Part 4
N.Y. City's Catskill Mt. water supply system is the greatest of waterworks, modern or ancient. Three-quarters of the project has been completed. The waters of the Esopus Creek in the Catskills are stored in the Ashokan reservoir, an artificial lake twelve miles long, situated about 14 miles west of the Hudson River at Kings Mt. From this reservoir the aqueduct extends 92 M. to the city's northern boundary, and supplies about 375,000,000 gallons daily. From the Croton watershed New York receives a supply almost as large--336,000,000 gallons daily. Construction on the Catskill supply system was begun in 1907, and the total cost will be about $177,000,000.
The river now widens and turns to the west; on the further bank is Cornwall, near which is the estate of E. P. Roe, the writer, and "Idlewild," the former home of N. P. Willis, likewise a writer of importance in his day. The home of Lyman Abbott, editor of the _Outlook_ is also here. The proprietor of Bannerman's Island, which we now pass, is a dealer in obsolete war material; he has built on the island a number of castle-like store-houses of old paving stones taken from the streets of New York.
58 M. BEACON, Pop. 10,996 & NEWBURGH, Pop. 30,366. (Train 51 passes 9:56a; No. 3, 10:17a; No. 41, 2:29p; No. 25, 4:10p; No. 19, 7:06p. Eastbound: No. 6 passes 7:50p; No. 26 8:09a; No. 16, 2:22p; No. 22, 3:48p.)
Beacon was incorporated in May, 1913, by merging the villages of Matteawan and Fishkill Landing, the latter of which lay closer to the west. The first settlement in the township was made in 1690. During the Revolutionary War it was an important military base for the Northern Continental Army. At Fishkill Landing on May 13, 1783, Gen. Knox organized the Society of the Cincinnati.
The Society of the Cincinnati was an organization of U.S. officers who had served in the Revolutionary War. Besides the general society of which Washington was president, another was organized for each state. (The name is in reference to Cincinnati, the Roman patriot who left the plough to serve his country.) Membership was limited to officers, native or foreign, of the Continental army who had either served with honour for three years or had been honorably discharged for disability, and to their descendants.
Because it included several European nobles, such as Lafayette and Steuben, and because it was founded on the principle of heredity the new society was denounced as the beginning of an aristocracy and therefore a menace, by such Revolutionary leaders as Franklin, Adams, and Jefferson, who were ineligible for membership because they had not been in the army. There was perhaps a real fear that it might become a military hierarchy which would appropriate the important offices of the new republic. At any rate, several states adopted resolutions against it and so great was the antagonism at the first general meeting in 1784 Washington persuaded the members to abolish the hereditary feature. In spite of this condition, the excitement did not die, and in 1789 the Tammany Society was founded in N.Y.C. in opposition to the Cincinnati, and as a wherein "true equality" should govern. This was the origin of Tammany Hall, which became conspicuous in N.Y. politics.
Alexander Hamilton succeeded Washington as president, but by 1824 most of the state branches of the Cincinnati and the general society itself were dead or dying. For a long time little was left but a traditional dinner held each year in N.Y.C. In 1893 the general society made an effort to revive the state organizations, with some little success. The hereditary feature has been restored and the living members number about 980. The motto is "Omnia relinquit servare rem publicam." (He abandons everything to serve the republic.)
Back of Matteawan are seen Beacon Mts., their name recalling Revolutionary days when beacon fires were lighted as signals on their summits. The summit of the highest of the group, Beacon Hill* (1,635 ft.) can now be reached by means of a cable railway, making possible a very pleasant excursion. The Matteawan State Hospital for the Insane is at Beacon on the north side of Fishkill Creek. Beacon's products include hats, silks, woolens, rubber goods, engines, brick and tile; the total annual value of manufactures is about $4,500,000. Four miles to the northwest on Fishkill Creek is the village of Fishkill, notable for two quaint old churches, both still standing, and interesting enough to repay a visit: the First Dutch Reformed (1731), in which the New York Provincial Congress met in Aug. and Sept., 1776, and Trinity (1769).
After Congress moved elsewhere, Trinity was used as a hospital, and the Dutch church, being constructed of stone, was converted into a prison. Its most famous prisoner was Enoch Crosby (who served as the original for Cooper's hero in _The Spy_), a patriot who twice escaped with the help of the Committee of Safety, the only persons who knew his true character.
