Cold Spring is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

in the town of Philipstown in

Putnam County, New York Putnam County is a County (New York), county in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 97,668. The county seat is Carmel (hamlet), New York, Carmel, within one of th ...

, United States. The population was 1,986 at the 2020 census. It borders the smaller village of Nelsonville and the hamlets of

Garrison A garrison is any body of troops stationed in a particular location, originally to guard it. The term now often applies to certain facilities that constitute a military base or fortified military headquarters. A garrison is usually in a city ...

and North Highlands. The central area of the village is on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

as the Cold Spring Historic District due to its many well- preserved 19th-century buildings, constructed to accommodate workers at the nearby

West Point Foundry The West Point Foundry was a major American ironworking and machine shop site in Cold Spring, New York, operating from 1818 to about 1911. Initiated after the War of 1812, it became most famous for its production of Parrott rifle artillery and o ...

(itself a Registered Historic Place today). The town is the birthplace of General Gouverneur K. Warren, who was an important figure in the Union Army during the

Civil War A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same Sovereign state, state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.J ...

. The village, located in the

Hudson Highlands The Hudson Highlands are mountains on both sides of the Hudson River in New York (state), New York state lying primarily in Putnam County, New York, Putnam County on its east bank and Orange County, New York, Orange County on its west. They conti ...

, sits at the deepest point of the Hudson River, directly across from

West Point The United States Military Academy (USMA), commonly known as West Point, is a United States service academies, United States service academy in West Point, New York that educates cadets for service as Officer_(armed_forces)#United_States, comm ...

. Cold Spring serves as a weekend getaway for many residents of

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. Commuter service to New York City is available via the Cold Spring train station, served by

Metro-North Railroad The Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company , also branded as MTA Metro-North Railroad and commonly called simply Metro-North, is a suburban commuter rail service operated by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), a New York State publ ...

. The train journey is approximately one hour, ten minutes to

Grand Central Terminal Grand Central Terminal (GCT; also referred to as Grand Central Station or simply as Grand Central) is a commuter rail terminal station, terminal located at 42nd Street (Manhattan), 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York Ci ...

History

Early history

On July 15, 1691, Dortlandt and Sybrant secured a deed to the tract from

Wappinger The Wappinger ( ) were an Eastern Algonquian Munsee-speaking Native American people from what is now southern New York and western Connecticut. At the time of first contact in the 17th century they were primarily based in what is now Dutc ...

leaders, totaling as much as much as 17,480 acres (according to recent historical analysis) along the eastern bank of the Hudson River from the peak on

Anthony's Nose Anthony's Nose is a peak in the Hudson Highlands along the east bank of the Hudson River in the hamlet of Cortlandt Manor, New York. It lies at the extreme northwest end of Westchester County, and serves as the east anchor of the Bear Moun ...

to (and including)

Pollepel Island Pollepel Island is a uninhabited island in the Hudson River in New York (state), New York, United States. The principal feature on the island is Bannerman's Castle, an abandoned military surplus warehouse. Description Pollepel Island has been ...

, and east to a marked tree which would establish the tract's eastern border. This tract contained a large portion of modern-day Phillipstown, NY, including the entire the Village of Cold Spring. While many land transactions in colonial America were disputed by settlers and natives, the original lands deeded to Dortlandt and Sybrant (containing the Village of Cold Spring) appear to have been legitimately obtained with the consent of the Wappinger. This is evidenced by testimony from Wappinger leader

Daniel Nimham Daniel Nimham (also Ninham) (c. 1726 – 1778) was the last sachem of the Wappinger people and an American Revolutionary War combat veteran. He was the most prominent Indigenous peoples, Native American of his time in the lower Hudson Valley. B ...

, who, in 1765, sought the assistance of the New York Common Council (and eventually the British Crown) in resolving land disputes over land claimed both by the heirs of

Adolph Philipse Adolphus Philipse (1665–1750) was a wealthy landowner of Dutch descent in the Province of New York. In 1697 he purchased a large tract of land along the east bank of the Hudson River stretching all the way to the east to the Connecticut b ...

and Wappinger natives. In this testimony, Nimham states that Wappinger ancestors had sold a tract of "Low Lands on that Part of the Peeks kill orth of modern-day Annsville Creek.. and also a pine swamp containing... a few Acres called Kichtondacongh and a piece of low Land lying Southeasterly from Kichtondacongh called Paukeminshingh." Nimham goes on to contest the sale of any land beyond this initial tract deeded by the Wappinger to Dortlandt and Sybrant, however, recognizes the initial transaction of land (including present-day Cold Spring) as legitimately ceded by the Wappinger to the Dutch.

Permanent settlements

The first permanent settler in the village of Cold Spring was Merrick Williams in 1730. In 1772, a highway master was chosen for the road from Cold Spring to the Post Road from New York to Albany. Prior to Williams presence, the land was woodlands. A small trading hamlet grew alongside the river by the early 1800s. A couple of sloops made regular weekly trips from Cold Spring to New York, carrying wood and some country produce, which came over this model road from the east. Those trips by sloop usually took a week. In 1818,

Gouverneur Kemble Gouverneur Kemble (January 25, 1786 – September 18, 1875) was an American diplomat, industrialist, and two-term United States Congressman from New York from 1837 to 1841. He helped found the West Point Foundry, a major producer of artillery ...

established the

opposite

to produce artillery pieces for the United States Government. The nearby mountains contained veins of ore, and were covered with timber for fuel. A brook provided hydropower, and the Hudson a ready shipping outlet. In 1843, the Foundry built the ''USS Spencer'', the first iron ship built in the U.S. With the influx of workers at the Foundry, local housing, businesses and churches increased, and Cold Spring was incorporated as a village in 1846. The first President of the Village was Joshua Haight. The Foundry became famous for its production of

Parrott rifle The Parrott rifle was a type of muzzle-loading rifled artillery weapon used extensively in the American Civil War. Parrott rifle The gun was invented by Captain Robert Parker Parrott, a West Point graduate. He was an American soldier and inven ...

s and other munitions during the

, when the foundry grew to a sprawling 100-acre complex employing 1,400. It also manufactured cast iron steam engines for locomotives, gears, and produced much of the pipework for New York's water system. The rise of steel making and the declining demand for cast iron after the Civil War caused the Foundry to cease operations in 1911. ''Note:'' This includes an
''Accompanying photographs''
/ref> Many artifacts from the Foundry's history can be viewed at the Putnam History Museum on Chestnut Street. Built in 1830, the building was originally a one-room schoolhouse for the Foundry's teenage apprentices and the children of employees. On January 22, 1896, local businessmen of Cold Spring formed a fire brigade known as the Cold Spring Hose Company, No.1. A horse-drawn hook and ladder was donated in 1899.Grace, Trudie A., ''Around Cold Spring'', Arcadia Publishing, 2011
The Municipal Building, designed by Louis Mekeel, was constructed in 1926 to house the company's first firetruck, an American LaFrance. The company, renamed Cold Spring Fire Company No.1 in 1900, serves the Villages of Cold Spring, Nelsonville and a district in the Town of Philipstown. Mr. Willis Buckner, a former slave from the South, was a driver and groom for

Susan Susan is a feminine given name, the usual English version of Susanna or Susannah. All are versions of the Hebrew name Shoshana, which is derived from the Hebrew ''shoshan'', meaning ''lotus flower'' in Egyptian, original derivation, and severa ...

and

Anna Bartlett Warner Anna Bartlett Warner (August 31, 1827 – January 22, 1915) was an American writer, the author of several books, and of poems set to music as hymns and religious songs for children. She is best known for writing the hymn " Jesus Loves Me". Biogr ...

at their farm on

Constitution Island Constitution Island is in the northeastern United States, located in New York on the east side of the Hudson River, north of New York City. It is directly opposite the U.S. Military Academy Reservation at West Point and is connected ...

. Mr. Buckner taught Sunday School at the Methodist Church. In the early decades of the 20th century, blacks who stayed in this part of New York state migrated away from rural towns to nearby cities with waterfront manufacturing such as Peekskill, Beacon, Newburgh and Ossining. During the 1920s, the

Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to KKK or Klan, is an American Protestant-led Christian terrorism, Christian extremist, white supremacist, Right-wing terrorism, far-right hate group. It was founded in 1865 during Reconstruction era, ...

had a presence in Cold Spring as well as Fishkill and Nelsonville.

