The Putnam History Museum at 63 Chestnut Street in Cold Spring, NY.
Don’t underestimate the size of the this museum packed with interesting exhibitions and information. It is really a terrific local museum that tells the story of the local community. I was very impressed.
The Putnam History Museum sign on Route 9.
The Mission of the Museum:
(From the Museum website)
The mission of the Putnam History Museum is to collect, preserve, interpret, and present the history of Putnam County, Philipstown, the West Point Foundry, and the Hudson Highlands. Through exhibitions, programs, and events, the museum uses its collections to engage the community with the vibrant history of our region, and to foster greater understanding of the role it has played in the growth of our nation.
The Current Exhibitions:
December 2023:
Indigenous Peoples in Putnam County
This exhibition explores Lenape and Wappinger culture in Putnam County, with a special focus on the Woodland period when these cultures flourished in the Hudson Valley. In addition to sharing Lenape stories—past and present—the exhibition features important artifacts and replicas including stone tools, stone points, pottery sherds, and a dugout canoe.
The Indigenous Peoples Exhibition:
(Funded in part by the Community Foundations of the Hudson Valley, American Historical Association, and the Cold Spring Lions Club. Image courtesy of the Staten Island Museum).
This exhibition was interesting in that it explained the local tribe of Lenape Indians who lived in the area before the Dutch and the contribution that they made to the community and their history in the area. The day to day lives of the tribes was shown in the various displays from the way they fished and hunted in the community. The dug out canoe the museum found out recently was a reproduction of the original. For years the curator explained to me the museum thought it was the real thing. Very detailed and very interesting exhibition.
Locally found Arrowhead Collection
The history of Indigenous people in the Hudson River Valley.
History of the Lenape Indians
The reproduction of the Lenape Canoe on display.
West Point Foundry
There is a permanent Foundry exhibition on display at PHM. It includes photographs, artifacts, paintings, maps, and videos highlighting the Foundry related objects within the PHM collection, including a fully restored 10-pounder Parrott Rifle.
The Foundry Exhibition is a permanent exhibition in the museum.
The map of the former foundry’s in the area.
I never realized that the Town of Cold Springs, NY was such a productive foundry area between all the wars. Many ironworks dotted the community which is now an upscale community just outside New York City. The foundry’s created many items that helped the ‘war machine’ such as train parts and cannon balls along with many modes of transportation.
The Foundry exhibition.
The objects of the Foundry.
The various sizes of cannon balls created by the local foundry’s.
The Foundry Painting “Foundry”
The “Foundry” painting sign.
The West Point Foundry part of the exhibit.
The West Foundry sign of the exhibition.
The West Point Foundry during the war.
A Brief History of Julia Butterfield
Born in 1823, at age 18 Julia Lorillard Safford married Frederick James, a broker and banker in New York City. They lived on Fifth Avenue and in 1852 built a magnificent stone village house in Cold Spring that was named Cragside because it had been constructed on a hillside strewn with rocks. It was surrounded by elaborate gardens, lawns, orchards and fields, according to Trudie Grace, author of “Around Cold Spring”. Haldane High School now occupies the site of Cragside, and a gatehouse built in 1866 still stands at the foot of Cragside Drive as a private residence.
The Julia Butterfield Exhibition
Frederick James died in 1884. Two years later, Julia married Daniel Butterfield, a Civil War general who is credited with composing “Taps” and whose father co-founded American Express. He lived until 1901. When Julia died in 1913, her estate (was) estimated to be worth $3 million, or about $75 million today.
This permanent exhibition of a local woman who supported her community and deserves much respect and admiration for the contributions to Cold Springs showed her immense generosity. I wish there was more people like her in every community.
Bequests by Julia Butterfield in her 1913 will, with current values:
YMCA – $2.32 million ($62M) Julia L. Butterfield Memorial Hospital – $150K ($4.6M) Union College, Schenectady – $100K ($3M) Julia L. Butterfield Memorial Library – $60K ($1.85M) Home for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females – $20K ($616K) Association for the Aid of Crippled Children – $10K ($308K) St. Mary’s Episcopal Church (for parsonage) – $10K ($308K) Association of New York Day Nurseries – $5K ($154K)
The library, a Georgian Revival building, was constructed on the foundation of the old Dutch Reformed Church and dedicated in 1925. The hospital, finished the same year, was built, many believed, because one of Julia’s sons had died after a fall from a horse and she felt he might have survived if a hospital had been closer.
