Bedford Village Historic District | |
Location | Roughly bounded by Court, Seminary, Poundridge and Greenwich Rds., Bedford, New York |
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Coordinates | 41°12′15″N73°38′23″W / 41.2042620°N 73.6398507°W [1] Coordinates: 41°12′15″N73°38′23″W / 41.2042620°N 73.6398507°W [1] |
Area | 89 acres (36 ha) |
Built | 1787 |
Architectural style | Greek Revival, Gothic Revival |
NRHP reference No. | 73001285 [2] |
Added to NRHP | October 2, 1973 |
The Bedford Village Historic District is a national historic district in Bedford, Westchester County, New York. The district contains 80 contributing buildings and one contributing site. It encompasses most of the original 1680 hamlet and is laid out in a typical village green plan. [3] Notable buildings include the court house (1787), library (1807), school house (1829), post office (c. 1838), and Presbyterian church (1872). The buildings are good examples of the Greek Revival and Gothic Revival styles. [3] Two of the buildings are now museums.
Bedford is 44 miles (71 km) northeast of New York City. [4] It is on hilly terrain with light soil. [5] The settlers in Bedford came from Connecticut around 1680 and built a hamlet. The pattern of the settlement is common in Massachusetts but rare in New York State. The town was planned around a triangular common where three roads met. Around it were at first three plots, which were assigned by lot to the first 20 settlers who planned to farm in common. The concept worked only for a short time but left its mark on the structure of Bedford, which became a market town. It was at times the seat of the county government during the Revolutionary War and one of two county seats, with a county court house, until 1870. The common village green is surrounded by the court house from 1787, the Historical Hall from 1806, a library, which was previously the Bedford Academy, from 1807, a school house built from cut stone in 1829, a post office and a general store from around 1838, and the Presbyterian church in Gothic Revival style from 1872. The buildings represent a New England village in Westchester County. [3] The hamlet was under a Connecticut license until 1700, when it was assigned to New York State on an order by King William. [4]
A Brief History of the Presbyterian Church at Bedford, N.Y. from the Year 1680 was written by Reverend Heroy and published in 1874. It describes the history of the building, including the laying of the cornerstone and the services celebrating the dedication of the then most recently restored building in 1872. [5]
The Westchester County Historical Society notes that the Bedford Village Historic District is of both historical and architectural importance as an unusual example of a "colonial New England pattern of home plots and jointly owned farm land" in New York State. During the Revolutionary War, it served as a center of resistance, a supply center, and the home of a county government house. After the war, buildings in Federal style, Greek Revival style and Victorian style were erected in Bedford, which was for a long time "one of the most vital farming and trading centers in the county". [3]
The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in northern Westchester County in 1973. [2] The Bedford Historical Society runs two museums, one in the former court house and another in the former school house. [6]
The court house was built in 1787. It is the oldest government building of Westchester County and one of three court houses in New York State from before 1800. [7] It was erected for Bedford as the county seat from 1788 to 1870. [7] In the court room were judges such as William Jay, son of John Jay, the first chief justice of the United States, and attorneys such as Aaron Burr, who later was vice president under Thomas Jefferson. [8]
The court house was restored in 1889 and once again from 1965 to 1970. [7] It houses the museum for the Historic District. In a tradition dating back to its first use, it is also a venue for lectures and meetings, and mock trials have also been performed in the courtroom. [8]
The school house was built in 1829 in the span of a few months. It had one room, which served for lessons in "grammar, spelling, arithmetic, history, geography, the Bible, and depending on the scholarship of the teacher, Latin and philosophy". A school library had books about history, travel, natural sciences, agriculture, biographies, and literature, listed in an 1843 directory. Sixty-two children were educated in 1842, but 27 of them were at school for four to five months only. When the school was too small for a growing population in 1912, the building was turned into a museum founded by the Bedford Agassiz Society in 1913. It has been run by the Bedford Historical Society since 1918. In 1970, the school became a special exhibit for historic education. [9]
Today's Presbyterian Church on the village green was built in 1872 as the fourth on the site. The first minister, Reverend Thomas Denham, settled in 1684, and a meeting house was built in 1689. When Bedford became part of New York, this house was transferred to Rye, New York. Bedford was part of the Anglican Church until the Revolution. A second meeting house was burned by the British in 1779. A third house was transferred to Westmoreland Sanctuary. The fourth church was built in 1872. [10]
Briarcliff Manor is a suburban village in Westchester County, New York, United States, approximately 30 miles (50 km) north of New York City. It is on 5.9 square miles (15 km2) of land on the east bank of the Hudson River, geographically shared by the towns of Mount Pleasant and Ossining. Briarcliff Manor includes the communities of Scarborough and Chilmark, and is served by the Scarborough station of the Metro-North Railroad's Hudson Line. A section of the village, including buildings and homes covering 376 acres (152 ha), is part of the Scarborough Historic District and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984. The village motto is "A village between two rivers", reflecting Briarcliff Manor's location between the Hudson and Pocantico Rivers. Although the Pocantico is the primary boundary between Mount Pleasant and Ossining, since its incorporation the village has spread into Mount Pleasant.