Across the river Newburgh is visible rising above the Hudson. From the Spring of 1782 to Aug. 1783 Washington made his headquarters in the Jonathan Hasbrouck house* (to the south of the city), built between 1750 and 1770. The house, a one story stone building with a timber roof, has been purchased by the State of N.Y. and is open to visitors. It contains many interesting Revolutionary weapons, documents and other relics. Here in May, 1782, Washington wrote his famous letter of rebuke to Lewis Nicola, who had written in behalf of a coterie of officers suggesting that he assume the title of king.
Washington's reply was peremptory and indignant. They could not have found, he said, "a person to whom their schemes were more disagreeable," and charged them, "if you have any regard for yourself or posterity, or respect for me, to banish these thoughts from your mind, and never communicate, as from yourself or any one else, a sentiment of like nature." Here also he made his reply to the so-called Newburgh addresses written by John Armstrong and calling for action on the part of the army to redress its grievances.
Newburgh was still his headquarters when Washington by the force of his influence secured the quiet disbandment of the Continental Army at the close of the war. Upon the occasion of the centennial celebration (1883) of this event, a monument called the Tower of Victory, 53 ft. high with a statue of Washington, was erected.
Newburgh is the center of a rich agricultural region, but it is a manufacturing center as well; its output comprises machine shop products, plaster, cotton, woolen and silk goods, felt hats, furniture, flour, lumber and cigars. Above Newburgh can be seen the lighthouse (on the west bank) called the Devil's Danskammer, or Devil's Dance Hall, recalling the time when Henry Hudson and his crew landed here to witness an Indian pow-wow. The Dutch, who were considerably startled by the affair, thought that it could be nothing less than a diabolical dance; hence the name.
73 M. POUGHKEEPSIE, Pop. 35,000. (Train 51 passes 10:14a; No. 3, 10:38a; No. 41, 2:48p; No. 25, 4:27p; No. 19, 7:24p. Eastbound: No. 6 passes 7:32a; No. 26, 7:51a; No. 16, 2:02p; No. 22, 3:29p.)
Poughkeepsie was the Apokeepsing of the Indians--"the pleasant and safe harbour" made by the rocky bluffs projecting into the river, where canoes were sheltered from wind and wave. The city is built partly on terraces rising 200 ft. above the river, and partly on the level plateau above. Poughkeepsie was settled by the Dutch in 1698. The most momentous event in Poughkeepsie's history and one of the most important in that of the whole Union, was the convention held here in 1788 at which the state of N.Y. decided to ratify the federal constitution. The decision was carried by three votes.
The credit for bringing N.Y. into the Union must go largely to Alexander Hamilton and his supporters, John Jay and Chancellor Robert R. Livingston. Of the three N.Y. delegates to the federal convention, Hamilton was the only one to sign its report, and when the state convention was called at Poughkeepsie, June 17, 1788, two-thirds of its members voted against the proposed U.S. constitution. The opposition was led by Gov. George Clinton and his party, known as the "Clintonians." Clinton, though he here fought bitterly the proposed new constitution and government, lived to be a Vice President of the U.S. (He should not be confused with the DeWitt Clinton who later built the Erie Canal.) The eloquence of Hamilton, Jay and Livingston, however, coupled with the news that New Hampshire and Virginia had ratified, finally carried the day, and the N.Y. Convention gave its approval of the new Constitution by a vote of 30 to 27.
Vassar College, the oldest women's college in America, and one of the most famous, occupies extensive grounds to the east of the city.
Vassar was founded in 1861 by Matthew Vassar (1791-1868), an Englishman who had established in Poughkeepsie in 1801 a brewery from which he became rich. He got the idea of founding a woman's college from his niece, Lydia Booth, a school teacher. His total gifts to the institution amounted to about $800,000. His nephew, Matthew Vassar, Jr., became manager of the brewery after his uncle's death, and gave in all about $500,000 to the college. Vassar now has a campus and farm of about 800 acres, and possesses an endowment of $2,440,000. Its students number about 1,100.
The Hudson near Poughkeepsie furnishes the course for the intercollegiate races in which American college crews, with the exception of Harvard and Yale (which row on the Thames at New London) have rowed practically every year since 1895. The river is spanned at this point by one of the largest cantilever bridges in the world. It is 2,260 ft. long and 200 ft. above the water, and is the only bridge over the Hudson south of Albany.
It required 4 years to build the bridge, which was finished in 1889 at a cost of $3,500,000. It connects New England directly with the coal fields of Pennsylvania.
Poughkeepsie has more than 50 lines of manufacture, with products of a total annual value of $15,000,000, including mill supplies, clothing, cigars, candied fruit and preserves, cream separators, foundry products, knit goods, ivory buttons, and piano and organ players.
