By Nancy Bendiner, HRH Collections Committee Volunteer

1795 survey of the Village of Red Hook with land parcels.

From Revolutionary War times, the Elmendorph Inn, in the Village of Red Hook, New York, has witnessed history. So has its immediate neighborhood, which includes Cherry and Graves Streets, which are today fairly unassuming, short, and mostly quiet except at Red Hook’s noon and late afternoon rush hours. The question is sometimes asked, what would walls tell us if they could speak? Recently, my question has been, what if Cherry and Graves Streets could tell us their stories, what secrets and surprises could we learn? Over the decades, what “evidence” has survived and where can it be found so that we know what really happened? Or can we?

The Evolution of these Streets

My readings suggest that Native American trails provided routes from which some local roads evolved. A major trail, the Mohawk Trail, connected at its southeast end to Albany Post Road along which Route 9 evolved. Cherry Street emerges from Route 9 and Graves Street turns off from Cherry. The Elmendorph is located on the corner of Cherry Street and Route 9.

The Post Road was a migration route and “followed older trails of the Wiccoppe and Wappinger” tribes on the Hudson River’s east side. Other tribes as well were present in the Hudson Valley. (See especially entries at FamilySearch.org on Albany Post Road and additional sources listed at the end of this article).

The transition from early Native American presence through the growth of European trade and settlement are described by both Clare O’Neill Carr in A Brief History of Red Hook, and by Richard Figiel in A Road Through Time. A Dutchman, Col Peter Schuyler, purchased land from the Native Americans in 1688. Dutch merchants by the early eighteenth century started fur trading outposts along the Hudson. Cherry Street was eventually considered a main East-West line to the Hudson River landing. Routes evolved for postal delivery, travel by citizens, and what became Route 9 served as a strategic road during the Revolution.

The land that became Red Hook was eventually owned by Alida Livingston, whose husband Brigadier General John Armstrong was landlord. In 1795 he had the land east and south of the Elmendorph surveyed and subdivided into lots along present-day Cherry Street.

The Elmendorph Inn, which was built about 1760, started out as a private home and soon became an inn, a stagecoach stop and a resting place for Revolutionary soldiers.

These descriptions suggest that Cherry Street in its early days was much more than a way to escape the local traffic light at the Four Corners.

Until the 1930s, Red Hook streets were not paved, as we now know paving; before then, horses, carriages and vehicles ran on dirt, later on pebbles and gravel.

Detail from 1876 map of the Village of Red Hook by O.W. Gray & Son. See full map here, courtesy of NY Public Library. This map is oriented with West on top and East to the bottom.

Edmund Basset, a Red Hook Village chronicler, writes about the street names in his “Reminiscences of Red Hook”- reprinted after a series of articles in the 1920s. He says “Kent Street is sometimes called Graves Street, also Division Street, but Kent was the original name.” On the 1867 Town of Red Hook map, Graves is listed. On that map, a lady named Mrs. Kent lives on the corner of Graves and Market Streets. By the time of the 1876 Red Hook Township map, however, the street name is now Division Street not Graves, but she is still there. Bassett adds that sometimes Cherry Street was called Cherry Lane when he was a child. Another name also comes up on old maps—on the 1876 map, the part of Cherry Street that entered East Market Street is named “Quarry Street,” then a block later- at the bend- it’s named “Cherry Street.” Local resident Todd Sherman meanwhile heard from a family member that a part of Graves Street was once called Cherry Street.

[You can explore Edmund Basset’s “Reminiscences” of the village using our interactive map.]

What Was on the Streets and What Did It Look Like?

One story that a few locals told me is that when Cherry and Graves Streets were first built, someone accidentally switched the names, probably on the construction maps. This possibility is at least somewhat supported by the rumor that there was once a Cherry grove on Graves Street. Meanwhile, the Methodist Burial Ground still stands on Cherry Street.

If one walks down Cherry and Graves Streets, the bulk of the houses are modest. Only a handful are now topped by tin (or more contemporary types of metal) roofs, and were originally built in the nineteenth century to house local workers. Several wealthy Red Hook residents such as Edward Martin and his descendants owned some of the small homes and rented them out. Red Hook manufactured tin, as well as chocolate and tobacco, and some locals worked in those industries.

