Amenia—Millbrook—Poughkeepsie—Kerhonkson, US 44. 58 m.
Two-lane concrete or macadam.
US 44 is a direct route between the Berkshires and the West by way of the Mid-Hudson Bridge at Poughkeepsie.
Section a. AMENIA to POUGHKEEPSIE; 26.4 m. US 44.
This section closely follows the route of the Dutchess Turnpike laid down between Litchfield, Connecticut, and Poughkeepsie in 1805. It crosses the rich, rolling farm country of Dutchess County, which in the eighteenth century was the main source of supply of wheat and hides for New York City. Many old rambling mansions, usually set in a clump of weather-torn locusts, are relics of this period of prosperity. Quakers were among the first settlers; although but few of the sect are left here, several of their simple meetinghouses remain.
AMENIA, 0 m. (573 alt., 1,500 pop.), is at the junction with State 22 (see Tour 20).
At 0.9 m. is LAKE AMENIA (L), 0.5 m. long, with a bungalow colony (swimming, boating, fishing).
At 5.8 m. is the MILLBROOK THEATRE (L), where Broadway tryouts are held during July and August from Wednesday to Saturday (no matinees). The one-story frame building was originally a Quaker meetinghouse; the pews are still used and seat about 250 persons.
MILLBROOK, 10.4 m. (565 alt., 1,296 pop.), is a prosperous village surrounded by wealthy estates. The town also enjoys the patronage of an artist colony; the summer theater is enthusiastically supported; riding and hunting are popular diversions.
In Millbrook the Hicksite and Orthodox Quakers are still active. The Hicksites meet occasionally in the Brick Meeting House in Mechanic, on State 343, east of South Millbrook. The Orthodox joined with the Dutch Reformed and Methodist congregations in 1926 to build the Federated Church in Millbrook.
At 11.6 m. is the BENNETT SCHOOL AND JUNIOR COLLEGE (R), founded in 1891 at Irvington-on-the-Hudson by May Friend Bennett, and moved to its present site in 1907. Several of its graduates in drama have appeared on Broadway.
At 11.7 m. is the junction with State 343.
Left on this road to the entrance (R), 0.4 m., to the PHEASANT BREEDERS AND HUNTING ASSOCIATION (varying admission charge for privilege of hunting pheasants).
At 1 m. is the BRICK MEETING HOUSE (L), built in 1780 by the Nine Partners Meeting of the Society of Friends. The simple two-story brick building is in excellent condition. The interior was divided to separate men and women worshippers. Cast-iron wood-burning stoves remain in position on either side.
The SITE OF THE NINE PARTNERS SCHOOL lies 500 ft. east of the meetinghouse. Opened by the Society of Friends in 1796, the school offered a thorough academic course and at one time had an attendance of 100. It continued to prosper until the division of the Society of Friends in 1828 into Orthodox and Hicksite groups; the Hicksites withdrew from the school and established a separate and similar institution under the principalship of Jacob and Deborah Willetts. Jacob Willetts, author of popular arithmetic and geography textbooks, wrote the modern version of the useful lyric beginning ‘Thirty days hath September.’
WASHINGTON HOLLOW, 17 m. (820 alt., 80 pop.), settled during the Revolution, was the campground for artillery trains bound for Sackets Harbor during the War of 1812.
At 17.1 m., about 200 ft. off the road and enclosed by a fieldstone wall, is the ZACHEUS NEWCOMB HOUSE (L), a very well preserved example of the early Dutch brick house, built in 1777 by Sarah Tobias Newcomb, while her husband, Zacheus, was away at war. The house, two stories high with a gambrel roof, has the usual eighteenth-century floor plan, with a bisecting central hall. The bricks are laid in Flemish bond. The south porch is an exact reproduction of the original, and the front door is the one built with the house, as are the mantels, window seats, corner cupboards, wood trim, and blue tile.
At 17.7 m. is a view (L) of the Hudson Highlands, strategic area in the Revolution.
At 19 m. is the junction with a dirt road.
Left on this road 0.7 m. to the JOHN NEWCOMB HOUSE (L), a two-story frame structure built in 1808 by John Newcomb, a son of Zacheus Newcomb. The house, an especially handsome one for its time and isolated location, is now occupied by a tenant-farmer. The front entrance is by way of a Dutch double door, around which are leaded lights. In the southwest bedroom is a carved mantel.
PLEASANT VALLEY, 19.2 m. (200 alt., 300 pop.), was settled in 1740 by Quakers and Presbyterians. A fine specimen of Quaker meetinghouse still stands here.
At 19.8 m., east of the power plant, is a curious old stone barn. Records of its origin are lost, but it is believed to have been erected in the 1750’s as a defense post against possible French-Indian raids. In the walls are openings, narrow outside, flaring within, similar to the loopholes in early blockhouses.
