Senate House

As soon as the Declaration of Independence was adopted on July 4, 1776, the Thirteen Colonies rushed to choose delegates for their local state governments. For their safety, representatives from New York were forced to escape their British occupiers in New York City. They fled up the Hudson River to Kingston, NY where at a local merchant’s modest stone house they held the first congressional session on September 6, 1777. Unfortunately, the seventeen Senators met only for just weeks when the British landed in Kingston and burned the rebellious town.

Built in 1676, Abraham Van Gaasbeek’s home, The Senate House, is typical of the early Dutch homes built in the Hudson Valley. Much of the home was destroyed in the fire but reconstruction began the next spring. The house remained in the family until New York State acquired the property in 1887. Then in 1946, the Ulster Garden Club began the project of restoring the grounds and hired a landscape architect to draw plans for a colonial garden.

The 1964 Founders Fund Award went to replant the perennial beds, the doorstep herb garden as well as extensive plantings in front of the museum. Landscape architect Herbert Cutler drew the plans for this garden containing appropriate varieties of perennials common to an 18th century garden.

Over the years, the garden has evolved from a basic, colonialstyle garden into a show-quality space known as the boxwood garden. Ulster Garden Club continues to care for the garden with regular work sessions. The Senate House today is maintained by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation through the Palisades Interstate Park Commission.