Irvington, sometimes known as Irvington-on-Hudson, is an affluent suburban village in the town of Greenburgh in Westchester County, New York, United States. It is located on the eastern bank of the Hudson River, 20 miles (32 km) north of midtown Manhattan in New York City, and is served by a station stop on the Metro-North Hudson Line. To the north of Irvington is the village of Tarrytown, to the south the village of Dobbs Ferry, and to the east unincorporated parts of Greenburgh, including East Irvington. Irvington includes within its boundaries the community of Ardsley-on-Hudson, which has its own ZIP code and Metro-North station, but which should not be confused with the nearby village of Ardsley.
Bedford is a town in Westchester County, New York, United States. The population was 17,335 at the 2010 census.
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The Armour–Stiner House is a octagon-shaped and domed Victorian-style house located at 45 West Clinton Avenue in Irvington, in Westchester County, New York. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1976. It is the only known fully domed octagonal residence. The house was modeled after Donato Bramante’s 1502 Tempietto in Rome, which in turn was based on a Tholos, a type of ancient classical temple.
Minard Lafever (1798–1854) was an American architect of churches and houses in the United States in the early nineteenth century.
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The Boston Post Road Historic District is a 286-acre (116 ha) National Historic Landmark District in Rye, New York, and is composed of five distinct and adjacent properties. Within this landmarked area are three architecturally significant, pre-Civil War mansions and their grounds; a 10,000-year-old Indigenous peoples site and viewshed; a private cemetery, and a nature preserve. It is one of only 11 National Historic Landmark Districts in New York State and the only National Historic Landmark District in Westchester County. It touches on the south side of the nation's oldest road, the Boston Post Road, which extends through Rye. A sandstone Westchester Turnpike marker "24", inspired by Benjamin Franklin's original mile marker system, is set into a wall that denotes the perimeter of three of the contributing properties. The district reaches to Milton Harbor of Long Island Sound. Two of the properties included in the National Park designation are anchored by Greek Revival buildings; the third property is dominated by a Gothic Revival structure that was designed by Alexander Jackson Davis.
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Charlton Historic District is a 123-acre (50 ha) national historic district located at the hamlet of Charlton, town of Charlton in Saratoga County, New York. The listing included 37 contributing buildings and one other contributing structure. The district dates to 1787 and includes notable Greek Revival and Italianate architecture.
Rehoboth is a historic former barn located on Aldridge Road in Chappaqua, New York, United States. It is a concrete structure that has been renovated into a house with some Gothic Revival decorative elements. In 1979 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
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The Scarborough Historic District is a national historic district located in the suburban community of Scarborough-on-Hudson, in Briarcliff Manor, New York. The 376-acre (152 ha) district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1984, and contains seven historically and architecturally significant properties dating from the late 18th century to the early 20th century. Most of the properties are domestic, or used for education or religion. The most common architectural styles within the district are Mid-19th Century Revival and Late Victorian.
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The Bedford Presbyterian Church is a parish church in Bedford, Westchester County, New York. The current structure was built in 1872 in the Gothic Revival style, as the fourth building for the congregation on the site. The historic building is part of the Bedford Village Historic District, and was listed in 1973. It also serves as a venue for performances of sacred music.
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