**ADDENDUM TO APPLICATION**

**FOR INCLUSION OF A PROPERTY**

**IN THE U.S. WORLD HERITAGE TENTATIVE LIST**

**Name of Property:**

**Olana**

### 

**Prerequisite G:** **Support of Stakeholders**

As discussed in the original application, in addition to the letters of
support received from various state and federal elected officials, we
received a resolution from the Town of Greenport, the town in which
Olana is situated. Since then, we have entered into discussions with the
highest elected official body in Columbia County, the county that
encompasses most of the towns in the 4 mile radius of Olana, considered
our most critical viewshed. In addition, we have sought support from the
towns within the 4 mile radius. Finally, we have sought support from
various preservation non-profit organizations. Below is a description of
where each stands:

**Municipalities:**

**Columbia County Board of Supervisors**: A draft resolution has been
prepared for passage on July 11^th^ calling for the support of our
application (enclosed). Several discussions with the chair of the board
of Supervisors have led me to believe that the full board will support
this application.

**Town of Claverack:** The board has drafted a resolution for support
for passage on July 9^th^ and the supervisor is confident that the town
board will give its support.

**Town of Livingston**: Discussions with the town supervisor have
indicated that they are willing to have a letter of support drafted.

**City of Hudson**: A resolution was passed by the Common Council on
June 19, 2007. A copy is enclosed. A letter of support from the Mayor of
Hudson is also enclosed.

**Town of Clermont:** Attempts have been made to connect with the town,
but due to the recent death of the town supervisor, this has been
difficult. Efforts will continue, however.

**Town of Germantown**: A letter has been sent to the town supervisor
along with a draft resolution. The matter was to be brought up at the
July 18^th^ meeting but because the supervisor had not had a chance to
review the material, they didn't pass the resolution. An effort will be
made to have it passed on July 17th, and the town attorney is extremely
optimistic that it will pass.

**Village of Catskill, Greene County**: Initial conversations have been
held with the Village of Catskill, starting with the Chamber of Commerce
and leading to a meeting with the President of the Village Board.

**Organizations involved in Preservation:**

**National Trust for Historic Preservation**: Wendy Nicholas, Director
of the National Trust Northeast Regional Office, has confirmed that the
National Trust in its entirety wholly supports Olana's designation as a
World Heritage Site.

**Open Space Institute**: Letter of support has been sent directly to
Stephen Morris. Copy is enclosed.

**Columbia Land Conservancy**: Letter of support has been sent directly
to Stephen Morris. Copy is enclosed.

**Scenic Hudson:** Letter of support will be sent.

**Preservation League**: A call has been made to them. We have not yet
heard if they will send a letter of support

**Nature Conservancy**: A call has been made to them. We have not yet
heard if they will send a letter of support

**Elected Officials:**

**Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton:** Letter of support has been sent
directly to Stephen Morris. Copy is enclosed.

**1.d.-e. Location, boundaries, and key features of the nominated
property**:

We request the omission of the Columbia County Land Use Map originally
submitted.

Five new maps are enclosed in order to give a clear picture of the
site's features and boundaries:

\- Olana State Historic Site, Site Survey

\- Olana State Historic Site, Four Mile Radius

\- Reconstruction Plan map

\- Location Plan map

\- Olana Views map

**2. a.** **Description of Property:**

Historic Olana is the approximately 250-acre property acquired over
eighteen years and developed by Church over the forty year period he
owned the property. It is today considered a historic, designed
landscape and a work of 19^th^-century landscape gardening. It is
attributed to Church, an important Hudson River school artist, and
influenced by his wife and others. The Olana landscape is considered one
of Church's finest artistic works. While a departure from his painting,
landscape gardening at Olana utilized a long-evolving design style that
had close aesthetic and historical ties to Frederic Church's painterly
pursuits. Olana was formed as a unified landscape that included the
Persian-inspired house and immediate grounds, a working farm, extensive
parklands and woodlands, a man-made lake, and over five miles of
carriage drives developed over time to provide planned access throughout
the property, presenting myriad views over Olana and outward to the
wider landscape in all directions.