At 23.4 m. is the junction with a macadam road.
Left on this road 0.4 m. to the ZEPHANIAH PLATT HOUSE (L). Constructed of native fieldstone, with a second story in brick and a gambrel roof, the house stands practically unaltered. The older portion, which consisted of but two rooms and a basement kitchen, was erected in 1735 by Gilbert Palen. Zephaniah Platt acquired the place in 1762 and built, before 1775, the addition at the right, which doubled the size of the house. The front door is of the Dutch double type and has a brass knocker of Revolutionary design.
Platt was a colonel of militia in the Revolution, a member of the New York Provincial Congress, State senator, and one of the members of the Ratification Convention at Poughkeepsie, whose courageous stand before the United States Constitution was ratified by New York State ultimately resulted in the adoption of the Bill of Rights. In the late 1700’s Platt, his three brothers, and others from Poughkeepsie, moved to the northern part of the State, where they founded Plattsburg.
The road turns L. just beyond the Platt House; at 0.8 m. is the junction of three roads; left here 0.7 m., to the SLEIGHT HOUSE (L), of native fieldstone, two stories high, with a main hall bisecting it in the usual eighteenth-century style. Jacobus Sleight built it in 1798.
POUGHKEEPSIE, 26.4 m. (175 alt., 40,237 pop.) (see Poughkeepsie), is at the junction with US 9 (see Tour 21) and State 55 (see Tour 40).
Section b. POUGHKEEPSIE to KERHONKSON; 31.6 m. US 44
The route traverses one of the foremost fruit-growing regions of the State, and then climbs the ancient Shawangunk Mountains, offering again and again exciting vistas. The section was settled in the main by Huguenots, whose descendants still till its soil. Over the mountains roamed that relentless Indian-killer, Tom Quick, whose numerous exploits have inspired a fund of legend. He has been credited with having killed more than 100 Indians singlehanded in his lifetime; by his own account he slew many more, casually, while he was out hunting.
Of the many Tom Quick stories, there is one that the historian, Quinlan, averred to be true. It seems that one day Tom was deep in the woods splitting rails. As he was driving a wedge in a log, suddenly six dusky warriors stepped out of the underbrush and surrounded him; they asked to be directed to Tom Quick. It was their intention to take him alive and torture him. Tom asked if they would not first help him finish his work. To this the savages agreed, and Tom ranged them three on each side of the log to pull it apart while he drove the wedge deeper. As they held on, he knocked the wedge out, catching all six Indians by their fingers and then leisurely knocked them on the head one by one. Quinlan said he visited the precise spot where this incident occurred and saw the bleached bones of the Indians.
West of POUGHKEEPSIE, 0 m., US 44 crosses the Hudson on the MID-HUDSON BRIDGE (toll 50¢), designed by Ralph Modjeski and Daniel E. Moran. It is a suspension bridge with a total length of 4,530 feet, including approaches. It crosses the river at the Long Reach near the official finish line of the annual intercollegiate rowing regatta.
At 1.4 m. in HIGHLAND (360 alt., 1,575 pop.) is the junction with US 9W (see Tour 21A).
Right from Highland on State 299 to NEW PALTZ, 6.9 m. (236 alt., 1,362 pop.), center for vacationists in the Shawangunk Mountains and home of the New Paltz State Normal School. HUGUENOT VILLAGE, Huguenot St., a group of fieldstone houses clustered along a ridge overlooking the Wallkill River, is a picturesque remnant of a settlement made by French Protestant refugees in 1677.
In the raid on Hurley and Kingston in June 1663, Esopus Indians kidnapped 45 white women and children to hold as hostages for the return of 20 braves shipped by Director General Stuyvesant to Curacao to become slaves. In early September a searching party took the Indians by surprise and set the hostages free. One member of the rescuing party, Louis DuBois of Hurley, in the midst of his joyful reunion with his wife and three sons, noted the fertile lowlands of the Wallkill. In 1677 he, together with 11 other refugees, purchased from the Indians and patented a large tract lying between the Shawangunk Mountains and the Hudson. Early in 1678 the 12 families loaded their possessions in three oxcarts and established their new home, which they called New Paltz after their first refuge, the Rheinish Pfalz. The little community prospered under the administration of the ‘Dusine,’ the 12 patentees, who allocated lands by lot and established whatever rules were needed. Until 1785, when the town was chartered by the State legislature, succeeding Dusines were chosen annually at town meetings from descendants of the patentees. No appeal from their judgment was ever recorded. Perhaps it was the influence of these Huguenots that explains the assertion that ‘so fine and free from animosity and greed has been the life of the people of New Paltz that previous to 1873 no lawyer ever found a permanent residence here.’
