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Eleanor Roosevelt and Mary Margaret McBride visited and broadcast a radio show from this Schoolhouse in 1952.
A co-writer of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, New Yorker and "First Lady of the World", Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) visited this schoolhouse with her colleague in the middle of the 20th century and delivered a radio broadcast about the Columbia County community, schoolteacher Jesse Merwin, Washington Irving, and Ichabod Crane.
In her historic visit to the Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse, Mrs. Roosevelt dedicated "this building to the furtherance of community understanding and community growth...(and) so it is understood that the women of this country can spread out the greater understanding of humanity throughout the world."
Mrs. Roosevelt and Ms. McBride were accompanied by local residents, Marian Peduzzi and Julia Fisher, who led a group of women to rescue the single-room schoolhouse from destruction, and dedicate to community use. Four of Jesse Merwin's granddaughters were also in attendance. In her visit to the Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse, Mrs. Roosevelt spoke of working with other nations at the United Nations, and simultaneously mentioned the great small towns and villages of Columbia County.
The First Lady of the World discussed the author's prerogative, wherein Washington Irving wrote many of his famed stories in this region, but took 'poetic license' to place the location description further south in Westchester, where Irving later retired.
This rural 19th-century building served as a local single-room public school into the 1940s.
During the 1950s-60s, local residents including alumni of the Schoolhouse cleaned and repaired the building to create a small community center. The structure was used for a decade or so to hold meetings and parties; it was regularly employed by a local 4-H club. Originally located on land at the corner of Route 9H and Fischer Road, the schoolhouse was the second school built on that site--replacing the original log cabin school--and was moved approximately 200 yards down the road to the Luykas Van Alen house property when the local school district centralized. During the 1970s it was restored to its 1930s appearance, and opened to the public as a museum.
Washington Irving was a friend of Martin Van Buren and lived at the Van Ness home in Kinderhook for several months in 1809 after the death of his fiancée. The author wrote portions of A History of New-York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty in Kinderhook, during which time he befriended Jesse Merwin, the Kinderhook schoolteacher, and housemate at the Van Ness mansion. Two twenty-something intellectuals in rural Columbia County, Irving and Merwin became friends, rode trails and went fishing together; after Irving moved on, the two friends continued their correspondence for more than three decades.
The Schoolhouse site features a 'Legends & Lore' historical marker awarded by the New York Folklore Society & William G. Pomeroy Foundation honoring Washington Irving's "Sleepy Hollow" character 'Ichabod Crane'—who was patterned after Jesse Merwin, the original Columbia County Schoolteacher who taught at the earliest one-room log-cabin school here.
Dedication of the NY Folklore Society historical marker was accompanied by actor Robert Ian MacKenzie's public reading of an excerpt from the short story, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", and screening of an adaptation of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by documentary filmmaker Jim Ormond.
The Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse / Columbia County Historical Society (CCHS) is a Preserve New York (PNY) grantees. The 2019 PNY grant cycle was the most competitive in the program’s 26-year history, and the grant of $10,000 will allow CCHS to work with Walter Wheeler of Hartgen Archeological Associates to complete a Historic Structures Report (HSR) of the Schoolhouse. The HSR project will assess the current condition of the building, make recommendations for repairs and restoration and serve as a guiding document for continued interpretive use and future preservation. More funds are needed to fully implement the restorations and repairs.. Several condition issues are present that must be addressed in the near future: the condition of the metal roof and the stability of the structure, as the building rests on steel girders that it was placed on, after the move in the 1970s.
A co-writer of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, New Yorker and "First Lady of the World", Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962) visited this schoolhouse with her colleague in the middle of the 20th century and delivered a radio broadcast about the Columbia County community, schoolteacher Jesse Merwin, Washington Irving, and Ichabod Crane.
In her historic visit to the Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse, Mrs. Roosevelt dedicated "this building to the furtherance of community understanding and community growth...(and) so it is understood that the women of this country can spread out the greater understanding of humanity throughout the world."
Mrs. Roosevelt and Ms. McBride were accompanied by local residents, Marian Peduzzi and Julia Fisher, who led a group of women to rescue the single-room schoolhouse from destruction, and dedicate to community use. Four of Jesse Merwin's granddaughters were also in attendance. In her visit to the Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse, Mrs. Roosevelt spoke of working with other nations at the United Nations, and simultaneously mentioned the great small towns and villages of Columbia County.
The First Lady of the World discussed the author's prerogative, wherein Washington Irving wrote many of his famed stories in this region, but took 'poetic license' to place the location description further south in Westchester, where Irving later retired.
This rural 19th-century building served as a local single-room public school into the 1940s.
During the 1950s-60s, local residents including alumni of the Schoolhouse cleaned and repaired the building to create a small community center. The structure was used for a decade or so to hold meetings and parties; it was regularly employed by a local 4-H club. Originally located on land at the corner of Route 9H and Fischer Road, the schoolhouse was the second school built on that site--replacing the original log cabin school--and was moved approximately 200 yards down the road to the Luykas Van Alen house property when the local school district centralized. During the 1970s it was restored to its 1930s appearance, and opened to the public as a museum.
Washington Irving was a friend of Martin Van Buren and lived at the Van Ness home in Kinderhook for several months in 1809 after the death of his fiancée. The author wrote portions of A History of New-York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty in Kinderhook, during which time he befriended Jesse Merwin, the Kinderhook schoolteacher, and housemate at the Van Ness mansion. Two twenty-something intellectuals in rural Columbia County, Irving and Merwin became friends, rode trails and went fishing together; after Irving moved on, the two friends continued their correspondence for more than three decades.
The Schoolhouse site features a 'Legends & Lore' historical marker awarded by the New York Folklore Society & William G. Pomeroy Foundation honoring Washington Irving's "Sleepy Hollow" character 'Ichabod Crane'—who was patterned after Jesse Merwin, the original Columbia County Schoolteacher who taught at the earliest one-room log-cabin school here.
Dedication of the NY Folklore Society historical marker was accompanied by actor Robert Ian MacKenzie's public reading of an excerpt from the short story, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", and screening of an adaptation of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by documentary filmmaker Jim Ormond.
The Ichabod Crane Schoolhouse / Columbia County Historical Society (CCHS) is a Preserve New York (PNY) grantees. The 2019 PNY grant cycle was the most competitive in the program’s 26-year history, and the grant of $10,000 will allow CCHS to work with Walter Wheeler of Hartgen Archeological Associates to complete a Historic Structures Report (HSR) of the Schoolhouse. The HSR project will assess the current condition of the building, make recommendations for repairs and restoration and serve as a guiding document for continued interpretive use and future preservation. More funds are needed to fully implement the restorations and repairs.. Several condition issues are present that must be addressed in the near future: the condition of the metal roof and the stability of the structure, as the building rests on steel girders that it was placed on, after the move in the 1970s.
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View the Exhibition Online:
Exploring Columbia County Schoolhouses: One-Room Schoolhouses In Columbia County
Exploring Columbia County Schoolhouses: One-Room Schoolhouses In Columbia County
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