Rhinebeck Village Historic District
Encyclopedia
The Rhinebeck Village Historic District is located along US 9 and NY 308
New York State Route 308
New York State Route 308 is a short state highway, in length, located entirely in northern Dutchess County, in the U.S. state of New York. It is a major collector road through mostly rural areas that serves primarily as a shortcut for traffic from the two main north–south routes in the area,...

 in Rhinebeck
Rhinebeck (village), New York
Rhinebeck is a village located in the Town of Rhinebeck in Dutchess County, New York, USA. The population was 2,657 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Poughkeepsie–Newburgh–Middletown, NY Metropolitan Statistical Area as well as the larger New York–Newark–Bridgeport,...

, New York, United States. It is an area of 167 acres (67.6 ha) contains 272 buildings in a variety of architectural style
Architectural style
Architectural styles classify architecture in terms of the use of form, techniques, materials, time period, region and other stylistic influences. It overlaps with, and emerges from the study of the evolution and history of architecture...

s dating from over 200 years of the settlement's history. It was recognized as a historic district
Historic district (United States)
In the United States, a historic district is a group of buildings, properties, or sites that have been designated by one of several entities on different levels as historically or architecturally significant. Buildings, structures, objects and sites within a historic district are normally divided...

 and added to the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

 in 1979 as a cohesive area of preserved historic buildings.

Its properties were developed primarily from the Colonial era
Colonial America
The colonial history of the United States covers the history from the start of European settlement and especially the history of the thirteen colonies of Britain until they declared independence in 1776. In the late 16th century, England, France, Spain and the Netherlands launched major...

 to the end of the 19th century, when the district reached its present form. Three U.S. presidents have passed through here, most significantly, Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

, who chose the design for a new post office
U.S. Post Office (Rhinebeck, New York)
The U.S. Post Office in Rhinebeck, New York serves the 12572 ZIP Code. It is located on Mill Street just south of the intersection with NY 308 at the center of the village.It is a stone Colonial Revival structure built in 1940, during the New Deal...

 during the 1930s, and spoke at its dedication. It is now one of the district's contributing properties
Contributing property
In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing resource or contributing property is any building, structure, or object which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic district, listed locally or federally, significant...

. Today the area has become a popular local attraction, many of them housing boutiques and other small businesses. The streets are lined with large shade trees, bluestone
Bluestone
Bluestone is a cultural or commercial name for a number of dimension or building stone varieties, including:*a feldspathic sandstone in the U.S. and Canada;*limestone in the Shenandoah Valley in the U.S...

 sidewalk
Sidewalk
A sidewalk, or pavement, footpath, footway, and sometimes platform, is a path along the side of a road. A sidewalk may accommodate moderate changes in grade and is normally separated from the vehicular section by a curb...

s and other historic features.

Geography

Due to the lot
Lot (real estate)
In real estate, a lot or plot is a tract or parcel of land owned or meant to be owned by some owner. A lot is essentially considered a parcel of real property in some countries or immovable property in other countries...

 lines most of it follows, the district's boundary is irregular. It is centrally located in the village, with the bulk of the properties within it located in the residential neighborhoods to the north east of the 9-308 junction.

Starting from Route 9, the rear property lines of South Street lots, then Crystal Lake and Landsman Kill form the southern boundary all the way to the east village line. On the north side of Route 308, it follows the east side of Crosmour Drive almost to Starr Drive, then it returns to the rear lot lines on Crosmour, 308 and Beech Street. At Chestnut Street it turns to the west along the south side of the street, and then includes the houses along the north side midway down the block.

It continues along these bounds to the rear property lines along Montgomery Street (Route 9). It turns north along them to where 9 forks off Montgomery onto Spring Brook Avenue at Northern Dutchess Hospital and then crosses the street to include the properties on the west side of Montgomery, all the way down to West Market Street. It includes the northern side of West Market to the west village line, and then some of the properties on the south side of West Market. After following the rear lines along Mill Street (Route 9) down to just north of the Astor Home for Children
Astor Home for Children
The Astor Home for Children building, home to Astor Services for Children & Families, is located on Mill Street in Rhinebeck, New York, United States. It is sponsored by Catholic Charities in the Archdiocese of New York, and provides mental health services to children on an inpatient and...