Two miles beyond Poughkeepsie the red brick buildings of the Hudson River State Hospital are passed on the right, and presently our route skirts Hyde Park (79 M.) near which, to the north, can be seen the estate of Frederick W. Vanderbilt. There are many beautiful country-places in the district. A little beyond Hyde Park on the west bank of the river is "Slabsides," the cabin home of John Burroughs, the poet, philosopher, and widely known writer on natural history.
John Burroughs was born in 1837 at Roxbury, N.Y., the fifth son of a farmer. His first books were bought with money he earned from tapping maple trees, boiling the sap and selling the sugar. One season, he tells us, he made twelve silver quarters, and has never been so proud since. Although he has lived much in the world and has travelled widely, the greater part of his time has been divided between Riverby, in the little town of West Park, N.Y., the famous "Slabsides," his cabin in the wooded hills back of the Hudson, and, since 1908, an old farm house which he has christened Woodchuck Lodge, 1/2 M. from the Burroughs homestead in Roxbury. In his retreat at "Slabsides" he wrote some of his most intimate and appealing studies of nature.
Esopus Island is now passed, on the high left bank of which, near the water, stands the home of Alton B. Parker, Democratic candidate for the presidency against Roosevelt in 1904. We now pass the estates of D. Ogden Mills and W.B. Dinsmore, former president of the Adams Express Company (on the right). Esopus Lighthouse is on the west bank where the river curves sharply to the left. On the high ground on the east bank is the country home of the late Levi P. Morton.
Levi P. Morton (1824-1920), American banker and politician, was born at Shoreham, Vt. After some years in business at Hanover, N.H., Boston and N.Y.C., he established in 1862 the banking house of L. P. Morton & Co. (dissolved in 1899), with a London branch. The American firm assisted in funding the national debt at the time of the resumption of specie payments, and the London house were fiscal agents of the U.S. government in 1873-1884, and as such received the $15,500,000 awarded by the Geneva Arbitration court in settlement of the "Alabama Claims" against Great Britain. In 1899 Morton became president of the Morton Trust Co. of N.Y.C. He was a Republican representative in Congress from 1879 to 1881, U.S. minister to France (1881-1885), vice-president of the U.S. during the administration of Benjamin Harrison (1889-1893) and governor of N.Y. state (1895-1896) signing in that capacity the "Greater New York" bill and the liquor-tax measure known as the "Raines law." In 1896 he was a candidate for the presidential nomination in the Republican national convention.
88 M. RHINECLIFF, Pop. 1,300. (Train 51 passes at 10:32a; No. 3, 10:56a; No. 41, 3:07p; No. 25, 4:46p; No. 19, 9:39p. Eastbound: No. 6 passes 7:13a; No. 26, 7:31a; No. 16, 1:37p; No. 22, 3:09p.)
Across the river from Rhinecliff is Kingston (Pop. 26,688), most of which lies on a plateau 150 ft. above the river. Rondout, once a separate town, is now a part of the city of Kingston, the center of which lies 3 M. inland. To the northwest is the noble scenery of the Catskills, to the southwest are the Shawangunk Mts. and Lake Mohonk, and in the distance on our right (that is, on the Rhinecliff side) are the Berkshire Hills.
Kingston is one of the oldest towns in the state. In 1658 a stockade was built here by order of Gov. Peter Stuyvesant, and although the Dutch had built a fort here as early as 1614, it is from this event that the founding of the city is generally dated. The town suffered a number of murderous Indian attacks before it was taken over by the British in 1664.
The early history of Kingston reached a climax during the Revolution, when the British under Sir John Vaughan sacked the town and burned the buildings Oct. 17, 1777. The "Senate House"* erected in 1676, was the meeting-place of the first State Senate during the early months of 1777. At the time of the British occupation the interior was burnt but the walls were left standing. The building is now the property of the state and is used as a colonial museum. The present Court House, built in 1818, stands on the site of the old Court House, where New York's first governor, George Clinton, was inaugurated, and in which Chief Justice John Jay held the first term of the N.Y. Supreme Court in Sept. 1777.
John Jay (1745-1829), son of Peter Jay, a successful N.Y. merchant, had a notable career. He was Chairman of the Commission which drafted the N.Y. State Constitution in 1777. In the same year he was made Chief Justice of the State. In negotiating peace with Great Britain (1783) he acted with Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Jefferson and Henry Laurens, and he is credited with having been influential in obtaining favorable terms for the former colonies. In 1789 Washington appointed him chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, in which capacity he served for six years. In the meantime, 1794, he negotiated the famous Jay Treaty with Great Britain, which averted a dangerous crisis in the relations between the two countries, and settled such questions as the withdrawal of British troops from the northwestern frontier, compensation for the seizure of American vessels during the Franco-British war of 1793, and the refusal of the British up to that time to enter into a commercial treaty with the U.S. From 1795 to 1798 he served as Governor of N.Y. Daniel Webster said: "When the spotless ermine of the judicial robe fell on John Jay, it touched nothing less spotless than itself."
