Sharpe Reservation

ago [1895] it ceased operations, and the buildings have remained idle, except for temporary occupation of the Water Street front as a county jail in 1902."85

NOTES

1Laura C. Holloway, Famous American Fortunes and the Men Who Have Made them (Philadelphia, 1885), p. 219. 2Elizabeth H. Haight, ed., The Autobiography and Letters of Matthew Vassar (New York, 1916), p. 21. 3/ bid., p. 22. 4Idem. 5Holloway, p. 219. 6Benson J. Lossing, Vassar College and its Founder (New York, 1867), pp. 18-19. 7/bid., pp. 19-20. 8Autobiography, p. 24-. 9Edmund Platt, The Eagle's History of Poughkeepsie, from the Earliest Settlements, 1683 to 1905 (Poughkeepsie, 1905), p. 85. loAutobiography, p. 31. 11/bid., pp. 26-7. 12Lossing, p. 23. 13Autobiography, p. 27. 14/ bid., p. 28. 15Holloway, p. 221. 18AutobiograPhy, pp. 29-30. 17Platt, p. 85. 18Autobiography, pp. 32-3. 19The Poughkeepsie Eagle; Souvenir Number: The Bridge and Its Connections, October, 1889. 20Honoway, p. 222. 21Lossing, p. 27. 22Platt, p. 85. 231 10noway, p. 222. 24Idem. 25Idem. 26Lossing, p. 30. 27Autobiography, p. 33. 28Lossing, p. 33. 29Honoway, p. 223. 30Platt, p. 85. 31The Poughkeepsie Enterprise, November 11, 1909. 32James Parton, Triumphs of Enterprise, Ingenuity and Public Spirit (New York, 1871), p. 93. 38Lossing, p. 33. 84Honoway, p. 223. 85Platt, p. 86. 88AutobiograPhy, p. 33.

37Platt, p. 104. p. 117. 89/bid., p. 108 40/bid., p. 110. 41/bid., p. 112. 42/ bid., pp. 139-40. 43/ bid., p. 119. 44/ bid., p. 108. 45Holloway, p. 223. 46Nancy Freeman, "A Life of Mr. Vassar," Vassar Alumnae Magazine, (December, 1938).

46

47Poughkeefisie Eagle Souvenir, 1889. 48Freeman Hunt (Anonymous), Letters about the Hudson River and Its Vicinity, 3rd ed (New York, 1837), pp. 239-40. 49Poughkeepsie Eagle Souvenir, 1889. 50AutobiograPhy, p. 2. 51Platt, p. 128. 52The Poughkeepsie Sunday Courier, August 11, 1929. 53Platt, pp. 166-7. 54Autobiography, p. 34. 55Parton, p. 93. 56Platt, pp. 140-1. 57/bid., p. 311. 58Lossing, p. 36. 59Holloway, p. 225. 60Lossing, p. 42. 61P1att, p. 167. 62AutobiograPhy, p. 2. 63Lossing, p. 59. 64Autobiography, p. 33. 65Holloway, p. 226. 66Platt, p. 167. 67Poughkeepsie Eagle Souvenir, 1889. 68Lossing, p. 60. 69AutobiograPhy, p. 2. 70Platt, p. 148. 71/bid., p. 167. 72Autobiography, p. 3. 73Holloway, p. 227. 74Mary M. Whitney, "The Founders of Vassar," The Vassar Miscellany, (May, 1895). 75Idem. 76Platt, p. 167. 77Holloway, p. 227. 78Lossing, p. 93. 79Holloway, p. 228. 80Whitney. sijutobiography, pp. 5, 12. 82Lossing, p. 34. 83Parton, p. 93. 84Autobiography, p. 5. 85P1att, p. 233.

The "Hog Back Guards" are getting themselves up in shape for their annual parade. They will be expected to present the grotesque feature of Thanksgiving Day. Their equipments will eclipse everything outre and their evolutions and drill throw the Chicago Zouaves in a deep shade. The Poughkeepsie Telegraph, November 20, 1860

47

SHARPE RESERVATION*

Sharpe Reservation, the Herald Tribune Fresh Air Fund s 3,000-acre camping area in southern Dutchess and northern Putnam Counties, has a long past but a short history. Its existence as a green oasis for the sidewalk children of New York City's tenements goes back only a decade or so, but its mountain fastnesses have looked down on nearly three centuries of colorful historical developments along the Fishkill Creek.

One might say that history was repeating itself when the noted brain surgeon, the late Dr. William Sharpe, donated to the Fresh Air Fund the first thousand acres of the reservation. After Washington's defeat at White Plains, October 28, 1776, numerous refugees from New York and White Plains described as "the poor and distressed," fled to Fishkill where they found asylum. There is no record as to exactly how many of these distressed persons received shelter and a sympathetic welcome one hundred and sixty years ago, —but it is doubtful if the number was as large as that of disadvantaged young Americans from the big city who have been receiving shelter and a sympathetic welcome since 1949 in the Fishkill mountains. Even by 1869, eight years before the founding of the Fresh Air Fund by the Reverend Willard Parsons, the population of Fishkill had not reached one thousand, despite steady growth since the Revolutionary War. Today, almost this number of persons inhabit Sharpe Reservation every summer.

The Fishkill Creek and the mountains south of it were known to the Indians as Matteawan, meaning the "country of good fur." The country on the east bank of the Hudson at this point was noted for beaver streams and it is quite likely that the skins of beavers from Sharpe Reservation decked the heads of Londoners or Parisians during the beaver hat period which reached a peak during the early days of John Jacob Astor. High among the traditions that are developing among the present denizens of Sharpe Reservation is that of "Josephine and Napoleon," regarded as the forebears of all the beavers in the area.

*The substance of a talk given •in the Bliss Dining Hall of Sharpe Reservation by Mr. Frederick H. Lewis, Executive Director of the Herald Tribune Fresh Air Fund, on the occasion of the pilgrimage made by the Dutchess County Historical Society, September 30, 1961.

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CLINIC, ADMINISTRATION, DINING HALL, CAMP HIDDEN VALLEY

LAKE FROM MARY LOUISE LODGE

INFIRMARY, CAMP ANITA DINING HALL, CAMP HAYDEN