West exterior of Elmendorph Inn at time of purchase by Friends of Elmendorph, 1975. Explore more images of the Elmendorph and other buildings, in our Then & Now walking tour.

The Elmendorph Inn, renovated starting in the 1980’s and now presentable, was just 50 years ago in dilapidated condition according to some who saw it then. Mary Kay Fraleigh Budd describes it as “a real run down building.” Chris Klose describes it as a “derelict” building “not used for much” by the time renovations started. Throughout its history though, this building loomed over Cherry Street and was a silent witness to change.

What Do Today’s Residents Have to Say?

Local residents who have lived near or in this neighborhood much or most of their lives have stories and observations to share- glimpses of the past, witnessed firsthand or heard from family and passed down through the decades. It is possible to tie memories with physical evidence, some of which has already vanished or changed in appearance.

What might at first seem like small events and images can throw light on the larger panorama of a village and even the world beyond, at least a world which has been around for a few hundred years and lived through the American Revolution and economic change. Some of the most intriguing stories are not in writing at all. Klose presents this theme: “You can never in reality judge a book by its cover- people will know a lot when you talk to them.”

My exploration here combines rarely heard stories gleaned from interviews of local residents and sometimes from written accounts (which may have missed the details that locals noticed).

Memories of Childhood and the Past

One question I explored with residents was how they feel the neighborhood has changed since they first lived here, some since childhood. There seemed to be a consensus that there is more traffic, less safety on the street, and less closeness and friendliness. It’s not that people aren’t civil and friendly, but that they are not as intertwined in each other’s lives and supportive of each other as they were, say, in the 1980’s and before.

In my interviews, I sense a more trustful society in the past than we have today- though not perfect in this regard as you will see.

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, there were many points of connection among residents of Red Hook Village. Locals routinely attended the same churches, the same organizations, and knew each other from social events. A few citizens today talk about the Circle of Friends, which brought people together as a social outlet and to help the community, including with the Elmendorph’s rescue and renovation.

Once the telephone came into usage about 1910, there were operators who connected the caller to the recipient of the call. Emma Coon, a phone company operator in the 1930’s, is quoted in O’Neill Carr’s book: “You got to know most of the customers by voice, or number: it was a very small town.”

Woman with a baby in the yard at 10 Cherry St, undated.

Cindy Day’s grandmother at 3 Graves Street invited neighbors “over for tea.” Local grandmas who lived on Cherry Street, such as Emma Coon at 16 Cherry, babysat local children, according to her grandson Chris Coon with whom I spoke recently while he tended his vegetable garden down the road.

One significant connector may indeed have been the children. According to several Graves Street residents including Day and Todd Sherman, they themselves played freely as children on the street without fear of getting hit by a car. As I sat on her front porch on Graves Street one recent afternoon, Day told me that there were “lots of families on the street, we knew everybody; we felt safe walking to the house of my grandparents- Augustus and Lena Day- on Graves Street; kids walked to school from five years old……I used to ride my bike down the middle of the street.” Sherman says, “There were kids everywhere, they played safely on the streets, there was hardly any traffic.” He adds, “This was a neighborhood, everyone knew everyone.”

Chris Coon remembers a large tree, “about three feet across,” at the corner of Cherry and Graves Streets on which the Village posted a stop sign. “A friendly Siberian Husky was tied up to the base but sometimes he got out, and that caused trouble with other dogs,” Coon says. An opportunity perhaps for neighbors to get to know each other.

It probably helped sometimes to bring the neighborhood closer when neighbors were related. In Red Hook census records, relatives often lived near each other. Chris Coon’s grandma and Cindy Day’s grandma were sisters. Coon lives on Cherry Street and Day lives on Graves Street.

Neighbors Respected History

Local citizens sometimes made an effort to restore buildings on Cherry Street and learn about their history. Klose mentions the award from Historic Red Hook to Jane Hollenberg for saving and preserving her historic barn near the house at 36 Cherry Street.

When I spoke to her before she moved from the neighborhood, Ms. Hollenberg was familiar with the history of her property. The house where she was a landlord, at 36 Cherry Street, was once a gatehouse to a larger estate on the west side of Cherry. This gatehouse was built in 1803. She replastered the gatehouse and worked on the foundation. Most of her renovation efforts, she said, were on the barn which originally had the same shale foundation as the house and to which stone was then added. Ms. Hollenberg believes that on part of her land there may have been an old dump, as she discovered shards of china coming up over the soil. She covered that area with plants.