, it crosses the road back to South Street.

The district includes several other streets, in whole or part, besides those on its boundary. Center and Livingston streets are included in their entirety. Several blocks of Mulberry and North Parsonage streets are also within district boundaries.

The area within the boundary is heavily developed. Most of it is residential, with some larger lots at the extreme points. Commercial use is concentrated on the tree-lined streets near the 9-308 junction. Larger businesses are east of the junction, with smaller storefronts in the area extending east several blocks along East Market Street (Route 308). Institutional use is represented with three churches within the district, and the town and village halls and fire station. All buildings are in a range of 19th- and early 20th-century architectural style
Architectural style
Architectural styles classify architecture in terms of the use of form, techniques, materials, time period, region and other stylistic influences. It overlaps with, and emerges from the study of the evolution and history of architecture...

s, from Colonial to Colonial Revival
Colonial Revival architecture
The Colonial Revival was a nationalistic architectural style, garden design, and interior design movement in the United States which sought to revive elements of Georgian architecture, part of a broader Colonial Revival Movement in the arts. In the early 1890s Americans began to value their own...

.

History

European settlement
European colonization of the Americas
The start of the European colonization of the Americas is typically dated to 1492. The first Europeans to reach the Americas were the Vikings during the 11th century, who established several colonies in Greenland and one short-lived settlement in present day Newfoundland...

 in the Rhinebeck area dates to 1686, when a group of Dutch crossed the river from Kingston
Kingston, New York
Kingston is a city in and the county seat of Ulster County, New York, USA. It is north of New York City and south of Albany. It became New York's first capital in 1777, and was burned by the British Oct. 16, 1777, after the Battles of Saratoga...

 and bought 2200 acres (890.3 ha) of land from the local Iroquois
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...

 tribes. Later, Henry Beekman obtained a patent
Land grant
A land grant is a gift of real estate – land or its privileges – made by a government or other authority as a reward for services to an individual, especially in return for military service...

 for the land, and saw a need for development to begin. He brought into the area Caspar Landsman, a miller, and William Traphagen, a builder.

In 1703 the New York colonial assembly approved money for the construction of the King's Highway, later known as the Albany Post Road
Albany Post Road
The Albany Post Road was a post road - a road used for mail delivery - in the U.S. state of New York. It connected the cities of New York and Albany along the east side of the Hudson River, a service now performed by US 9.The rough route was as follows:...

 and today most of Route 9. Three years later Traphagen bought a tract of land in Beekman's patent where the King's Highway intersected the Sepasco Indian Trail, the route today followed by Market Street. He built a house and tavern on the trail a short distance west of the King's Highway. This was the beginning of Rhinebeck.
A decade later, in 1715, Beekman's son brought in 35 Palatine Germans
German Palatines
The German Palatines were natives of the Electoral Palatinate region of Germany, although a few had come to Germany from Switzerland, the Alsace, and probably other parts of Europe. Towards the end of the 17th century and into the 18th, the wealthy region was repeatedly invaded by French troops,...

 who had fled religious persecution at home and had just concluded an attempt to produce naval stores for the British government on the lands of Robert Livingston
Robert Livingston the Elder
Robert Livingston the Elder was a New York colonial official, and first lord of Livingston Manor. He married Alida Schuyler in 1679. He was the father of nine children, including Philip, Robert and Gilbert...

 to the north in what is now Columbia County
Columbia County, New York
Columbia County is a county located in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2010 census, the population was 63,096. The county seat is Hudson. The name comes from the Latin feminine form of the name of Christopher Columbus, which was at the time of the formation of the county a popular proposal...

. The village grew with the new arrivals. New trades established themselves, and in 1733 the Reformed Dutch Church had been built. Its first building was on the site of its current one at Mill and South streets. In 1766 the beginnings of the current Beekman Inn were erected. It has remained in operation as a hotel ever since.