I love visiting the Old Dutch Reformed Church of Sleepy Hollow and its cemetery. The church itself is steeped in history but made famous by “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” by Washington Erving, a local resident. The church was the inspiration for the book and to this day it is still celebrated during the Halloween season with Open Houses and storytelling. I have visited the church to hear storyteller Jonathan Kurk tell the story of Ichabod Crane and then at Christmas to hear “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens. These are musts when you are visiting the church.
The Old Dutch Reformed Church of Sleepy Hollow
Though the cemetery stretches for miles it is the part by the church that is the most interesting. The tombstones are over 300 years old and some weather beaten to wear the tombstones are unknown. Still it has that classic look with faded cracked tombstones and large shade trees where you might think a ghost or ghoul would pop out. It is a classic Dutch Church cemetery of the Hudson Valley and I highly recommend the cemetery walking tour where you can visit the graves of many famous resident of the cemetery including Washington Irving. Whether the fall or the spring, it is fascinating to walking among the graves and just pay your respects to these people.
The gates leading to the cemetery
The Church that inspired a legend:
(From the Reformed Church website)
When Washington Irving set his ghost story about the Headless Horseman at the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow, he made the church world-famous. Ever since the publication of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in 1819-20, visitors have come to see where Ichabod Crane led the choir and courted Katrina Van Tassel among the old gravestones in the churchyard and looked for the grave of the Headless Horseman in the Old Burying Ground.
The inside pew of the church
The church was already old when Irving first saw it, when he was a teenager. It was built in 1685 and formally organized as Dutch Reformed in 1697. It served as the congregation’s home for more than 150 years, until a new building was constructed. Even then, it was retained for worship on summer Sundays and special holidays. This custom continues today.
The pews and pulpit inside the Old Dutch Reformed Church
This inscription on the bell that hangs in the belfry of the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow has been a comfort to the congregation through war and peace, personal joys and tragedies, since it was commissioned in Holland and installed in the belfry. Most historians date the church’s construction to 1685, the year engraved on the bell.
The back part of the pees
The church is recognized as the oldest extant church in New York and a National Historic Landmark. The Old Dutch Burying Ground, which surrounds it on three acres, is believed to predate the church. Washington Irving is buried just up the hill, in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery adjacent.
The historic marker
During Holy Week and Easter, the Reformed Church holds Good Friday services and an Easter Sunrise service at the Old Dutch Church. Summer worship services at Old Dutch feature “Seven Sundays of Worship and Music,” with guest musicians each Sunday morning during the season.
The Church’s historic marker
The History of the Church:
(from the church website)
The Reformed Church of the Tarrytowns in Tarrytown. NY , serves both Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow, NY. It was constructed in 1837 as an extension of the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow to serve the Tarrytown community.
The graveyard by the church in the Fall of 2024
The new community of Dutch Reformed would have had its own Elders and and Deacons shared a minister with the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow. That church has a similar arrangement with the Dutch Reformed at Cortlandt Manor dating from 1697 when the Sleepy Hollow community was first recorded as established, though the structure had been completed in 1685 and the community had been there for long before. The Cortlandt Manor community had its own Elders and Deacons but recognized the community at Sleepy Hollow as its head, and regularly went down to the village for services and to record their births and marriages.
The oldest part of the graveyard near the church
The community at Tarrytown became independent from Sleepy Hollow in the 1850s and soon after dropped the “Dutch” association from its name. As the Sleepy Hollow community diminished and the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow became less used, the Tarrytown community adopted the name for their landmark church the Reformed Church of the Tarrytowns, adding that it was a “continuation of the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow.”
The family plots in the oldest part of the graveyard
Presenting an impressive façade on North Broadway, the structure’s steeple remains the highest point on North Broadway and the tallest physical structure in Tarrytown, despite not being built on the heights of the city. The church’s porch of four columns supporting an extended pediment offers a refined architectural addition to the business district of historic Tarrytown.
The Historic church and cemetery
The Church’s cemetery
The tree is so old that the tombstone is inside of the trunk
During my many visits to the church, I have heard Master Storyteller Johnathan Kruk perform and tell his stories of “The Headless Horseman” during Halloween and of “Scrooge” during Christmas time. Here are some of his videos of his performances.
