Choate House was built in 1867 by shoe manufacturer Samuel Baker in what is now

Pleasantville, New York Pleasantville is a village in the town of Mount Pleasant, in Westchester County, New York, United States. It is located 30 miles north of Manhattan. The village population was 7,019 at the 2010 census. Pleasantville is home to the secondary campu ...

. It later became the residence of Dr.

George C. S. Choate George Cheyne Shattuck Choate (March 30, 1827 – June 4, 1896) was an American physician and the founder of Choate House, a psychiatric sanatorium. Biography He was born in Salem, Massachusetts, on March 30, 1827, to Margaret Man ...

. Choate added a wing as a private sanitarium to accommodate patients being treated for mental and nervous disorders.

Horace Greeley Horace Greeley (February 3, 1811 – November 29, 1872) was an American newspaper editor and publisher who was the founder and editor of the '' New-York Tribune''. Long active in politics, he served briefly as a congressman from New York, ...

was being treated there at the time of his death on November 29, 1872. Choate died in 1896; the sanitarium closed ten years later. His widow, wanting to turn the house over to her newly married son as a wedding gift, decided to live in the wing after moving it down the hill to its present location near Bedford Road. The job of detaching the wing and moving it began on New Year’s Day 1909 and was completed in summer. Teams of horses pulled the building over logs to its new location. Mrs. Choate lived there until her death in 1926 at age 95. Her dwelling subsequently had three more private owners: banker Dunham B. Scherer, advertising executive Lewis H. Titterton, and Wayne C. Marks, an alumnus and trustee of Pace College (now

Pace University Pace University is a private university with its main campus in New York City and secondary campuses in Westchester County, New York. It was established in 1906 by the brothers Homer St. Clair Pace and Charles A. Pace as a business school. Pace ...

). In 1962, Marks gave his home and surrounding acreage to Pace. His gift formed the nucleus of Pace's campus in

Westchester County Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population ...

. The wing from Choate House is now a campus welcome center known a
"Marks Hall."
Eventually, the original Choate House also became part of the campus. As a condition of its acquisition, Pace entered into an agreement with the Choate family to maintain the house in its original state and retain its original pink color. Choate House is visible from the

Taconic Parkway The Taconic State Parkway (often called the Taconic or the TSP and known administratively as New York State Route 987G or NY 987G) is a parkway between Kensico Dam and Chatham, the longest in the U.S. state of New York. It follows a g ...

. The building houses an office for the president and offices of the University's Dyson College of Arts & Sciences.

References

The History of Pace
{{coord, 41, 07, 43, N, 73, 48, 34, W, type:landmark_region:US-NY, display=title Pace University Houses in Westchester County, New York University art museums and galleries in New York (state) Mount Pleasant, New York 1867 establishments in New York (state)