About 1700 the community began replacing the original cabins by sturdy stone dwellings, six of which still stand, four practically unaltered, comprising a unique eighteenth-century ensemble.
The JEAN HASBROUCK HOUSE (Memorial House), opposite Front St., was built in 1712 by Jean Hasbrouck, one of the patentees. The design closely follows Ulster county types, and it has escaped to an unusual degree later ‘improvements.’ The rough stone walls are topped by a high, steep roof of medieval flavor. The simple entrance door is sheltered by a primitive shed-stoop. The interior has a typical central hall plan with two rooms on each side. In the hall, a glazed panel reveals the mud plaster, ‘wattle-and-daub,’ wall construction. In the attic are two or three small garret rooms, but in the rest of the enormous space, broken only by light collar beams and struts, were stored great hogsheads of grain. The north right front room was used by Major Jacob, Jr., during Revolutionary times as a store; the bar is still in the attic. Although rented after 1808, the house remained in the Hasbrouck family until 1899, when it was purchased by the Huguenot Patriotic, Historic, and Monumental Society, to be maintained as a memorial house.
Opposite, to the north, is the DEYO HOUSE, the walls of which were part of the house built by Pierre Deyo, the patentee. The dwelling suffered ruthless alterations in the nineteenth century. Again opposite and north, is the DANIEL DUBOIS HOUSE (the ‘Old Fort’), the stone first story of which was built in 1705 by DuBois on the site of the Redoute, a stone fortress required by Governor Andros in the patent. Parts of the Redoute walls may have been incorporated in the new house. About 1835 the house, now a tea room, was enlarged and the interior refitted.
Next, opposite and north, is the BEVIER-ELTING HOUSE, the central part of which was built by Louis Bevier, the patentee, soon after 1699. This portion comprises a single room, attic, cellar, and wine subcellar. In 1735 Bevier’s son Samuel extended the house to the east and possibly at the same time built the west addition fronting Huguenot Street. About 1765 the house was sold to Captain Josiah Elting.
North is the ABRAHAM HASBROUCK HOUSE. Abraham (d. 1717), patentee, brother of Jean and grandfather of Colonel Jonathan Hasbrouck, builder and owner of Washington’s Headquarters in Newburgh, built the south portion with two rooms, garret, and cellar kitchen. Some time later, the central part was added, and finally, the north end with two rooms and a cellar with a great fireplace and primitive flagging. The house fortunately has escaped nineteenth-century alterations.
Just north is the HUGH FRERE HOUSE, erected in the early eighteenth century, but now defaced by a nineteenth-century porch.
The DUTCH REFORMED CHURCH, built in 1839, the fourth house of worship, is a trim example of Greek Revival with red brick walls and a wood portico of four Doric columns. Above the pediment is a fine steeple in two stages. The church body goes back to the Walloon Protestant congregation organized in 1683. The group assembled in a rude log building opposite the Jean Hasbrouck House until 1717, when a small stone structure with a tiny belfry replaced it. In town and church, French was the accepted language until in 1752 the church became affiliated with the Dutch Reformed faith. Not until after 1799 was English adopted. A third building, gambrel-roofed, was built just before the Revolution.
CLINTONDALE, 8.2 m. (552 alt., 603 pop.), is a fruit-raising center named in honor of the Clinton family. Orchards extend almost to the back doors of the homes. In 1830 William Cornell of Clintondale invented and patented a waterproof overshoe, the forerunner of the modern arctic.
From 13.8 m. the SHAWANGUNK (Ind., pile of white rock) MOUNTAINS form the western skyline. They are the upturned edges of beds of resistant white and pink sandstone of Silurian age. The thick, jointed strata form cliffs several hundred feet high. Halfway up the mountainside is a view (R) of the Hudson River Valley—flat and velvety. The rock-strewn slopes of the mountain are covered with white pine, sugar maple, hemlock, and black cherry.
At 25.7 m. is the entrance (L) to LAKE MINNEWASKA (open May 30—Oct. 12; boating, bathing, tennis, riding, hiking). The name is from the Indian for floating waters—in reference to its position atop the mountain. Cliffs of white sandstone, 100 feet or more high, rise above the lake and are topped by two massive hotels. The lake was formed during the Ice Age when the ice sheet, several thousand feet thick, slid over the mountain top and plucked out blocks of the sandstone.
The road runs through a deep cut in the white rock. From the parking place (R), a view is unfolded of the Rondout Creek Valley, with the lofty peaks of the Catskill Mountains, rising as high as 4,000 feet above sea level, forming the distant horizon.
KERHONKSON, 31.6 m. (254 alt., 550 pop.), is at the junction with US 209 (see Tour 6).