Storyteller Jonathan Kruk singing the story of the ‘Headless Horseman”
The Church Marker
The famous bridge was once here
Master Storyteller Jonathan Kurk telling the story of the ‘Headless Horseman”. He is excellent!
The Pascack Reformed Church is one of those historic centers to a town that dot New England and set the tone for a town. The church gives a town its ‘classic’ look and it bases for the development of the town. This elegant church is located on Pascack Road, one of the early Colonial byways of Bergen County, NJ and is one of the few remaining churches from the Revolutionary War era.
Built in 1813, it has that unique look of a time when religion played a more important role in people’s lives and was the center of the community. Its cemetery is the resting place of many of the ‘first’ families of Bergen County including the Demarest, Wortendyke, Bogart, Terhune, Van Ripper and Haring families whose names are still part of the county.
Walking in the cemetery is a experience to know the history of our State and the contribution that these families had in the creation of the State of New Jersey. There is a quiet elegance of a historic cemetery in the fall around Halloween. It is as if the spirits of the past remind us of the future that lies ahead of us. Plus it has the classic “New England” look of a church and its cemetery. It is a piece of Bergen County history that most people just pass. Please take time to walk the grounds in the Fall and Spring and experience an open air museum of what has made our County what it is today.
Please also show respect to the people buried there.
The History of the Pascack Reformed Church:
(from the Pascack Reformed Church website)
In the 1700’s the early settlers of the Dutch Reformed faith in the Pascack Valley attended the churches of Tappan, Schraalenburgh, (Bergenfield-Dumont), Paramus and Saddle River. As the population increased they desired a church in their own vicinity. On May 27, 1787, residents of Pascack petitioned the Classis of Hackensack to form a church. Another meeting was held in Hackensack for the purpose of forming a church, but since no one from the Pascack area attended, the matter was closed.
Over the next 25 years several attempts were made to establish a church in Pascack. In 1812, following the separation of the Saddle River church from the Paramus church, the people of Saddle River offered to unite with the people of Pascack and to assist them in building a house of worship. The two congregations would be one church, with services held on alternating Sundays at Pascack and Saddle River.
The Pascack Reformed Church Historic Marker
On October 23,1812, Peter Wortendyke his wife Matze, and Abraham Campbell and his wife Margaret deeded one acre of land to John J. Demarest, Garret J. Ackerson, Albert Wortendyke and John J. Blauvelt, appointed trustees for the building of the Reformed Dutch Church as Pascack, for the sum of $60.00 (current New York State money).
The historic church graveyard next to the church in the Fall of 2024
At this time, the church building was begun as members of the Saddle River and Pascack congregations took part in the construction of the edifice. The shell of the building was completed that fall, and the Rev. Stephen Goetschius presided at its dedication. The interior was completed in the spring of 1813, and the founding date of the church has been reckoned as May 3, 1813. The front and Pascack Road side of the church was constructed of sandstone quarried locally while fieldstone was used for the rear wall and east side.
The Demarest/Wortendyke/Banta family graveyard
In 1814 the boundary line of the Paramus church located one quarter mile to the south of the Pascack was annulled. A plan for the new church to be constitutionally organized was drawn up once consent was gained from consistories of neighboring congregations (whose members might wish to join the new congregation). On the third Tuesday of June in 1814, the Classis of Paramus met at Pascack and selected a committee to elect a consistory for the church. Those chosen Elders were John T. Eckerson, John Campbell, Garret Duryie, Esq., Jacob Banta, Esq. Deacons chosen were Garret J. Ackerman, Edward Eckeson, Hendric Storm and John F. Demarest. The newly installed pastor of the Saddle River Church, the Rev. Stephen Goetschius, became President of the Consistory.
The church sign outside the church.
On August 29, 1814, with about 48 members, the new church was officially organized and incorporated as “The Consistory of the Congregation of Pascack in the County of Bergen.” This declaration was signed and sealed by all members of the Consistory on that date.
The historic graveyard next to the church
Following its organization, the Pascack Church and the Saddle River church became separate congregations served by one pastor, the Rev. Stephen Goetschius, who resided in the Goetschius family home (which still stands at East Saddle River Road and Lake Street in present day Upper Saddle River). Goetschius continued to be pastor of both churches until 1835 when he resigned due to old age. When he was over 80 years old, he could still ride a horse between the two churches! He passed from this life in the year 1837.