In the mid-1770s, a soldier named Richard Montgomery
Richard Montgomery
Richard Montgomery was an Irish-born soldier who first served in the British Army. He later became a brigadier-general in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War and he is most famous for leading the failed 1775 invasion of Canada.Montgomery was born and raised in Ireland...

 moved into the village with his new wife, a member of the Livingston family. He had just begun to settle into life as a farmer when the Revolution
American Revolution
The American Revolution was the political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century in which thirteen colonies in North America joined together to break free from the British Empire, combining to become the United States of America...

 began. After being elected to the New York Provincial Congress
New York Provincial Congress
The New York Provincial Congress was an organization formed by rebels in 1775, during the American Revolution, as a pro-rebellion alternative to the more conservative Province of New York Assembly, and as a replacement for the Committee of One Hundred.A Provincial Convention assembled in New York...

, he was commissioned a general in the Continental Army
Continental Army
The Continental Army was formed after the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War by the colonies that became the United States of America. Established by a resolution of the Continental Congress on June 14, 1775, it was created to coordinate the military efforts of the Thirteen Colonies in...

, and died at the end of 1775 in the Battle of Quebec
Battle of Quebec (1775)
The Battle of Quebec was fought on December 31, 1775 between American Continental Army forces and the British defenders of the city of Quebec, early in the American Revolutionary War. The battle was the first major defeat of the war for the Americans, and it came at a high price...

. The cottage still stands, although it was moved to 77 Livingston Street, where it houses the local Daughters of the American Revolution
Daughters of the American Revolution
The Daughters of the American Revolution is a lineage-based membership organization for women who are descended from a person involved in United States' independence....

 chapter; the street it was on was later named in his honor.

After independence, the village continued to grow. The Town of Rhinebeck
Rhinebeck (town), New York
Rhinebeck is a town in Dutchess County, New York, United States. The population was 7,548 at the 2010 census.The Town of Rhinebeck in the northwest part of Dutchess County in the Hudson Valley. Rhinebeck is also the name of a village in the town. US Route 9 passes through the town...

, which contains the village, was organized in 1788. The current Dutch Reformed Church
Dutch Reformed Church
The Dutch Reformed Church was a Reformed Christian denomination in the Netherlands. It existed from the 1570s to 2004, the year it merged with the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands to form the Protestant Church in the...

 was built in 1802, making it the oldest church in the village. The current route of East Market Street was laid out the same year during construction of the Ulster-Saulsbury Turnpike, later to become Route 308.

Rhinebeck continued to attract politicians. George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...

 visited in 1796, dining at Bogardus's, the second Traphagen tavern, when he stayed at a nearby friend's house.During the 1804 gubernatorial election, both Aaron Burr
Aaron Burr
Aaron Burr, Jr. was an important political figure in the early history of the United States of America. After serving as a Continental Army officer in the Revolutionary War, Burr became a successful lawyer and politician...

 and Morgan Lewis
Morgan Lewis (governor)
Morgan Lewis was an American lawyer, politician and military commander.Of Welsh descent, he was the son of Francis Lewis, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. He graduated from Princeton in 1773 and began to study law on the advice of his father...

 used taverns in Rhinebeck as campaign headquarters.
The village was incorporated
Municipal corporation
A municipal corporation is the legal term for a local governing body, including cities, counties, towns, townships, charter townships, villages, and boroughs. Municipal incorporation occurs when such municipalities become self-governing entities under the laws of the state or province in which...

 in 1834. Ten years later, Alexander Jackson Davis
Alexander Jackson Davis
Alexander Jackson Davis, or A. J. Davis , was one of the most successful and influential American architects of his generation, in particular his association with the Gothic Revival style....

 built the Henry Delamater House
Henry Delamater House
The Henry Delamater House is a historic house at 44 Montgomery Street in Rhinebeck, New York, USA. It was designed by architect Alexander Jackson Davis in a Gothic Revival style...

 at 44 Montgomery Street. It still stands today, one of the best examples of the early use of the Gothic Revival style in American residential architecture.

By the 1850s, Rhinebeck had grown even further and acquired a reputation as a woodworking
Woodworking
Woodworking is the process of building, making or carving something using wood.-History:Along with stone, mud, and animal parts, wood was one of the first materials worked by early humans. Microwear analysis of the Mousterian stone tools used by the Neanderthals show that many were used to work wood...

 center. The town's name on milled products was a symbol of quality, and its furniture was shipped as far away as South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...