Less than a mile beyond Rhinecliff we pass "Ferncliff," the beautiful country-place of Vincent Astor, son of the late John Jacob Astor III, who lost his life in the "Titanic" disaster. The large white building on a hill nearby is the Astor squash court.
John Jacob Astor III (1864-1912) was the son of William B. Astor II. The latter was the son of William B. Astor (1792-1875), known as "the landlord of New York," because of his extensive real estate holdings in New York City. He was the son of the founder of the Astor fortune, John Jacob Astor (1763-1828). The latter was born near Heidelberg, Germany, worked for a time in London, came to N.Y.C. and took up fur trading, in which he amassed an enormous fortune, the largest up to that time made by any American.
Six miles above Rhinecliff we pass Anandale on the right, the former home of Gen. Richard Montgomery (b. 1736), who was killed Dec. 31, 1775, while conducting the American attack on Quebec.
It is not always remembered that the Americans undertook an expedition against Quebec during the first year of the Revolutionary War. Gen. Montgomery was joined near Quebec by Benedict Arnold, then a colonel, and they pushed on towards their objective with barely 800 men. The assault met a complete defeat; almost at the first discharge, Montgomery was killed, and many of his men were taken prisoners. In 1818 Mrs. Montgomery, then a gray-haired widow, sat alone on the porch of the house while the remains of Gen. Montgomery were brought down the Hudson on the steamer "Richmond" with great funeral pomp. A monument has been erected in St. Paul's Chapel, N.Y.C., where his remains were finally interred. General and Mrs. Montgomery, who was a daughter of Robert R. Livingston, had been married only two years when he went away on his expedition.
Just north of Tivoli (98 M.) is the site of the Manor House of the Livingston family, "Clermont," after which Robert Fulton named his first steamboat.
The Livingston Manor comprised the greater part of what are now Dutchess and Columbia Counties. The founder of the family was Robert Livingston (1654-1725) who was born at Ancrum, Scotland, emigrated to America about 1673 and received these manorial grants in 1686. He was a member of the N.Y. Assembly for several terms. The Livingston Manor was involved in anti-rent troubles which began in the Rensselaer Manor.
109 M. GREENDALE, Pop. 1,650. (Train 51 passes 10:54a; No. 3, 11:19a; No. 41, 3:32p; No. 25, 5:08p; No. 19, 8:10p. Eastbound: No. 6 passes 6:49a; No. 26, 7:09a; No. 16, 1:07p; No. 22, 2:44p.)
From Greendale a very fine view is obtained of the noble scenery of the Catskill Mountains. The village of Catskill (Pop. 4,461) across the river, was at one time the only point of entrance for visitors to the mountains--now reached chiefly by railway from Kingston. Catskill Station, however, is still a point of departure for this favorite summer resort. In clear weather it is possible to get a glimpse of the deep gorge of the Kaaterskill Cove (about one mile west of Catskill village) where Rip Winkle strayed into the mountains, discovered Hendrick Hudson playing at skittles, and, bewitched by the wine supplied by the ghostly sportsmen, slept for 20 years. On the high crest back of the station (about 10 M. from the river) the Mountain House (Alt. 2,225 ft.) and Kaaterskill House, famous old hotels, can be seen in clear weather.
The Catskill Mts.,* a group possessing much charm and beauty, run parallel with the Hudson for about 15 miles, at a distance of from 5 to 9 miles from the shore line, on the west bank; they cover an area of about 500 Sq. M. On the side visible from the train they rise steeply to a height of 2,000 to 3,000 feet though on the other sides the slopes are gradual. The highest summits are those of Slide Mt. (4,205 ft.) and Hunter Mt. (4,025 ft.). The summits of several of these mountains are reached by inclined railways that afford splendid views. A number of deep ravines known as "cloves," a word derived from the Dutch, have been cut into the mountains by streams. The name Catskill, formerly Kaatskill, is a word of Dutch origin, referring, it is said, to the catamounts, or wild cats, formerly found here. The Indians called the mountains "Onti Ora" or Mts. of the Sky. Washington Irving in his introduction to the story of _Rip Van Winkle_ says, "Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill Mts. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change of season, every change of weather, indeed every hour of the day, produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains, and they are regarded by all the good housewives far and near as perfect barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky; but sometimes when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which in the last rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory."