By MAUREEN L. KOEHL
In 1887, J.J. Dean, the pastor of the Goldens Bridge Methodist Episcopal Church, described his little community for the church paper, The Volunteer, as follows:
“Goldens Bridge is located on the Harlem R.R., 44 miles from New York … The natural location is beautiful, and not surpassed by any place along the Harlem road. All trains stop here, which fact gives the place an advantage in point of trade and travel. A branch road runs up to Lake Mahopac, a beautiful summer resort ten miles distant. In the midst of such beautiful scenery, and with trains running almost every hour, we wonder that the place has not grown to larger proportions … The place is in its infancy. The growth is yet to come. Some may reply, ‘It’s a rather old infant!’ and suggest that it is a dwarf … There is a future for Goldens Bridge. The continual growth of New York City, and its high rents and rate of taxes, its din and dirt, must send people up this way more and more. If city people only knew what health and happiness dwell among these hills they would not be long in coming. When these grand heights shall have been crowned with palatial residences, as they are sure to be, Goldens Bridge will be justified in its name.”
The late 19th century and the early 20th century proved a boon for the crowd escaping from the “din and dirt” and pollution of the big city to the south. And Harlem Railroad promotions and travel brochures assured travelers of a wonderful summer retreat, not only in Goldens Bridge, but in nearby Cross River and Waccabuc. There were hotels and summertime boarding houses, taverns and pristine lakes and the Croton River, and by the early 1900s, awesome reservoirs, locally called “lakes,” for fishing, swimming and boating. Northern Westchester was a happening place.
Life went on with or without tourists for the residents of our westernmost hamlet. Family names like Brady, Todd and Green had long roots in the area. The hustle and bustle that went on along the railroad tracks and Route 22, the Albany Post Road, never brought the prosperity the railroad brought to other Hudson Valley towns.
However, from items in the town historian archives we can get a glimpse of earlier Goldens Bridge life.
In 1905, the District Nursing Association of Northern Westchester was organized at the home of Stephen B. Quick by his daughter, Mrs. Florence Brady. She was an untiring worker for the group until her tragic death in one of the worst train disasters along the Harlem R.R. line. On Feb. 16, 1907, the newly electrified train she was riding in derailed in Woodlawn and Mrs. Brady was among the 22 people, mostly women, who were instantly killed as the car she was riding in was whipped off the rails.
Her place was filled by Mrs. Oliver Smith and the first Goldens Bridge district nurse, Miss Taylor.
In 1912, the DNA committee organized a Girls Club boasting 12 members from ages nine to 17 who called themselves the Busy Bees. These young ladies made infant clothing, aprons and dresses for the supply closet and the annual church sale. Social events and play performances made the Busy Bees a welcome part of the community.
In contrast to the Rev. Dean’s remarks, we have one of his possible parishioner’s recollections of her turn-of-the-century childhood. In 1975, Mrs. Judy Smith interviewed her mother-in-law, Nora Smith, age 78, about her long life in the hamlet. Nora came to Goldens Bridge in 1899. The family lived in a Brady rental house on Route 138. She attended an older one-room schoolhouse located behind the old community house on Old Bedford Road, a dark shingled building with a pot-bellied stove for heat, water from a neighbor’s bucket to drink, and the necessary house out back.
Nora Smith said, “I loved to play baseball and I made the other children angry by hitting the ball out of the school yard. Another favorite game was ‘hide and seek.’ I don’t remember dances, but we had Christmas plays and we used paper, pens and pencils for our lessons. Our teacher was Miss Twilliger.”
Nora Smith talked about the square dances held in different homes with potluck refreshments.
“Music was supplied by local musicians playing the fiddle, banjo, harmonica and accordion,” she remembered. In the summer, families went swimming and fishing in the reservoir and she and her mother would go “strawberrying” to Whitehall Corners. They either walked or rowed across the reservoir to get there.
“Our family never owned an automobile. We traveled the dirt roads from Goldens Bridge to Katonah to Yorktown by horse and wagon in the summer and horse and sleigh in the winter. There was a narrow wooden bridge on Route 138 where the double bridge is located … I could watch the cows being unloaded from the train in Goldens Bridge and put into large trucks for their trip to local farms.”
She remembered the milk factory along the railroad tracks and a sawmill at the end of Park Avenue. She also remembered at least three hotels, Callahan’s and Ballard’s, along the railroad tracks, and Ryan’s hotel on Route 22, which was known as Pinemeadow Restaurant in the 1970s.
Mrs. Smith’s mother made her own soap and the girls’ dresses. She bought her fabric and other household goods either from the Green Brothers’ or Olmstead’s stores. These stores sold everything from high buttoned shoes to farm equipment. If you couldn’t find it there, you didn’t need it. Life was simple, but good, and folks were proud of their hamlet just as Goldens Bridgers are today.
Maureen Koehl is the Lewisboro town historian.