The landscape garden design of this renowned landscape painter is
preserved at Olana and is slowly being restored to the artists' vision.
This property, and a few other early Romantic period (roughly
1800-1860s) garden compositions that remain in the Hudson River Valley
today are at the center of historic events that decisively shaped the
concept of scenic beauty in America. These gardens are seen as a
distinctly New York State cultural phenomenon. Olana reflects not only
one man's creativity but also the artistic and spiritual values of this
place and time. As such, the Olana landscape is a rare and important
artifact of national significance.

While Olana exemplifies the ideals of an era, its loveliness results
from the sill and sensibilities of its designer, Church. That the most
successful member of the Hudson River School designed this landscape
garden is exceptionally fitting. Church was uniquely qualified and
supremely suited to create was is certainly one of the finest surviving
19^th^-century landscape garden designs in the United States.

**2.b**. **History and Development:**

**A Chronology of Olana: *Construction, Changes and Restoration of the
Property and its Structures from 1860 to 2007.***

**1860 -** Church purchases Wynsant Brezie farm from Levi Simmons for
\$10,000. The 1855 census lists 126 acres to the parcel of which 110
acres were "improved" farm that included orchard, gardens, meadows,
pastures, barnyards, roads and a farmhouse and the remainder being
woodlots and wetland. There were three and possibly four structures on
the site when purchased by Church. These included the Brezie farmhouse
(1794) and farm outbuildings (1 or 2) that existed in the location of
the extant barnyard and a house on Oak Hill-Hudson Road (today State
Route 9G) which is no longer extant.

After the sale, Simmons is retained to manage the farm and the purchase
agreement allows for the Simmons family to continue residence in the
existing farmhouse. That same year he marries Isabel Carnes and begins
work on a cottage designed by architect Richard Morris Hunt, later
called Cosy Cottage by the family. Church and Isabel take up residence
in spring of the following year.

**1860-1867 --** In the Churches' first years on the property two
extensive landscape projects are started: the planning of hundreds of
trees in the "park" and the excavation of the wetlands to form the
present day lake. A contiguous 30-acre lot is purchased in 1864 and the
Bethune Road is built. A freestanding studio is built in 1865 at the
highest point on the property and additional roads are laid out in the
park. In 1867 major renovations are undertaken with Church building a
new barn and remodeling the exiting barn. At this time Church writes
that he had constructed "ten distinct buildings" which include Cosy
Cottage and its shed/privy, the studio, the new barn, the extensively
remodeled barn, a house for the coachman, an ice house, corn crib,
granary, and wood shed. That same year a second wing is added to Cosy
Cottage.

**1868-1872 --** Church purchases two lots, 18 acres of woodlot at the
top of the hill and 6.5 acres of woodlot adjacent to the north end of
his existing property. While traveling to Europe and the Holy Land with
his family, Church begins work to construct a new home at the top of his
land on these newly acquired acres. In 1867 he asks Hunt to design the
home but for unknown reasons in late 1869, when the family returns from
their journey abroad, he engages architect Calvert Vaux to work with him
on the design for his new home. In May 1870 the project began with the
construction of a "stable" (also referred to as the "bunkhouse" and
following the family's occupation of the new house, referred to as the
"carriage house"). Once completed, excavation for the new house begins
and the family occupies the "uncompleted" structure late in 1872.
Completion of the woodwork and painted decoration continues for four
years. In this same period, Church constructs his North Road entrance to
the property and an addition is made to the earlier "stable" at the top
of the hill to provide a home for the coachman and family. After the
family's exit Cosy Cottage is occupied by a series of farmers and farm
managers continuing up to the 1960s.

**1873-1879 --** The construction of the lake is finally completed. A
pump house is constructed and 1,500 feet of pipe is laid to bring water
from the lake to a cistern at the top of the hill. In 1877, Church
expands his land again with the purchase of a 9-acre parcel at the
southwest corner of his property allowing Church to significantly
improve the South Road entrance to his property. The new South Road
provides a dramatic entrance as it passes just under the escarpment of
Red Hill and then follows the contour of the new lake to the farm. The
final land acquisition by Church occurrs in 1878 when a 50-acre lot, the
so-called North Meadow, is purchased. This same year, Church designs a
balcony for the nursery and the "east balcony" off the Churches' bedroom
is constructed.