While he was in the process of renovating 16 Cherry Street before the pandemic, I spoke with Patrick Doyle about his plan to maintain original architectural details. This house was in earlier days owned by an older generation of the Coon family. He believes that initial construction occurred over 150 years ago. In the basement, there is a stone fireplace on the west wall and at right of that there is a chimney with an exhaust area, suggestive of a wood burning stove- both evidence of an early kitchen. He showed me some of the woodwork he was restoring. Sherman also finds evidence of a kitchen in his basement.

Local children also helped to keep up the neighborhood. Chris Coon, whose family owned a newer house at 24 Cherry Street, observes that in the late 1980s when some trees were growing into the Methodist Burial Ground, the Boy Scouts helped clear it; they also helped repair some broken stones.

Home Businesses

A number of locals had businesses in their homes, in addition to babysitting, that could bring people together because services were needed. Day remembers the “green and feed” business in Mr. Weaver’s garage. George F. “Hop” Michael remembers “Charlie’s Pizza” located in the garage next to the Elmendorph in the 1960’s between the now-CVS parking lot and the Elmendorph. There was also a flea market later in that area, run by the Elmendorph, where his mother Edith Michael worked. In a 1982 article in the Rhinebeck Gazette Advertiser, O’Neill Carr describes the country store at the Elmendorph, with two gas pumps; that store was run by the Pulvers who lived there.

A number of residents were related to farmers or worked on the local farms. The farming community’s interests were reflected in some of the local Village businesses. Peggy Tomson describes Red Hook as once a farming community where farmers knew each other. By 1950, according to O’Neill Carr, many residents started to move away from farming and Village interests evolved in other directions too.

Stories about What We Can See Now and Can’t:

The Masonic Lodge

Many of the residents with whom I spoke are familiar with the mounded raised earth behind the Masonic building just beyond the parking lot. This is hard to see unless one gets up close (where it also becomes dark and rather dismal). It has been described as a semi-underground vault. Klose calls it a “holding box” for winter burials: “they stacked up the coffins for burial in the Spring.” The bodies were destined for the Methodist Burial Ground. At some point, probably after (one hopes) the body storage role, this mounded earth also served as a root cellar.

Sherman, whose parents purchased the house where he lives Graves Street in 1952, remembers that kids were warned not to go near the root cellar but he and his friends played there anyway. He says the Masons’ parking lot used to be dirt and much smaller, the cars at meetings lined up all along Graves Street. Terry Reetz, a local long-time Village resident has heard that an “underground railroad” during the Civil War started at the root cellar. A great subject for further research!

Sherman also heard that there was a field on the land where the Masonic Lodge building and parking lot now stand. There are some rumors that the field included a cherry orchard. According to O’Neill Carr, this was a cow and animal pasture, an extension of lawyer Jacob Elseffer’s estate which fronted on N. Broadway. In her book, she describes the mansion, “Mapleton” as a “handsome house surrounded by gardens running through to Graves Street. Fraleigh Budd speaks of the house as “beautiful.” She adds that in the early 1950s the house was torn down to make room for the A&P supermarket. Today the lot has a storage business and parking lot that can be accessed from both Graves Street and Route 9.

A House Moved by Horses

A few years ago someone mentioned to me that his uncle had seen a house moved by horses down Cherry Street in the direction of the Elmendorph but that’s all he knew about it.

Coon was recently able to clarify this story further. He heard that the house was originally in the forested area next to the Methodist Burial Ground. The 1867 and 1876 maps locate Mrs. Gregg in the house next to the cemetery, a house which eventually disappeared. In census records, she is listed as a widow from Ireland. According to Coon, this is the house that was moved down Cherry Street to the location where the Story Studio now stands next to the Elmendorph. He adds that this building became a kitchen for the Inn, but eventually the “kitchen” burned down. I have also heard that the house ended up in the location next door, at 7 Cherry Street, and there was a fire there. Several years ago, the owner there at that time, Pat Dul, told me she had never heard of a fire at her location.

Meanwhile, the foundation of the house that was moved was left behind, next to the graveyard. According to Coon, it became a “dumping ground” for the neighborhood. He adds that young people and others have been known to go over there and find old bottles- and I have seen a few bottles that were pulled from that site!

