From a Troy Orphanage to a Pioneering Medical Career: Pathbreaker Dorothy Lavinia Brown
“Dreams can be made to come true,” said Dorothy Lavinia Brown, who achieved her aspirations by becoming the first African American female surgeon in the South, among other important accomplishments. While Brown spent her adult life in Tennessee, the Hudson...
America’s First Female Real Estate Tycoon: Catheryna Rombout Brett
The life of Catheryna Rombout Brett — namesake of Scenic Hudson’s Madam Brett Park in Beacon — reads like fiction: A young woman forsakes the big city for the wilderness, carves out a life for herself and young sons following...
Get Inspired at These 10 Powerful Sites of the Valley’s Black History
Black Americans have been making important contributions to life in the Hudson Valley since the 17th century, but only in recent decades have their contributions been publicly recognized and celebrated. To continue appreciating Black history well beyond February, explore these 10...
The Glory Days of Hudson Valley Ice Harvesting
Block ice was once a can’t-live-without-it piece of American culture. For about a century beginning in the 1830s, keeping food and beverages cold in and around New York City depended on this ice — and on harvesting it from the...
FDR’s Deft Civil Rights Advocate, Elizabeth McDuffie
Shortly after Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt moved into the White House in 1933, leaving behind the family’s beloved home on the Hudson River, Elizabeth “Lizzie” McDuffie arrived there as well. Hired as a maid, McDuffie was actually a college graduate...
Newburgh: the Cradle of American Speed Skating
Back in the days when people could count on the Hudson River freezing over nearly every year, skating on it was a popular pastime. In Newburgh, people took to it with particular zeal. As early as 1815, hometown skaters like...
Celebrating the Scenic Hudson Decision
When the 6 people who founded Scenic Hudson gathered to protect Storm King Mountain in 1963, they knew they faced an uphill battle. When it came to big industrial projects like the hydroelectric plant Con Edison proposed to build on...
New Life for Old Bridges
In the early 20th century, access to the Hudson River in upper Dutchess and southern Columbia counties was confined largely to those wealthy families whose sprawling estates lined its banks. To reach the shore, and in some cases their mansions, many...