**1880 --** Olana is adopted as the property's name culminating the
moment when the farm had finally completed its evolution into an
expansive residential estate. The name, Olane, refers to a specific
location in ancient Persia, identified by 2^nd^-century Greek historian,
geographer and philosopher Strabo in his 17-volume work *Geographica*,
meaning an "elevated stronghold overlooking a fertile river valley in
ancient Persia."

**1881-1883 --** An ornamental wood floor, tiles and new hardware are
installed on the main floor of the house. Repairs are made to the roof
and caps are installed on the chimneys. Painting and other "decorative"
work continues through the period.

**1884-1886 --** In the house a tile floor and laundry are installed in
the basement, an additional room is configured next to the nursery and
awnings were added to the windows. The Ridge Road and Lake Road were
both built and the construction of Crown Hill Road is completed. This
last road and the Ridge Road are constructed as "ornamental" roads that
are devised in Church's plan to provide striking views for the pleasure
of the family and their guests. The topography near each is greatly
altered by Church to better enhance the experience of the viewer.

In 1886, Church begins construction of what would be his final road
project -- a new North Road approach to the house. This same year,
Frederic Joseph Church, the 20-year-old son of the artist, completes a
course on land surveying and his resulting work is a concise (albeit not
perfect) plan of the property and includes features otherwise not
recorded prior to the "plan" including a "summer house" directly south
of the main house (possibly a more elaborate construction of the earlier
studio) and a "North View" located at the highest point above the north
meadow and likely included a seat for the pleasure of a visitor to
Olana. The plan also identifies a large kitchen gardens and existing
patterns of forest and open space not previously recorded. In 1885,
Church begins "improvements" on the house interior including parquet
flooring, carved Indian fireplace fronts, and stencils for the pillared
screen on the stair landing. In 1886, a new "room" in the garret was
completed (bell tower) and a large bell from Mexico was installed.

**1887-1891** **--**The construction of the new North Road approach is
completed in 1887 and included the installation of a new flower garden
as a feature from the road. The beds were laid out with more than 200
plants and several vines suitable for growing on a trellis fitted to the
retaining wall that backed the new garden (the approach road being above
this wall). In subsequent years, orders for as many as 100 additional
perennial flowers are made. Set below the retaining wall, this garden
could not be seen from the house so the natural setting of the hilltop
was left "uncompromised." In this same year Church began work to prepare
for the construction of the Studio Wing to the house. This addition
includes a connecting corridor, observatory, piazza, bedroom, lavatory
and storage. Upon completion of the wing in 1891, Church closed his New
York studio and removes his freestanding studio from the landscape. His
son Louis moves into the "bedroom" below the studio and becomes the
salaried manager of the farm. A new Boynton furnace is installed in the
house in 1889.

**1892-1900 --** Throughout this period Church continues to alter the
landscape through extensive planting and clearing of views along his new
roadways, although the work is directed by Louis the plan is clearly
that of the artist. In 1894, Louis oversees the construction of a new
pump house near the lake and the installation of a new pump and pipe
system to bring water to the top of the hill. At this same time a
covered sawmill is constructed and attached to this new pump house. In
1896 a greenhouse is constructed under the direction of Louis for
"tropical" plants and palms. Rhododendron and roses are added to the
landscape. Beds are developed in the East Lawn and near the house for
the roses. In the spring of 1899 a large cow barn is constructed,
connected to the east side of the older barn, and intended for dairy
farming. In May 1899, Isabel Church dies in New York City. In March
1900, Church returns from Mexico to New York City and dies on April 7.

**1900-1964 --** January 1901, Louis married Sarah Baker Good, known as
"Sally" and following several months of honeymooning in Europe, the
couple settles at Olana where they live out their lives. Louis Church
dies November 8, 1943 and Sally Church on August 17, 1964. Throughout
their tenure there are minor changes made to the property.

**1907-1917 --** A lamp room between service wing and bedrooms is
remodeled into bathroom for staff. Electricity is installed in the
house. The stair from bedroom chamber to nursery is removed and stored
in basement, ceiling and wall are plastered. Guest room suite is altered
to provide new master bedroom, dressing room and attached bath for Louis
and Sally.

**1933-1934 --** Storm knocks down the bell tower chimney (never
restored).

**1930-1943 --** Louis Church makes repairs to several interior walls
and exterior walls of studio tower (observatory) utilizing painted
canvas to staff off leaks and falling plaster.

**1943-1964 --** Sally Church purchases and installs new wallpapers on
second floor of house. Church-designed stencils are "repainted" in
coordinating color scheme. The elaborately designed cornice stencils
(exterior of house) were painted over with brown paint. Painted "fields"
(not stencils) on the main floor of house were repainted during this
period by Sally. Several farm structures are destroyed either through
neglect or to reduce property taxes. These include; ice house, corn
crib, granary, saw mill (attached to existing pump house), wagon house,
farm stable shed (attached to existing farm stable), coachman's house,
farm house, farm house privy, farm house shed, and wood shed.

**1966 --** House, land and all contents acquired by New York State
(through the efforts of Olana Preservation, Inc.). Telephones and
exterior security lighting system installed, TV antenna removed from
bell tower and storm window fabricated and installed.

**1969 --** The site's c. 1904 garage was located on another property
and returned to location next to studio wing. Boiler moved from within
house to this garage. New heating units installed throughout house.
Second floor occupied as office with collections being moved to attic
for storage.

**1971 --** Fire-resistant board installed in basement and exterior
woodwork (except cornice) repainted.

**1972 --** New York State undertakes restoration work including removal
of existing sheet metal roof and installation of flat-seam lead-coated
copper roof and flashing; railing on edge of piazza replaced, some areas
of slate roof replaced and crow's nest rebuilt with new wood.

**1973 --** Much of exterior woodwork is repaired or replaced including
decorative features and balustrades. Plumbing, heating and electrical
systems all replaced and several chimneys and brick piers of the studio
tower are rebuilt (with hollow-core bricks).

**1975-77 --** Skylight replaced and others repaired; in Room 218, a 5'
x 8' section of plaster ceiling was removed and replastered. Ceilings in
rooms 214, and 217 were replastered; rooms 305 and 306 floorboards were
removed to examine plaster of room 105 below. Rooms 105, 114, and 119
ceilings are removed, lathed, replaced and replastered. Stonework on
round veranda (studio wing) is entirely rebuilt.

**1978-1980 --** Studio tower rebuilt using all new materials (again
with hollow-core bricks) and steel bracing added. Bay window of guest
room rebuilt using new materials. In 1972 woodwork restoration is
repaired and repainted. A ticket counter is installed in laundry window
and to prepare for handicapped lift, floor is dug out, scraped flat and
brick floor is installed. Many of the first floor rooms are repainted
(color field only -- not stencils).

**1981-90 --** Chimney C rebuilt (hollow-core bricks), water tower
repaired and painted, handicapped accessible lift installed (from
basement to piazza), brick piers of studio tower rebuilt (hollow-core
bricks) and much of the wood replaced, stonework re-pointed. *Polykote*
applied to roof seams, tiles removed surrounding window W81 (thought to
be installed by Louis Church), acoustic tile ceilings, installed in
1960s, are removed from second floor and third floor rooms.

**1991-2000 --** Minor repairs and repainting (interior and exterior)
continue. Historic Structure Report completed for main house and
extensive exterior restoration projects identified. Some collections
removed from attic to NYS storage facility.