Pete Seeger Peter Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014) was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and social activist. He was a fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s and had a string of hit records in the early 1950s as a member of The Weav ...

formed the Clearwater organization, an environmental group dedicated to advances in sewer treatment, industrial waste disposal, and addressing the discharge of major pollutants into the Hudson. In 1970, the sloop '' Clearwater'' docked for a songfest at Cold Spring. As Seeger appeared on stage to thank the audience for coming, fifteen drunks stood up waving little American flags, yelling “Throw the Commies out.” That night someone cut the sloop's moorings and there were threats to torch the boat. All of this created tension within the Clearwater organization.

Country estates

Towards the latter part of the nineteenth century artists, writers and prominent families came to Cold Spring, and mansions were built along Morris Avenue, including "Undercliff," the home of publisher

George Pope Morris George Pope Morris (October 10, 1802 – July 6, 1864) was an American editor, poet, and songwriter. Life and work With Nathaniel Parker Willis, he co-founded the daily ''New York Evening Mirror''Sova, Dawn B. ''Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z''. New Yo ...

, and "Craigside," the home of Julia and General

Daniel Butterfield Daniel Adams Butterfield (October 31, 1831 – July 17, 1901) was a New York businessman, a Union general in the American Civil War, and Assistant Treasurer of the United States. After working for American Express, co-founded by his father ...

. To the south,

employees Dr. Frederick Lente built " The Grove,"

Robert Parker Parrott Robert Parker Parrott (October 5, 1804 – December 24, 1877) was an American soldier and inventor of military ordnance, famed for developing the Parrott gun prominently used in the American Civil War. Biography Parrott was born in Lee, New H ...

built " Plumbush," and

Hudson River School The Hudson River School was a mid-19th-century American art movement embodied by a group of landscape painters whose aesthetic vision was influenced by Romanticism. Early on, the paintings typically depicted the Hudson River Valley and the sur ...

painter Thomas P. Rossiter built " Fair Lawn."

Geography

The village is bordered by the

Hudson River The Hudson River, historically the North River, is a river that flows from north to south largely through eastern New York (state), New York state. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains at Henderson Lake (New York), Henderson Lake in the ...

to the west, and is bound by the

Hudson Highlands State Park Hudson Highlands State Park is a non-contiguous state park in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, located on the east side of the Hudson River. The park runs from Peekskill, New York, Peekskill in Westchester County, New York, Westchest ...

to the north, where

Mount Taurus The Taurus Mountains ( Turkish: ''Toros Dağları'' or ''Toroslar,'' Greek'':'' Ταύρος) are a mountain complex in southern Turkey, separating the Mediterranean coastal region from the central Anatolian Plateau. The system extends along a ...

and

Breakneck Ridge Breakneck Ridge is a mountain along the Hudson River between Beacon and Cold Spring, New York, straddling the boundary between Dutchess and Putnam counties. Its distinctive rocky cliffs are visible for a long distance when approached from the ...

rise out of the banks of the Hudson and form two basically parallel ridges that track each other inland. The valley between them has an abandoned dairy farm, two lakes, and a camp. According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the village has a total area of , of which is land and , or 0.91%, is water.

Demographics

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2020, there were 1,986 people, 834 households, and 834 families residing in the village. The population density was . The racial makeup of the village was 94%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0.49%

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.44% Native American, 3.05% Asian, 2.12% from other races, and 0.08% from two or more races.

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 0.07% of the population. Out of the 834 households, 25.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 41.9% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together. The average household size was 2.13 and the average family size was 3.0. The median income for a household in the village was $98,056 (an increase of 83.7% from 2010), and the median income for a family was $135,500 (an increase of 78.2% from 2010). About 8.4% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 13.8% of those under age 18 and 4.4% of those age 65 or over.

Arts and culture

Attractions

The Foundry Preserve Trail is located here. The Julia L. Butterfield Memorial Library was established in Cold Spring in 1913. Magazzino Italian Art is a museum focused on Postwar and Contemporary Italian Art and features a herd of Sardinian donkeys.