The Methodist Burial Ground

Recently I discovered that in the nineteenth century, there was a small building on Division Street (named Graves Street at other times) where Methodists could worship. According to a 1931 article in the Rhinebeck Gazette, a hall was built on the estate of Mr. Elseffer-the estate that crossed over Graves Street. At the HRH Archives, there are explanations about the origins of the nearby Methodist Burial Ground located around the corner on Cherry Street. An excellent resource about some of the inhabitants of the graveyard is “The Cemetery Next Door,” compiled by Sarah K. Hermans for Historic Red Hook.

In my own “worker’s house” at 23 Graves Street, the Osterhaut family lived with at least three children. Some in that family died of tuberculosis. Several ended up in the Methodist Burial Ground. At least three Osterhaut children were buried there by the time they were four years old. Two other Osterhauts, also buried there, died in their twenties. The burial ground is sad witness to many early deaths.

Coon describes one change at the Burial Ground. There came a time when grapevines got into the original black wrought iron fence: “The Church ripped it down and put in a new fence.” Coon also describes some curious activities in the graveyard- see “The Dark Side” in this article.

Workers and Owners

Starting in the 1840s, O’Neill Carr notes that area residents found railroad jobs, service jobs on local estates, and positions in the “fledgling” telegraph industry. Many of the residents on Cherry and Graves Streets worked in local businesses and many but not all, rented their homes. Some worked for local home owners. Other professions of Graves and Cherry Street residents included tobacconist, hotel keeper, carpenter and laborer.

George Palmier, an early owner of 3 Graves St., was listed on the 1850 US Federal Census as living with his wife and 6 children, aged 3-15. He was a painter by trade but more interested in politics than painting according to Edmund Bassett. A black gentleman, Ellsworth Jackson, rented at 16 Cherry St., working among other places at the Chocolate and Tobacco Factory as a night watchman. In what was a fairly small house, he sheltered his large family of seven children.

HRH has multiple research holdings about the lives of the more prominent Cherry and Graves Street residents or owners, such as Edward Martin, philanthropist and farm owner, and Jacob Elseffer, lawyer.

Mary Tselikis, who with her husband Pete has lived on Cherry Street since 1979, inherited her house from family- it was passed down from family member Cora Petri to Mary’s grandmother Kathleen Delamater. Cora Petri, in her first years of ownership, used this as a summer home, lived in Scarsdale and was well off- not the usual pattern among Cherry Street residents at that time. As she got older she stayed more often in Red Hook.

Both Tomson and Fraleigh Budd describe a past, privileged neighborhood just beyond Cherry and Graves and the Elmendorph. It seems to me that for a time at least this further highlights a contrast between the economic conditions of residents and owners. Tomson remembers the row of once elegant homes along the original Post road. One house across from CVS eventually became a boarding house and later was “refurbished” into a bed and breakfast. Fraleigh Budd speaks of the race horses that Alice Scism housed in her backyard that raced at Saratoga and Vernon Downs.

Evidence of Change from Photos

You can explore highlights from our collections at https://www.historicredhook.org/collections. Todo a more thorough search through our items on CatalogIt, make an appointment to visit the StoryStudio at 5 Cherry St. (View map) . The archives are currently open on Tuesdays 10:00 a.m. to 12 p.m. and 2:00 p.m. to 4:00, the first Saturday of every month from 10:00 a.m. to 12 p.m. and by appointment. Email info@historicredhook.org to make an appointment.

Historic Red Hook has multiple photographs and maps that depict Cherry and Graves Streets as early as the nineteenth century.

In the HRH Archives are impressive 1960s aerial photos of both Graves and Cherry Streets and the surrounding area. According to Fraleigh Budd, they were taken by Henry DeWolf who attempted to sell them to owners of farms and businesses. Prominent in some photos is the Amoco gas station which Stewarts replaced. Chris Klose remembers that Stewarts had gas pumps which were removed about eight years ago.

Aerial photograph of North Broadway (Route 9) and Cherry Street. Graves Street joins Cherry Street at upper right. Visible, left to right along Broadway: the American Gas Station, a white ceramic tiled mid-century modern classic, later demolished and now where Stewart's stands; Red Hook Village Diner; Roy W. Scism residence.