The Historic graveyard during the Fall of 2024
In 1834 with the advanced age of the previous pastor, the Rev. John Manley was called and become pastor of both churches upon the resignation of Stephen Goetschius in 1835. During this year there was some sentiment for separation between the two churches, as it became apparent that each congregation desired a minister of its own. Manley continued to serve as the pastor of the Saddle River Church until 1866 and served the Pascack Church as minister until 1853 when the latter church desired to have a service every Sunday. He lived on a small farm in the present day Upper Saddle River and was also engaged in farming. Manley died in New Brunswick, NJ on May 21,1871.
The year 1853 saw the start of a movement to obtain additional land for the expansion of the church cemetery and the erection of a parsonage due to the calling of a full time minister to serve the congregation at Pascack. On August 24,1855, a deed was given by Peter P. Wortendyke and Polly, his wife, to the Consistory of the church at Pascack for 15 acres of land for the consideration of $1,600.00. (Of this 15 acre parcel a portion was later sold to the Hackensack Water Company and another portion to the Borough of Park Ridge. Of the remaining 7.98 acres, 3.7 acres are in cemetery usage; the remainder is used for the parsonage and the Park Ridge Barrier Free Housing.) The first parsonage was built in 1855 on the site of the present church parsonage at Pascack Road and Fremont Avenue.
The inside of the church:
The interior of the church before service
The beautiful stained glass windows
The beautiful stained glass windows of the church
Upon the departure of the Rev. John Manley in 1854, a call was made upon the Rev. John T. Demarest, who accepted the call and became the third pastor of the church and its first full time minister. Pastor Demarest and his family were the first to occupy the newly built parsonage. In 1857 John Demarest received an Honorary Doctor of Divinity Degree from Rutgers College and remained at Pascack until 1867. He died in New Brunswick, NJ on January 30,1897 and was buried at New Prospect, NY.
In 1868 the Rev. Benjamin Bartholf became pastor and served for five years. In 1872 a plan was put forth to tear down the church and replace it with a $12,000 edifice. That plan did not succeed and the original building remained.
The years 1873-1875 saw the church without a pastor. During this time the original stone building was remodeled at a cost of nearly $4,000, and its interior was renovated and refurnished. The parsonage was also rebuilt at this time at a cost of $1,000. A minister of the Classis, the Rev. Alexander McKelvey, served the congregation as its “Stated Supply Pastor.”
On April 20,1875, the Rev. Edward Lodewick was installed as pastor; his tenure continued for the next 28 years. On May 11, 1900 a reception was held for Rev. Lodewick and his wife in honor of the 25 anniversary of his pastorate. After his passing in the year 1910, Mrs. Lodewick erected a plaque to his memory at the rear of the Sanctuary.
Work was begun on the Parish House (Sunday School Building) in 1885 and was completed in 1887. The Church Sunday School–in existence as early as 1841, and which had previously met in the church balcony and the barn of G. J. Ackerman on Werimus Road in the present day Woodcliff Lake–now had a home of its own.
Another unsuccessful attempt was made to replace the church building in the year 1890. The next year saw the original church remodeled with the balcony lowered to its present form. A new bell was installed above the tower. A few years later the bell became the first fire alarm system for the newly formed Park Ridge Fire Department when its pull rope was extended to ground level on the outside of the tower. Further remodeling in the year 1893 included an addition to the rear of the church, and the choir was relocated from the balcony to a new loft behind the pulpit.
With the resignation of Mr. Lodewick in 1903 the church was once again without a pastor; on April 10, 1904, the Rev. Francis A. Seibert was installed as the new minister. On October 9, 1912, the congregation celebrated the 100th anniversary of the passing of the deed for the church property. The Sunday School’s celebration continued the next evening.
In 1921 the church received its first pipe organ, which was given by the family of J. Boyce Smith in his memory. During the month of April 1929 the church observed the twenty-fifth anniversary of Mr. Seibert’s pastorate and at a public reception the membership presented him with a fully equipped insured and licensed Chevrolet Coupe along with $125.00 for operating expenses of the vehicle. In addition to his faithful devotion to the congregation, Mr. Seibert was very much involved in service to the community; he served as Mayor of Park Ridge from 1914 to 1918.
On September 12,1931, the church was re-incorporated as “The Pascack Reformed Church of Park Ridge, New Jersey, Inc.” Six years later in 1937 the congregation celebrated its 125th year of ministry. The end of the decade saw the passing of Mr. Seibert after 35 years of service to the Pascack Reformed Church. His pastorate is the longest on record, and he was the last minister to occupy the old parsonage.
The Rev. James Reid served as the next pastor for a short time, and was followed by the Rev. Francis E. Potter, who along with his wife moved into the newly constructed parsonage, which had been erected at a cost of $6,000. His ministry to the congregation was interrupted from 1944 to 1946 while he served as a Chaplain in the U.S. Navy. During that time the Rev. Gordon Markey served as the Interim Pastor.
During the 1940’s the church moved forward with an active Women’s Missionary Society, which maintained projects at home and abroad along, as well as a Ladies Aid Society which was active in fundraising activities. The Youth Group was very active at this time and an Evening Guild was established. In 1949 the Choir produced a show which raised enough money for new robes, and the first Men’s Club came into existence at this time. The same year saw the departure of Mr. Potter and shortly after, in September, the Rev. Wilbur E. Ivins was installed as pastor.
During the 1950’s the Upper Pascack Valley area grew and developed and so did the church. With greater activities it was necessary to renovate the basement of the Sunday School Building (previously known as the Parish House) along with an addition in 1953 with a complete renovation of the remainder of the building.
In 1955 the Evening Guild oversaw the work of illuminating the steeple. The same year saw the beginning of a weekly newsletter now known as “THE SPIRE.” Also in 1955 a retirement dinner was held for Mrs. George Bennet who retired after 50 years as Church Organist. In 1959 the 1893 addition to the church was demolished and replaced with the present much larger structure. Extensive rebuilding was done to the original portion of the church building (including removal of the wooden floor and the installation of a concrete floor topped off with tile). In 1960 the present pipe organ was installed in memory of Elsie Holloway Gowell, and in 1961 the Edward J. Sisley Memorial Carillon was dedicated. The year 1962 marked the 150th year of the life of the congregation and was celebrated by a year-long series of services and activities, including a Historical Pageant on October 28th.
In 1963 Mr. Ivins moved on to another church and a seminary student, Robert H. Pope, arrived for a summer assignment to fill in the gap until a new minister could be found. Mr. Pope liked the church and a delegation from the congregation informed him that they would be willing to wait until his graduation if he would accept a call to be the next pastor of the Pascack Reformed Church. He accepted and was ordained and installed in June of 1964, thereby becoming the tenth pastor in the history of the church.
Like many congregations Pascack Reformed Church felt the need for more space in the early 1960’s; therefore the Sunday School Building was renovated Fellowship Hall added to the Sunday School Building in 1965. (Previous plans for the Hall were for the erection of a separate building on a portion of land purchased in 1957, land now used for the church parking lot.) With the addition of Fellowship Hall the church opened its doors as a meeting place for various groups, a tradition that continues to this day.
In the nation’s bicentennial year, 1976, Pascack Reformed Church was honored with the erection and dedication of the Historical Marker which stands adjacent to the original church building on Pascack Road.
With the need for handicapped housing in the area becoming apparent in the early 1980’s, numerous members of the congregation led a movement which resulted in the erection of the Park Ridge Barrier Free Housing Complex (Woodland Gardens) on the unused portion of the Church Cemetery. The complex is accessible to Sulak Lane, and provides access for people with handicaps to reach various businesses and local facilities.
The 175th Anniversary celebration began with a church picnic in September of 1987, followed by various events to mark the occasion, and ended with a closing service on May l, 1988, in which former pastor Wilbur Ivins took part. The day concluded with refreshments in Fellowship Hall, during which historical items were on display.
Mr. Pope and his family were honored for his twenty-fifth anniversary as Pastor of Pascack Reformed Church on June 11, 1989, at a well attended luncheon after the Sunday morning service. Less than a year later, in March of 1990, he announced his plans for retirement and that December 30th would be his last Sunday.