**2001-2005 --** Slate roofs repaired, gold-leaf slates restored to bell
tower roof, completed brick analysis and conditions report of all
ornamental and structural exterior, project to conserve original bricks
through injection of ethyl silicate into brick face completed over two
years, exterior woodwork repairs and repainting of all wood surfaces
completed, restoration (repainting) of original artist-designed cornices
completed over four years, restoration of artist-designed stencils on
piazza completed over one year, 11 of 12 chimneys completely rebuilt of
solid bricks, studio tower rebuilt using marine-grade lumber and solid
bricks completed over two year, minor repair to flashing and roof seams.
The Olana Partnership reconstructs missing wings and restores interiors
of Cosy Cottage to move offices from main house to the cottage.

**2005-2007 --** House closed to public for 18 months to install fire
suppression, climate control and enhanced security systems, which
includes lifting of floorboards, some drilling of plaster, some
electrical rewiring, installation of chiller and water units with attic
and basement of house, addition of electrical transformer sited behind
the carriage barn, stair to nursery (stored in basement since early
1900s) is returned to Church bedroom suite and opening to nursery
restored. Stencils in court hall and vestibule are conserved,
reproduction oriental carpet is made for studio and corridor,
reproduction wall-to-wall carpet is made and installed in court hall.
One quarter of original orchard is restored near Cosy Cottage
(surrounded by 15' deer fence) and 120 apple, pear and cherry whips are
planted. Existing apple and pear trees are pruned and age identified
with graft taken from apple tree found to be approximately 120 years old
and grafted to apple whips installed in orchard. Archeology and
structure reports on farm complex undertaken for reconstruction of
missing wagon house and shed (to house year-round education center and
public restrooms -- work begins June 2007 and will be completed in seven
months) and for the restoration of existing pre-1860, 1867 and 1899
barns (work to begin spring 2008 and continue through 2009).

**2.c. Boundary Selection:**

Located near the Hudson River about 20 miles south of Albany, Olana was
the estate property of Frederic Edwin Church, his wife Isabel Mortimer
Carnes and their children. Olana is today a New York State Historic Site
comprising about 373 acres. This total includes land not owned by Church
at the time of his death in 1900. The more recently acquired, contiguous
parcels were purchased by Church's son Louis during his lifetime and
later by New York State to provide additional buffer to the original
property and its historic artist-designed landscape.

The total area of 373 acres comprising Olana State Historic Site today
encompasses the Church-designed landscape, the main house with its
collection and the buffer to the original property. It is this 373 acres
that are being proposed as the boundary for the property.

Olana State Historic Site contains eleven historic structures, the most
prominent being the Persian/Aesthetic-style main house. The house is
itself a work of art; its design, furnishings, materials, decorative
elements, stenciled walls, and other features are all discussed at
length throughout this application. Most of the other buildings on the
property were erected under Church's supervision, notably Cosy Cottage,
designed by Richard Morris Hunt, and the stable, for which there are
drawings by Church.

The main house at Olana is an architectural and decorative focal point
for the property and simultaneously represents a blend of known design
references and elements executed directly from Church's own imagination.
The building, ultimately a vernacular structure, draws on sources as
diverse as Roman cathedral stairs, intricately tiled mosque interiors
and the colorful facades of the mountain hewn ancient city of Petra, all
seen first hand and recorded through sketches during Church's extensive
travels. Complex in both plan and decorative scheme, the building uses
regionally available building materials such as limestone and brick to
illustrate more exotically grounded design elements.

In the design and building of Olana, Church did not adhere strictly to
accepted building practice, but forced materials to conform to his own
artistic sensibilities. Examples of this are most apparent in the
complex brickwork on Olana's facades, where Church uses this material in
unorthodox ways, such as stacking individual bricks to create a veneer
border on a corner of the building. Church carefully crafted designs
which worked well with the inherent widths and lengths of brick,
ultimately creating large scale and elaborate patterns made entirely of
brick, instead of using individual bricks to make an overall pattern in
the façade. Numerous elements taken from religious architecture find
their expression in a purely vernacular form on the building, and even
the local stone which forms the structure itself has been used in such a
way as to highlight a uniquely beautiful crystalline face, not commonly
found in other buildings made of the same material.

Feeling unencumbered by established precedents, Church designed a
building that is an intensely personal expression, serving as an
artistic exercise for his own enjoyment, drawing upon many sources, but
used for his own creative devices.