Patrick Doyle describes the original mid-nineteenth century house at 16 Cherry Street which he came to own. It was made of more than one section. The first section was made of straw, mud and sticks. A later addition was of brick, then clapboard. So far, I am not aware of any photos of the exterior of the house when first built. Today it appears to have two levels, the top story reached by outside stairs.

1920 "Cherry Lane" - West of 10 Cherry Street

The house at 10 Cherry Street now owned by Mary and Pete Tselikis does not look she says much like it did when it was built. Half of the house was built in the late 1800’s, with more recent alterations and additions from about 1900 until the garage addition in 1980. There are a few photos that capture the house as it changed.

Day remembers that the neighborhood of her childhood was “prettier, with lots of trees.” There are photos that picture the trees that lined Graves and Cherry Streets. It is possible that the trees were removed to widen the street- there are written accounts of Village efforts to widen central streets in Red Hook. According to Sherman, Graves Street is wider now than when he was a child- there used to be a few feet of yard beyond his fence on Graves but the street was widened by the Village.

When Tselikis moved to her house, she says there were trees along Cherry which seemed to get in the way of traffic. One day a car was going too fast and hit a tree in front of 7 Cherry Street. The tree was subsequently removed.

Chris Klose laments that “we’ve lost so many of the outbuildings or they go to rack and ruin, get dilapidated.” Others I interviewed mentioned a few buildings that are no longer standing. There are a a few photos of buildings that are gone forever. Tselikis says that where there is an apartment building today, next to Stewarts, there was a small structure and a garden. She has donated to the HRH Archives a photo of this structure as well as many others taken on Cherry Street.

House on the Corner of Market and Graves. Written on back: A local house & Red Hook denizens, late 19th Century, East Street, George Hart family. Also known as Near House.

The Dark Side of the Streets

Every neighborhood had its stories that awaken tension or fear in some who hear or tell them. Day often walked as a child up Graves Street toward the corner, turning at Cherry Street. She was scared to walk by the cemetery where she often heard bats flying around.

More than one resident mentions a suicide that occurred in the garage of a Graves Street house in 1950 (though the house’s current owners request anonymity). An article in the Red Hook Times several days after the man’s death stated that he had a history of depression, and that he was born in 1888 in Italy. There was reportedly a sighting of a ghost on that very property, no one knows exactly where, and at least two old-time local residents have heard this story. So far, the current owners have not seen (or heard) a ghost.

Coon remembers the times in the 1980s when young adults hung out in the back of the cemetery on Cherry Street, lighting campfires. Not far from the cemetery, there was a road sign on a post next to the road. The kids carried out drug deals (pot) and money exchanges, hiding their booty and money in a crevice between the sign and the post that supported the sign. The chief of the Red Hook Fire Company, Donald V.R. Coon Jr., set up surveillance from the Coon house nearby and the offenders were soon apprehended. The sign is no longer there.

Changes and Trends

Some locals associate current problems in part to the increase in traffic and population: “There are 14,000 plus cars going through there now,” Klose observes, speaking about the Four Corners intersection. Tomson feels that the arrival of IBM changed the community from its rural character. She mentions that IBM increased the population starting in the 1960s at least through the mid-1970s and offered bigger salaries than usual for the area. I have heard others suggest this explanation. She expresses appreciation about Red Hook, “It’s a lovely place to live,” but observes that it seems more of a living place now for people from elsewhere who have come in and increased property prices.

Sherman exclaims: “I want the good ole days where you could drive through the intersection at the Four Corners and not wait a long time.”

It is notable though that Red Hook Village in its earlier history struggled with a few congestion problems as well. As described by O’Neill Carr, the arrival of cars into a world of horses and buggies could cause disruptions and confrontations. “The automobile was a real intrusion to many citizens- noisy, unpredictable and above all, fast.” At one point, to improve the situation, the “horseless carriage” speed was limited to ten miles per hour. The Elmendorph was certainly a central horse and buggy stop and now witnesses the Village car congestion.

Meanwhile, Hop Micheal mentions how businesses changed. Competition altered what businesses stayed, moved, or left. He mentions for example Tiberio’s supermarket which had to close due to the competition from Hannaford’s. There used to be an A&P, which CVS replaced, by the parking lot between Graves and Route 9. Later, the CVS moved, replaced by the storage facility.