In 1990 the congregation learned of the passing of former Pastor Francis E. Potter. On the afternoon of December 9th a “Retirement Worship Service” was held for Mr. Pope which was attended by well over 200 people. After the service a reception, which lasted well into the evening, was held in Fellowship Hall. Robert Pope along with his wife, Joey, departed for their retirement home in Walton, New York early the next month and shortly after Rev. David H. Smith became the interim pastor, who served until the arrival of the Rev. Paul G. Janssen in October of 1991.
The pastorate of Rev. Janssen had an unusual beginning when shortly before his installation service at 4:00 p.m. in the afternoon of Sunday, October 20,1991, the ballast of a fluorescent tube in the church balcony burned out. The ballast’s untimely death caused a smell of smoke in the building, so the Park Ridge Volunteer Fire Department was called to the scene and after a thorough check of both the church and Sunday School Building the service began 35 minutes later. At the conclusion of the service the packed church emptied into Fellowship Hall for a reception honoring the new pastor, the eleventh in the history of the church.’
On October 4th, 2015, Pascack Reformed Church installed it’s twelfth minister, the Rev. Larissa Romero – the first minister serving Pascack Reformed to graduate from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. She was also the first woman minister installed at the church, as well as its youngest, accepting the call at age 28. Sunday, January 1, 2023 launched the next pastorate at Pascack Reformed Church with our thirteenth minister, Sharon Gross-Gills.
Much more will be written as we travel into the future. The Pascack Reformed Church has a wonderful history of over 200 years of proclaiming the Gospel and ministering to the needs of people, and now looks forward to continuing into the future!
Carl W. Weil, Church Historian Larissa Romero, Sharon Gross-Gill, Editors
The History of their Historic Cemetery:
(from the church website)
The Pascack Reformed Church Historic Cemetery
In 1813, shortly after the founding of the church, a cemetery was established at the rear of the building. At that time a one room schoolhouse, built in 1808, stood at the north end of the church property. This school eventually evolved into Park Ridge High School. Years later a 10 x 12 inch bronze plaque on a metal pole was installed at the site of the original building. The plaque remained until early 1989 when it was discovered missing.
The first burial in the cemetery was that of six year old Katherine Blauvelt in 1813; the most recent burial occurred in 1972. After 180 years the gravestone for the first interment is still legible. In 1893 several graves were moved due to the construction of an addition to the rear of the church. At this time the graves and their new locations are not known.
In 1959 49 grave sites were removed to permit construction of the present addition at the north end of the church. The remains of all were reburied in a vault, the front of which has a plaque containing the names and year of passing of all of the deceased. The gravestones for the aforementioned are mostly on the embankment at the east end of the cemetery and plans are being made to re-erect the stones at a suitable location in the cemetery as memorials. In 1912 and 1913 the New Jersey Historical Society did a study of this portion of the church cemetery and noted a 1745 gravestone with no further reference. The inventory received is incomplete and an attempt to obtain a complete reference will be made to the Society.
The historic cemetery
On at least two known occasions, graves were moved to Pascack from other locations. One such occasion involved two members of the Wortendyke Family who were previously buried on a farm in Wyckoff. The other involved several graves from an old cemetery in Hillsdale west of Broadway and slightly north of Parkview Drive. Evidence of another possible relocation, a rough stone with the initials “L.H.”, is located next to the grave of Ellen Holdrum, who died in 1820. It is possible that the grave marked “L.H.” is that of a member of the Holdrum Family who died earlier whose remains and stone were moved to Pascack after the establishment of the church cemetery.
While records and maps for the cemetery at the rear of the church may exist, they are not in the church’s possession. Many mysteries, therefore remain, including the discovery of human bones uncovered in 1965 when a trench was excavated for a new sanitary sewer line from Fellowship Hall to Wampum Road. When the time comes to replace the parking lot surface it is hoped that the area can be x-rayed for more remains especially the portion next to the cemetery directly behind Fellowship Hall.
The Hopper and Wortendyke family plots
When the church purchased the larger (southern) part of the church cemetery from the Wortendyke family in 1855, three older cemeteries already existed on the property: the Wortendyke Family Cemetery, the African American Cemetery, and the American Indian Cemetery.
The exact age of the Wortendyke Family Cemetery, located at the northeast corner of the larger cemetery, is not known, but the two oldest legible stones date to the year 1780. There may be older graves, however, since the Wortendyke Family had bought the property in 1735 and rented out land to several tenant farmers who lived in log cabins until Wortendyke moved from the present day Harrington Park in the year 1750.