Olana's impressive collections include paintings, sculpture,
manuscripts, photographs, correspondence, decorative arts, household
furnishings, farm implements and vehicles. Frederic Church and his
family assembled the majority of these approximately 40,000 objects
between 1860 and 1964. The collection reflects their wide-ranging
aesthetic, intellectual and religious interests; foreign travels, and
life on a working farm.  At the heart of the collection are 701 oil and
pencil sketches and finished works by Church. In addition, there are
several hundred architectural sketches, stencil designs and stencils by
Church that directly relate to all parts of the main house.

Other nineteenth-century artists represented in the collection include
Thomas Cole, Martin Johnson Heade, Charles deWolff Brownell and Camille
Pissarro. Frederic Church's collection of Old Master paintings, amassed
over the artist's entire adult life, are today still displayed in the
artist's original hanging plan. This collection is an excellent
illustration of American 19^th^ century taste for collecting 16th, 17th
and 18th century European works.  Olana's collection is rare in that it
remains intact, in situ and represents the collecting vision of one
individual. Many of these works were loaned in 1873 to the Metropolitan
Museum of Art\'s first exhibition of Old Master paintings. The Olana
collection contains works by sixteenth-century Italian master Pietro
Perugino, seventeenth-century Dutch painter Jacob Vinkboons and
eighteenth-century Mexican painter Andreas Lopez, among others and is
further enhanced by supplemental materials such as letters, historic
photographs and receipts which trace the genesis of the acquisition of
this group of paintings. Church also accumulated a large collection of
prints after American contemporary artists such as John Kensett, Thomas
Cole and Jasper Cropsey, and European painters as diverse as Claude
Lorrain, Rembrandt van Rijn, and Henri DuJardin.

Olana's historic landscape, comprising 250 acres, was designed by
Frederic E. Church. It includes two entrances, lengthy carriage drives,
miles of additional pleasure drives, a lake, parkland, woodland, and a
vibrant farm. The result is one the last remaining Picturesque
residential landscape garden designs in the United States. The landscape
is a work of art, a consciously designed composition that serves as the
setting for extensive views and for the overall experience of anyone
traversing the site. These views are an important element of the site's
significance but are not included inside the proposed boundary.

Certain views from Olana are integral to the integrity and uniqueness of
the site. When Frederic Church developed the house and property at
Olana, the views stretched in every direction as far as the eye could
see. Because the main house was built on cleared land that had been used
for farming at the top of the hill, during Church's lifetime, the
landscape and house offered 360 degree panoramic views of the Hudson
River, Catskill Mountains, and Berkshire and Taconic ranges. These views
were a significant part of the design of the property and were the
principal subjects of many of Church's sketches. However, in planting
thousands of trees and in the design of the openings in the house,
Church framed the views he thought most important. Today the views he
framed are substantially protected by a combination of conservation
easements, State-designated parkland, the State Open Space Plan, State
laws protecting Scenic Areas of Statewide Significance ("SASS"), and
local zoning laws.

Some of the most significant views from the property are the views of
the Catskill Mountains to the west and southwest, views that Church
framed with the windows of the main house. These mountains were the
inspiration for Church and other members of the Hudson River School. The
mountains themselves are protected by State law. The "Catskill Park"
includes all lands located in the counties of Greene, Delaware, Ulster
and Sullivan within the "blue line" of the park boundary. The Catskill
Park is both a park and a forest preserve, and the Department of
Environmental Conservation is authorized to acquire real estate in and
adjacent to the Park to protect the forest preserve. A 1983 amendment to
the laws protecting the Catskill Park was prefaced with these words:
"The natural resources and open space of the Adirondack and Catskill
Parks are unique and time honored assets of the state. For almost a
century constitutional safeguards for the state lands in the Adirondack
and Catskill Parks have preserved the wild forest character of lands
constituting approximately forty percent of the six million acres of the
Adirondack park and forty percent of the seven hundred five thousand
acres of the Catskill Park." These views are not at risk.

