Sunnyside (Tarrytown, New York)

Infobox nrhp
name = Sunnyside (Washington Irving's Home)
nrhp_type = nhl


caption = Front view of Sunnyside
location = Tarrytown, NY
nearest_city = White Plains
lat_degrees = 41 | lat_minutes = 02 | lat_seconds = 52 | lat_direction = N
long_degrees = 73 | long_minutes = 52 | long_seconds = 12 | long_direction = W
area = 10 acres (4 ha)
built = 1835
architect = George Harvey
architecture = Gothic
designated= December 29, 1962 cite web|url=http://tps.cr.nps.gov/nhl/detail.cfm?ResourceId=424&ResourceType=Building
title=Sunnyside (Washington Irving's Home)|date=2007-09-18|work=National Historic Landmark summary listing|publisher=National Park Service]
added = October 15, 1966cite web|url=http://www.nr.nps.gov/|title=National Register Information System|date=2007-01-23|work=National Register of Historic Places|publisher=National Park Service]
visitation_num =
visitation_year =
refnum = 66000583
mpsub =
governing_body = Historic Hudson Valley

Sunnyside is a historic house on 10 acres (4 ha) of grounds alongside the Hudson River in Tarrytown, New York. It was formerly the home of noted early American author Washington Irving, best known for his short stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle", and is a National Historic Landmark.National Park Service, [http://www.cr.nps.gov/nhl/designations/Lists/NY01.pdf National Historic Landmarks Survey, New York] ; retrieved June 4, 2007.] The building is now operated as a museum by Historic Hudson Valley, which charges an admission fee. [Although the neighboring village of Irvington was named after Washington Irving, and Sunnyside was long considered to be located there, Tarrytown incorporated first, in 1870, two years before Irvington did, and when the boundaries were drawn, Sunnyside ended up on the Tarrytown side of the line.]

Sunnyside contains a large collection of Irving's original furnishings and accessories. In particular, all furniture and most accessories in his writer's study are original. The dining room, drawing room, and picture gallery, as well as most bedrooms, are open to the public and contain much of their original furnishings.

In some sense, Sunnyside began almost 200 years before Irving with Wolfert Acker, a Dutch-American inhabitant of the region. His property, "Wolfert's Roost", was part of the Manor of Philipsburg; it contained the simple two-room cottage (built 1656) and surrounding land that Irving purchased in June 1835 from Benson Ferris for $1,800. Indeed Irving wrote a story, "Wolfert's Roost", about Acker and the site. As Irving wrote at the time:

:You have been told, no doubt, of a purchase I have made of ten acres, lying at the foot to Oscar's farm, on the river bank. It is a beautiful spot, capable of being made a little paradise. There is a small stone Dutch cottage on it, built about a century since, and inhabited by one of the Van Tassels. I have had an architect up there, and shall build upon the old mansion this summer. My idea is to make a little nookery somewhat in the Dutch style, quaint, but unpretending. It will be of stone.

Irving requested that George Harvey become his aesthetic collaborator and foreman in the house's subsequent remodeling and enlargement. The result with its wisteria-covered, stepped-gable entrance and Spanish tower, are instantly recognizable. In its time, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. said that Sunnyside stood "next to Mount Vernon, the best known and most cherished of all the dwellings in our land."

Irving died of a heart attack in his bedroom at Sunnyside on November 28, 1859. The Irving family continued to inhabit the cottage until 1945, when John D. Rockefeller, Jr. purchased the house. He opened it to the public in 1947.

It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1962.,citation|title=PDFlink| [http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NHLS/Text/66000583.pdf National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination: Sunnyside (Home of Washington Irving)] |437 KiB |author=Richard Greenwood|date=July 18, 1975|publisher=National Park Service and PDFlink| [http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NHLS/Photos/66000583.pdf Accompanying 8 photos, exterior, from 1975.] |1.28 MiB ]

A partial replica of Sunnyside may be found in the Washington Irving Memorial Park and Arboretum in Bixby, Oklahoma, with a statue of Irving seated on the side porch.

ee also

*Washington Irving Memorial

Notes

External links

* [http://www.irvingtonhistoricalsociety.org/nrhp/nrhp01.html Sunnyside] , at Irvington Historical Society
* [http://www.hudsonvalley.org/content/view/13/43/ Sunnyside web site (Historic Hudson Valley)]
* [http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/hhh.ny0876 Sunnyside: 11 photos and 9 drawings] , at Historic American Building Survey