The historic Demarest-Wortendyke-Bogart-Terhune family plots
The previously mentioned 1912 and 1913 inventory by the New Jersey Historical Society noted about 100 rough stones in the areas of the present day church cemetery all of which were noted as having “no marks” (inscriptions of any kind). Several Terhune family field stones are listed as being somewhere in the church cemetery by the Ackerman and Goff study dated May 1946. The oldest Terhune burial is listed as “1766 I.T.H.” and, along with the others, could be in the Wortendyke Family Cemetery. As of now only about 30 of the rough stones are visible and a future historical project is planned to raise all to their original elevation above ground and clean and study them for markings.
The African American Cemetery is located adjacent to the cemetery building directly behind the church parsonage and, like the Wortendyke Family Cemetery, is 50 feet by 100 feet in area. Its oldest known burial dates to 1834. Buried here are members of the families of Bergen County’s Free Blacks of the pre-Civil War periods. In addition, many of the men buried in the African-American cemetery were Civil War Veterans who had served with a Connecticut Regiment.
To the east of this cemetery in a rectangular hollow, cleared at a very early but unknown date, lies the American Indian Cemetery. There are no markings of any type in this area and knowledge of the burial grounds existence has been passed on by word of mouth through the years.
The Wortendyke/Demarest family marker.
The remaining area of the larger cemetery was laid out into 16 grave plots in 1855. Many of these plots were bought by the older area families, probably because the four and five hundred acre farms in the northern Bergen County area were being broken up into smaller parcels in the middle of the 19th century, and little room was left for family cemeteries.
With most of the older families leaving the area in late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries many of the plots were no longer used and in time the church saw fit to reclaim them through legal means and sub-divide the plots into smaller units.
In more recent times church members have purchased available smaller plots or single grave sites. There are now about six burials per year in the Pascack Reformed Church Cemetery. Burials are limited to owners of plots, and new sales of the very limited number of plots is restricted to members of the Pascack Reformed Church. It is hoped that in the near future all gravestones that are downed will be raised and those that are broken in both the main part of the cemetery and the one behind the church will be repaired.
The Wortendyke family plot at the Pascack Reformed Church
When research concerning the three older cemeteries in the southern portion of the cemetery continues, an application will be made for the erection of a second historical marker which will be an additional tribute to the American Indian tribe of the area and the early African and European American settlers of the Upper Pascack Valley area of Bergen County.
The beautiful historic cemetery is so breathtaking in the fall months.
Carl W. Weil, Church Historian Larissa Romero, Editor
Visit from Bergen Community College for the Bergecco-Parc Consulting Inc. project ‘The Bergen 250-the 250th Anniversary of the Revolutionary War’:
As part of the Team project, I took my students on a tour of the church and its historic graveyard, which is home to the Wortendyke family plot. As part of the project’s ’Farm to Table Dinner’, there is to be a ‘Candlelight Walking tour’ of the graveyard after dinner. I also challenged the students to create a ‘Halloween Walking tour and Spaghetti Dinner’ fundraiser for these historic churches.
We were given private tour by the new church pastor, Pastor Sharon Gross-Gill, whose pride in this church and its history was shared with the students.
The tour started with a talk of the church’s place in Bergen County and its history. Then we toured the bell tower and the students got to ring the bell
The students touring the Bell tower
The students were given an opportunity to ring the bell
We then toured the historic graveyard after the tour of the church. This is the resting place of the Wortendyke family plot as well as members of the Demarest, Banta, Bauvelt, Van Ripper, DeBraun and Terhune families.
Barbara, one of the church historian’s and tour guide, explained that some of the graves dated back to 1635 long before the founding of the country.
Before we moved onto the next site, we took a group shot with Pastor Gross-Gill. It was a very informative and interesting afternoon.
The Easter Holidays:
During the Holy Week I visited the church after visit to say ‘Thank you’ for the tour. I went for the Palm Sunday services and the sun finally broke and it was a nice day. The flowers were blooming and it was nice to be outside. It was a very nice Palm Sunday services.
The church on Palm Sunday morning
The front of the church on Palm Sunday 2025
The front of the church in full bloom during the Easter holidays
The inside of the church during Palm Sunday morning
Visiting a Museum: The Unique, Unusual, Obscure and Historical 