“Preservation is the program” for Hudson Valley historic house leaders
Author: William Richards, Ph.D.
Michael Dwyer’s design for a guest house at Edgewater is an homage to Ange-Jacques Gabriel’s 1772 Petit Trianon at Versailles.
On Thursday, June 12, the Richard Hampton Jenrette Foundation convened directors of Hudson River Valley institutions to take the pulse on audience engagement, pain points, and programming at a pivotal time for house museums in America.
“The Hudson River Valley is such a rich tapestry of historic sites and landscapes, and the cultural and institutional leaders of those places we convened today are the area’s greatest stewards,” said Jenrette Foundation President Benjamin Prosky. “We gathered them at Edgewater as a community to exchange experiences and serve as a resource to each other.”
Representatives from more than a dozen house museums gathered in Edgewater’s guest house, designed by the architect Michael Dwyer, a place where the Jenrette Foundation intends to convene future meetings.
“What we’re finding in terms of this challenging moment for our sites and it’s about finding a way forward to stay true to our mission,” said William Harris, Director of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in Hyde Park, New York, “but, on the other hand, what our survey data shows about our opportunities is that people who visit us want to engage with something that’s about inspirational leadership.”
On one hand, historic house museums in the Hudson River Valley face a range of critical issues, including declining visitation and financial sustainability, and often rely on limited public funding and private donations. Additionally, these museums are grappling with how to present more comprehensive narratives that acknowledge the histories of Indigenous peoples, enslaved individuals, and marginalized communities previously excluded from traditional interpretations. Climate change also poses a growing threat, with increased flooding and severe weather endangering fragile historic structures and landscapes, not to mention the exigencies of older structures.
Many sites also struggle with aging infrastructure and the costs associated with conservation and restoration. Boscobel House and Gardens, completed in 1808, suffered a major ceiling collapse on April 16, 2024. It forced the house to close, shifting its team’s focus to recovery, which also became an opportunity to focus on its mission.
“We have long trusted that our house and collection were all done—curated in the 1970s, and proclaimed by everyone who has visited since—but we essentially lost our interiors after our roof fell last year—and we lost a lot, and it sent dust to every possible surface of the house,” said Jennifer Carlquist, Boscobel’s Executive Director, “and it was a reminder that nothing survives inevitably. So we’re reinvesting and thinking about what Boscobel is in 2025 and going forward.”
Carlquist said the house will reopen in July, completing the first phase of its recovery. The house, supported by the Jenrette Foundation, will begin its next phase of retooling its educational framework. “This disaster has totally changed my thinking. Preservation is the program. People expect to move beyond the ropes. They expect to move off the carpet runners. The question is how do we animate this treasure for the next generation.”
Historic house museums have opportunities to revitalize their relevance and expand their impact through innovative programming and inclusive storytelling. Growing public interest in local history, heritage tourism, and environmental sustainability creates avenues for partnerships with schools, cultural organizations, and conservation groups. By embracing digital technology—such as virtual tours, augmented reality, and social media—they can engage broader and more diverse audiences. The region’s scenic beauty and proximity to New York City also provide a strategic advantage in attracting visitors and funding.
“We are really in a time of change,” said Kathy McManus, Site Director of Bard College’s Montgomery Place, “and because of that, we really want to pull back the curtains, not just in sharing our restoration work, but also in highlighting our huge, gorgeous locust trees—and all the paths that people walk and hike all the time.”
Whole-site interpretation is one strategy mentioned, shifting—as Olana has—away from calling itself a house with grounds and toward a landscape with architecture, says Mary Lawrie, Vice President of Visitor Engagement and Business Operations at Olana, designed by Frederic Edwin Church and Calvert Vaux and completed in 1872.
“A lot of the themes and challenges that have come up today are things we think deeply about with our team,” said Lawrie. “What’s our next capital project? How are we preserving the legacy of Frederic Church? What does it mean to pursue whole-site interpretation? All of these questions are things we are actively answering.”
This is the second convening of the Hudson River Valley house museum heads by the Jenrette Foundation. The first, in 2024, focused on similar issues—and this follow-up proved effective in moving beyond a baseline understanding of the scene and into more collaborative opportunities.
“This is a time of change for all of us and we all have different experiences at our respective institutions,” said Kevin Cherry, Ph.D., Jenrette Foundation Vice President, “and we see one of our roles to help people learn from each other as one of the most dynamic because it means finding things we can actively pursue together as stewards and as preservationists.”