Churches

In 1826, Union Church was built. By mutual agreement the Presbyterians used the building in the morning and the other religious groups in the afternoon. In 1830, the Baptists constructed a church on land donated by Samuel L. Gouverneur. The first Methodist church was built in 1833.Floyd-Jones, Elbert. ''St. Mary's Church in the Highlands'', Frank B. Howard, Poughkeepsie, 1920
/ref> The building was sold in 1870, and a new brick Italianate structure was built in 1868. The Dutch Reformed Church was built around 1855 in Neoclassical style. The building was later replaced by the Julia L. Butterfield Library. Many of the workers at the Foundry were Irish immigrants. Our Lady of Loretto church was constructed in 1833 of locally made red brick covered with stucco. The church was abandoned in 1906 and fell into disrepair. It was repaired and re-dedicated in 1977. Saint Mary's in the Highlands church was incorporated in 1840. A second larger church was built in 1867, designed in the

Victorian Gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an Architectural style, architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half ...

style by architect and vestry member

George Edward Harney George E. Harney (September 1, 1839 – November 12, 1924) was a late 19th-century American architect based in New York City. Biography George Edward Harney was born September 1, 1839, in Lynn, Massachusetts, to George Ballard Harney and Mary ...

Education

Cold Spring is home to the Haldane Central School District. The school is located at 15 Craigside Drive and teaches students grades K-12. The school received a blue ribbon award in 2017 from the U.S. Department of Education.

Media

Cold Spring has two weekly newspapers: ''Highlands Current'',https://highlandscurrent.org founded in 2010, and ''Putnam County News and Recorder'', founded in 1868.

Notable people

Henrietta Ash Bancroft Henrietta Ash Bancroft (1843–1929) was an American professor and religious leader. For six years, she was professor of English and dean of women at Albion College. Leaving academia, she served as field secretary and general secretary of the Dea ...

(1843-1929), professor and religious leader *

Gail Brown Gail Marjorie Brown (née Ziegler; born October 11, 1937) is an American former actress. She is best known for her role as Clarice Hobson on the NBC daytime soap opera ''Another World (TV series), Another World'' (1975–1986). Early years Bro ...

, actress * Bob Duffy, college and pro basketball player, born in Cold Spring *

Scotti Hill Scotti Hill (born Scott Lawrence Mulvehill on May 31, 1964) is an American musician best known as a guitarist in the New Jersey heavy metal band Skid Row. Overview One of the last glam metal bands to hit the big time before the advent of gru ...

, rock musician * Albert L. Ireland, United States Marine *

Sean Patrick Maloney Sean Patrick Maloney (born July 30, 1966) is an American attorney and politician who served as the U.S. ambassador to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development from 2024 to 2025. He served as the U.S. representative from from ...

- Congressman from New York's 18th Congressional District * Jean Marzollo, writer, creator of the ''

I Spy I spy is a guessing game where one player (the ''spy'' or ''it'') chooses an object within sight and announces to the other players that "I spy with my little eye something beginning with...", naming the first letter of the object. Other players a ...

'' book series * Sarah P. Monks, California naturalist, born in Cold Spring *

Charlie Plummer Charlie Faulkner Plummer (born May 24, 1999) is an American actor. He began his career as a child actor in short films and made his feature film debut in David Chase's drama '' Not Fade Away'' (2012) before landing a lead role in ''King Jack'' ( ...

, American actor, grew up in Cold Spring *

Emily Warren Roebling Emily Warren Roebling (September 23, 1843 – February 28, 1903) was an engineer known for her contributions over a period of more than 10 years to the completion of the Brooklyn Bridge after her husband Washington Roebling developed caiss ...

, first female field engineer of the

Brooklyn Bridge The Brooklyn Bridge is a cable-stayed suspension bridge in New York City, spanning the East River between the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. Opened on May 24, 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge was the first fixed crossing of the East River. It w ...

* Gouverneur K. Warren, American military commander during the

and hero of the

Battle of Gettysburg The Battle of Gettysburg () was a three-day battle in the American Civil War, which was fought between the Union and Confederate armies between July 1 and July 3, 1863, in and around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The battle, won by the Union, ...

References

External links

*
Articles about Cold Spring's history

* ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwjjvyLA_pg "A Look At Cold Spring's History", CBS {{authority control Villages in New York (state) Populated places established in 1846 New York (state) populated places on the Hudson River Villages in Putnam County, New York 1846 establishments in New York (state)