During the ten years I have lived on Graves Street, I have noticed that sometimes when older residents pass away, their homes are sold to developers and landlords who renovate the properties and then rent them. On occasion, new owners purchase the homes and live there full or part time. Sometimes, ownership results from inheritance.

Cherry and Graves Streets Today

As a resident, I feel a certain sense of peace here when I return from a visit to New York City, despite our traffic. The cars waiting for the Four Corners traffic light on Route 9 at noon and the evening rush hour can however span the full distance to CVS- the length of two blocks at least. The signal seems very slow, but there are no doubt more cars going through than in the past.

I notice that every day cars run the stop sign at the corner of Graves and Cherry as they drive along Cherry, and don’t always watch out for pedestrians. Sherman remembers that for much of his life, there was no traffic control there at all. So far, I am not aware of any accidents, but I warn others especially children about that intersection.

Nor am I aware of any immediate scandals or current dark stories (except one, which must remain a secret).

For the most part, but not entirely, the buildings are kept up on Cherry and Graves Streets. There is a mix of owners and renters, and almost everyone seems friendly when approached though I imagine they don’t all know each other and a few are quieter about their presence. When there was a crisis with a tree in my yard, some neighbors came to help and I am sure would do so again. There are few children.

One issue mentioned by Todd Sherman is how the old construction responds to today’s needs. He says that the foundations of his house and others are slate, built around the 1850’s. He feels the slate could be moved around when large and heavy construction vehicles go down Graves or Cherry Streets. During the Village water project over the last year or so, my own 1850s house on Graves trembled noticeably when the heaviest construction vehicles drove down the street. Once I presented this issue to the Village, there was an effort by the truckers to sometimes avoid my street or to drive more slowly.

Reetz tells me that a few years ago, some people with metal detectors asked to go around areas in yards where there had been outhouses in hopes they would find jewelry, or who knows what, left from the past. Actually my yard had an outhouse but I have yet to buy a metal detector to try out my luck, maybe later.

Thank you to the following for their insights and memories: Chris Coon, Chris Klose, Todd Sherman, Cindy Day, Terry Reetz, Mary Kay Fraleigh Budd, Peggy Tomson, Mary Tselikis, George F Michael, Patrick Doyle, Jane Hollenberg, Claudine Klose, Jim Haskin, and the late Patricia Dul.

SOURCES FOR THIS ARTICLE AND FOR FURTHER RESEARCH

Books

A Road Through Time by Richard Figiel
History of Dutchess County, New York by James H. Smith, 1882
A Brief History of Red Hook by Claire O’Neill Carr, published 2001 by the Wise Family Trust in cooperation with the Egbert Benson Historical Society of Red Hook (purchase a copy here).

Pamphlets and other unpublished sources

Building Structure Inventory, 1987, Red Hook Village, Historic Red Hook Archives
Elmendorph Inn- An Historic Structure Report,, Sept, 1982, Historic Red Hook Archives
Reminiscences of Red Hook (A Story of the Village) by Edmund Basset, originally published as weekly newspaper stories in the Red Hook Advertiser, 1926-1927, reprinted 1976 by the Red Hook-Tivoli Bicentennial Committee, copies at Historic Red Hook Archives and online here.
“The Cemetery Next Door,” by Sarah K. Hermans

Newspaper Articles

“Broadway, Red Hook,” a paper by Elizabeth Cole, circa 1920-1923, Historic Red Hook Archives
“Schuyler’s Patent: part of Red Hook Village History,” Daily Freeman, Aug. 17, 199
“First subdivision started village,” by Claire O’Neill Carr, Gazette Advertiser, Feb. 17, 199
“1894 fire created the village,” by Claire O’Neill Carr, Gazette Advertiser, Jan. 27, 199
“Village of Red Hook sees the light,” by Cara Parravani, Gazette Advertiser, March 9, 2000
“20th-century village grew from historic Hamlet,” Poughkeepsie Journal, Jan. 3, 1996

HRH Online Resources

Search historic maps, see especially Red Hook Town and Village maps 1858, 1867, 1876
Search Red Hook historic newspaper collection

External Online Resources

FamilySearch.org- about Albany Post Road
USGenNet - “Early Transportation in Dutchess County”
New York State and Federal Census records, online at ancestry.com