. It was said to have no better in making carriages, coaches and sleighs. Some makers of clothing also achieved national prestige. The area
Hudson River Historic District
The Hudson River Historic District, also known as Hudson River Heritage Historic District, is the largest such district on the mainland of the contiguous United States...

 was also acquiring a cachet as a location for the country estates of the Gilded Age
Gilded Age
In United States history, the Gilded Age refers to the era of rapid economic and population growth in the United States during the post–Civil War and post-Reconstruction eras of the late 19th century. The term "Gilded Age" was coined by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in their book The Gilded...

 wealthy.

In the late 1880s the village was visited by a president-elect. Levi P. Morton
Levi P. Morton
Levi Parsons Morton was a Representative from New York and the 22nd Vice President of the United States . He also later served as the 31st Governor of New York.-Biography:...

, a former congressman and ambassador to France
United States Ambassador to France
This article is about the United States Ambassador to France. There has been a United States Ambassador to France since the American Revolution. The United States sent its first envoys to France in 1776, towards the end of the four-centuries-old Bourbon dynasty...

, had settled in Bois Dore on Mill Street. Benjamin Harrison
Benjamin Harrison
Benjamin Harrison was the 23rd President of the United States . Harrison, a grandson of President William Henry Harrison, was born in North Bend, Ohio, and moved to Indianapolis, Indiana at age 21, eventually becoming a prominent politician there...

 chose him to be his running mate on the 1888
United States presidential election, 1888
The 1888 election for President of the United States saw Grover Cleveland of New York, the incumbent president and a Democrat, try to secure a second term against the Republican nominee Benjamin Harrison, a former U.S. Senator from Indiana...

 Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

 ticket. Harrison was visiting him in Rhinebeck later that year when word came to them that they had just been elected. Later, Morton would serve as governor.

The end of the 19th century saw a new industry center on Rhinebeck: the cultivation of violets. Roughly 20% of the village's population during the Gay Nineties
Gay Nineties
Gay Nineties is an American nostalgic term that refers to the decade of the 1890s. It is known in the UK as the Naughty Nineties, and refers there to the decade of supposedly decadent art by Aubrey Beardsley, the witty plays and trial of Oscar Wilde, society scandals and the beginning of the...

 was in this business in some way, and the total crop was later estimated to have exceeded a million dollars in value some years. Several of the "violet houses" built during this era survive and are located in the district.
An 1890 map of the village shows it as nearly coterminous with today's historic district. That area has remained mostly as it was at that time. A third president, Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

, himself a native of nearby Hyde Park
Hyde Park, New York
Hyde Park is a town located in the northwest part of Dutchess County, New York, United States, just north of the city of Poughkeepsie. The town is most famous for being the hometown of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt....

, would play a role in the town's history during the later years of the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...

 when he oversaw the design process for the new post office
U.S. Post Office (Rhinebeck, New York)
The U.S. Post Office in Rhinebeck, New York serves the 12572 ZIP Code. It is located on Mill Street just south of the intersection with NY 308 at the center of the village.It is a stone Colonial Revival structure built in 1940, during the New Deal...

. He had long promoted Dutch-style fieldstone
Fieldstone
Fieldstone is a building construction material. Strictly speaking, it is stone collected from the surface of fields where it occurs naturally...

 as a material for public buildings in the area, and told the architects to use Henry Beekman's house (burned in a 1910 fire) as their model and some of its remaining stones for the post office.

Preservation

The village of Rhinebeck's zoning
Zoning
Zoning is a device of land use planning used by local governments in most developed countries. The word is derived from the practice of designating permitted uses of land based on mapped zones which separate one set of land uses from another...

 code creates a "special sensitivity" overlay district along Route 9 to preserve the historic character of that portion of the district, the part seen by most visitors to the town. It mandates that all new construction in residential areas preserve the appearance of a single detached dwelling, and that businesses in the area covered are not operated in a way to make it outwardly appear that they are a business.

In their current draft comprehensive plan
Comprehensive planning
Comprehensive planning is a term used in the United States by land use planners to describe a process that determines community goals and aspirations in terms of community development. The outcome of comprehensive planning is the Comprehensive Plan which dictates public policy in terms of...

, the village and town call for historic resources in the communities to be preserved with a historic district and formal architectural review process to ensure compatible, non-intrusive new structures and renovations. It asks that the town historian inventory all known historic sites in town, and that any eligible buildings not previously included be nominated to the National Register and its state equivalent.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK