacts, many of which stem from the Stoneco/Clinton Point and Bowdoin Park area in the vicinity of the Town of Wappinger. This collection of artifacts was once considered to be the largest private collection in New York State.

Victorian Hair art of the dead

It consists of over 2000 objects, many of which are projectile points (arrowheads and spear points). Some of these have been found to date back 8,500 years. Also included are tools such as scrapers, knives, axes and hatchets. A small portion of approximately 100 pieces of the collection is on display at the Mesier Homestead and can be seen as part of our guided tours.

The Native American collection is extensive at the Meiser House

The Mission of the Wappinger’s Falls Historical Society:

The Wappinger’s Historical is dedicated to preserving and promoting the history of the Town of Wappinger, the Village of Wappinger’s Falls and neighboring communities and to maintain the custodianship of the Mesier Homestead.

The beauty of Downtown Wappinger’s Falls, NY

When you are a member of the Wappinger’s Historical Society, you help:

Storage area of the house

*Preserve and expand our archives, collections and library to actively chronicle the life of our hamlets, village and town for future generations.

*Develop and implement programs and exhibits so that people of all ages can better understand their connection to history.

*Safeguard our architectural heritage of the 1741 Mesier Homestead.

(This information was taken from the Wappinger’s Falls pamphlet, and I give them full credit for it)

The Mesier Homestead in the summer months

Their wonderful gift shop that should not be missed

Boscobel House & Gardens 1601 Route 9D Garrison, NY 10524

Boscobel House & Gardens

1601 Route 9D

Garrison, NY 10524

(845) 265-3638

http://www.boscobel.org

Homepage

Open: Sunday-Monday 9:30am-5:00pm (closes 4:00pm between November and January 5th) The house is only open between April and the beginning of January.

Fee: Adults $18.00/Seniors $15.00/Children (5-18) $9.00/Children (under 5 years old) Free (This is for house and Garden/Garden tours are different and depend on the season. Please check the website)

My review on TripAdvisor:

The front of Boscobel during Christmas time.

the back of the house at Christmas time.

The view from the back of the house of the Hudson River.

The view from the back of the house at twilight.

Entering the house for the evening “Candle Light” walking tour.

I recently visited the Boscobel House and Garden for their Christmas decorations and for a tour of the house at the holidays. Like most houses of its time period (the house was built in 1806), it was Post-Revolutionary War and the decorations would not have been that lavish as in the Victorian times. In 2023, the house had “Evening Hours” where you could take a self-guided tour and then come back to the Visitors Center for pastries, candy and hot drinks of Apple Cider and Hot Chocolate. These were the best nights to attend. For $25.00, you got to take your time in each room and talk with a docent about the history of the house.

The Grand Hallway display Boscobel

The floral displays in the Grand Hallway were amazing.

The Boscobel Grand Staircase in the Great Hall.

When you enter the house from the front entrance, you enter the Grand Hall with its winding staircase decorated in garland, flowers and lights. The Grand Hall was also once used for balls and informal dances. Decorated for the holidays, the Great Hall was dazzling for the Christmas holiday season.

The Great Hall decorated to the hilt for the holidays.

The house was tastefully decorated with garlands and mistletoe along the archways inside the foyer and with holly and mistletoe inside the house. Some of the tables were set for afternoon tea and entertaining in the Front Drawing Room and there was a small table Christmas tree which were just coming into vogue after the War of 1812. The Front Drawing Room was also set for entertaining as would be done in the holidays months in the later 1800’s.

The Front Drawing Room just off the Great Hall.

The Front Drawing Room set for tea during the holidays.

The Front Drawing Room

The Front Drawing Room is where guests would be received when they entered the house. They would be entertained until the Dyckman’s were ready to greet visitors. Tea and refreshments would be served here while they waited. After the guests would be received, if they were going to stay for the afternoon or evening, they would move to the Back Drawing Room for games, entertainment and conversation before moving on to the Dining Room for the main meal.

The Drawing/Music Room is where Mrs. Dyckman would have received guests and where informal entertaining would have happened. There was also musical instruments and player music boxes on display.

The Back Drawing Room with the Table tree.

The Back Drawing Room with the portrait of Mrs. Dyckman.

The Table Top tree in the Back Drawing Room.

Our tour guide, Sam, was fantastic and I hope when you tour the house he is your guide. I was impressed with his knowledge of the house and of the Dyckman family. I had not realized that they were related to the Dyckman Farmhouse family in Inwood (See my review and write ups on the Dyckman Farmhouse here on VisitingaMuseum.com and MywalkinManhattan.com: https://wordpress.com/post/visitingamuseum.com/771)

He told the story of Mr. Dyckman, who had the house built, how he made his fortune, how he died young without ever living in the house and then his son and his wife dying around the same time. The son-in-law then squandered the fortune with a series of bad investments and the house was foreclosed. It sat empty and was falling apart until a group of local citizens saved it. The house is now back in its full beauty and furnished in period furnishings to reflect the time that the house was built. The tour then guides you from the Front and Back Drawing Rooms to the Main Dining Room, where the real entertaining would take place.

The Main Dining Room was set for a Christmas dinner circa 1830’s and 40’s with the elaborate dishes, crystal and silver and laded with the foods of the holiday season. Meals would take several hours and many courses and would be accompanied by good conversation and maybe some music.

The Formal Dining Room’s table was set for a holiday dinner. The candles had been lit (they were electric) and the room had a warm glow to it. The windows must have let in natural light so earlier meals must have been quite nice when in the summer months the sun shined inside the room. There was custom made china set on the places and there was family silver next to it. The side boards were made by Sheraton and the cut glass had been imported from England.

The formal Dining Room set for Christmas dinner.

Another view of the Dining Room.

The fireplace in the Dining Room decorated for the holidays.

The Christmas desserts for dinner in the Dining Room at Boscobel.

In the back of the Dining Room was the dumbwaiter and the service area, The Warming Room, where items would be finished once they came up from the basement kitchen. They would be plated, decorated and served from this area and the timing would have had to be precise so the food did not arrive cold into the Dining Room.

The Warming Room where meals would be finished before serving.

Items to be served at meals in the Warming Room.

We then toured the back areas of the Warming Room, where all the food would have finished and plated. The room had all sorts of gadgets to keep the plates warm and where all the silver and china would have been kept. After the tour of the downstairs was finished, it was time to climb the Grand Staircase to the rooms in the second floor of the home.

The Grand Staircase to the second floor bedrooms.

The other side of the Grand Staircase.

The second floor Landing at the top of the steps is where all the bedrooms were concentrated.

The Card Table at the top of the Landing in Boscobel.

We then toured the upstairs bedrooms, where we learned the family would have ‘camped out’ in for the cold winter months. I was surprised to learn that the whole front of the house was closed off and the upstairs bedrooms would have been sealed off with fireplaces to keep them warm and the cloth hangings around the bed to keep out the drafts. Both mother and son’s bedrooms were nicely furnished with period furniture.

The Mrs. Dyckman’s bedroom at Boscobel.

Peter Dyckman’s Room on the second floor

Peter Dyckman’s Room at Christmas time.

Sills Dyckman’s Room with the nursery.

Sill’s Dyckman’s Room at Christmas time.

The guest room

The Guest Room at Christmas time.

Our last stop was the kitchen in the basement back area of the house where all the food would have been prepared and brought up to the Butler’s Pantry. There were all sorts of kitchen equipment for roasting, baking and boiling. You could tell that it was not easy work cooking these elaborate meals without the modern conveniences that we take for granted today. These cooks had a tougher time with the stoves and fireplaces as a source of cooking.

The Dyckman kitchen preparing Christmas dinner.

The Dyckman basement kitchen during the holidays.

The kitchen during the Christmas

The Dyckman Kitchen where the servants were preparing a holiday dinner.

In the lower level gallery, there was an exhibition of miniature displays by artist Helen Bruce. She created these tiny diorama’s that are on display. She was quite clever in the details.

Bio on Artist Helen Bruce

‘The Seamstress’ by Helen Bruce

‘The Seamstress’ by Helen Bruce

‘The Toy Shop’ by Helen Bruce

“The Toy Shop” by artist Helen Bruce.

“The Rug Merchant” Artist Helen Bruce.

“Seamstress” by artist Helen Bruce.

The gallery was lined with a series of these diorama’s and each was very detailed in their appearance.

After the self-guided tour was over, I was able to walk around the property and see the gardens. At night the gardens were all lit with Christmas lights and the trellises were done with garland.

Boscobel’s Gardens at night during Christmas.

The walkway through the gardens.

The fountain at Boscobel is decorated to the hilt.

The Herb Garden at night.

The Front of Boscobel at night.

The front of Boscobel at night when I left the house.

The back of the house on the way back to the Gift Shop.

When I toured the house in 2019, what I thought was a nice touch at the end of the tour in the kitchen area was that Sam served us cold apple cider and small gingerbread men which I thought was special keeping with the house’s tradition of a place of entertainment. I thought it was gracious and very much welcome.

When I went to the evening Open House in 2023, the gift shop was serving refreshments when we returned from our self-guided tour. They were serving Hot Chocolate, Hot Apple Cider, Doughnuts, cakes, cookies and Christmas candy while we walked around the Visitors Center.

The Gift Shop at Christmas time.

The Gift Shop at Christmas time.

It really was an interesting tour and I will have to return in the summer months.

History of Boscobel House & Gardens:

States Morris Dyckman was a descendant of a German-Dutch family whose roots in New York stretched back to 1662. During the American Revolution, he was a Loyalist serving as a clerk in the British army’s Quartermaster Department. In 1779, he accompanied his quartermaster superiors to England and for the next decade he rebutted the government allegations that the quartermasters had engaged in profiteering. (As the keeper of the department’s ledgers, he well knew how they had fattened their purses, assets Dyckman’s biographer James Thomas Flexner). The officers were eventually cleared, largely because of Dyckman’s testimony. They rewarded him with an annuity.

The portrait of States Dyckman in the Front Drawing Room.

Dyckman returned to America in 1789 after a general amnesty of Loyalists had been declared. Five years later, he married Elizabeth Corne, a member of a distinguished New York family and 21 years his junior. Dyckman returned along to England in 1800 to settle problems with the payment of his annuity. The trip lasted nearly four years but was a success. He returned a rich man worth more than seven million dollars today. Before he left England, he bought many items for the house including silver, china, glass and books for his library.

The architect for the house was unknown but records show that Mr. Dyckman had some influence in the design of the house. Mr. Dyckman died in 1806 at age 51 and the house had only had the foundation finished at time. His 30 year old wife, Elizabeth finished the house in 1808 with the help of her husband’s cousin, William Vermilyea. She furnished the house and added to its inventory. She and her son, Peter lived in the house upon finishing it. She lived in the house until her death in 1823 and her son, Peter died the following year in 1824 at age 27. The house stayed in the family until about 1899 and then was foreclosed on. According to the guide, the house had not been updated at that point and was falling apart. The house had a series of absent owners over the next few years and then sat empty. It was bought by Westchester County in 1924 and the grounds were turned into a park.

Boscobel House & Gardens in winter

In 1945, the park was acquired by the Veterans Administration for a hospital and the owners took care of the exterior for a time. By 1954, the house was considered an excess on the budget and was being sold for $35.00 for demolition.

The house was saved by Historian Benjamin West Frazier and some friends of his who raised about $10,000 to have the house moved and dismantled to save ‘this treasure’. The house was stored in pieces until 1955, when Lila Acheson Wallace, the co-founder of Readers Digest became involved in the project.

She purchased the land that the house now sits on and devoted her time and money to have the house restored and worked with the curators of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where she was a donor to help restore the house into its period design with landscaped gardens and period furniture. In 1959, she commissioned the firm of Innocenti & Webel to create the gardens that surround the house. The house opened to the public in 1961.

(This information was taken from the Boscobel Museum Booklet and I give them full credit for the information)

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