Views in the near and middle ground are protected by a more complex
combination of laws and easements. To identify the vulnerable areas of
the viewshed that need protection, in 2004 The Olana Partnership
completed a GIS topographical study of sensitive areas of the viewshed
in a 360 degree radius. As a first screen, we eliminated any areas
beyond four miles on the assumption that development at that distance,
unless massive in scale, would be difficult to see and would not impair
the view. New York State and organizations devoted to land protection
have therefore had a roadmap from which to work and have succeeded in
protecting a large portion of our most sensitive views.

The views looking south and southwest within several miles of the
property boundary are largely intact today because New York State and
Scenic Hudson (a land preservation organization in the Hudson Valley)
have either purchased land outright or purchased conservation easements
totaling several hundred acres. The immediate views to the east and
south east are also fairly well protected because of a number of
conservation easements acquired through the Columbia Land Conservancy,
though there are a couple of vulnerable spots which are being actively
pursued. The northeastern views are partially blocked from the house
today by woods planted by Church, but they are visible from Cosy
Cottage. That view was the subject of a significant fight in recent
years as the possible location of a massive cement plant, a plan that
was defeated in large measure because of the protected status of Olana.
In the foreground the view is somewhat protected by the presence of the
Columbia Greene Community College. The northern views aren't visible
from the house and only from certain areas at the northern end of the
property; still certain parcels are protected thanks to conservation
easements by the Columbia Land Conservancy. To the west and northwest,
looking across the Hudson River, the most critical land on the east side
of the River is owned by the State and further north the River itself
protects the view from the most visible potential intrusions. It should
be noted that a power plant was sited in the northwestern view, but
because of the protections given to Olana, the owners were forced to use
another method of power to reduce the plume from the steam, and to
reduce the size of the stacks.

In terms of protective measures outside of outright purchase of land or
conservation easements, the State has identified the views from Olana as
Scenic Areas of Statewide Significance. There are two consequences of
this designation. First, it gives acquisition of land and conservation
easements the highest priority in the State's Open Space Plan. We expect
this to result in continuing acquisitions by the State in the future.
Second, any private development in a SASS must undergo a more stringent
standard of review, implemented in part by the requirements of the State
Environmental Protection Act. Finally, although the Town of Greenport
does not have zoning, the Town of Livingston to the south does, and has
zoned the land in the viewshed to the south for rural residential use.

**Criteria 3a.ii:**

The main house and the designed landscape that comprise Olana serve as
quintessential examples of an original synthesis of developments in
architectural decoration, use of building materials, use of decorative
motifs and landscape design. Drawn from numerous international and
domestic sources, this synthesis simultaneously reflects 19^th^-century
design ideas and also illustrates innovative applications of these ideas
in ways that are unique to Church's personal genius. The result is a
singular tour de force, clearly a reflection of his personal artistic
innovation, but also an homage to the human capacity for creative and
artistic endeavor over the centuries, in all corners of the globe.

While Olana as a total entity serves as a representation of certain
ideals, the main house alone conveys important concepts relating to
building design and decoration. The house, conceived before the
Churches' trip to Europe and the Middle East, was to transform as
Frederic and Isabel were exposed to centuries of architecture and
design. As Church studied the buildings in Alexandria, Beirut, Damascus,
and Rome, he began to imagine how to translate the floor-plans, colors
and patterns into a "modern" home for his family. The result is truly an
amalgam: a doorway sketched in Jerusalem would become the inspiration
for the master-bedroom window; the designs found on decoratively tiled
Mosques would be developed into stenciled cornices; Roman steps would be
carefully measured for recreation as the main staircase and ancient
stone walls would insure that the new Church home would be built of
stone. All of these ideas would find a place in what is, in essence, an
Italianate Villa, the style sweeping the Hudson Valley in the late
19^th^ Century.

For the desired effect, Church was fearless in his innovative
combinations of various traditional techniques. Inspired by an Owen
Jones pattern and the wooden screens he would have seen throughout the
Middle East, Church graces the Court Hall at Olana with his own
invention: a window composed of two sheets of glass, one clear and one
amber, that serve to sandwich a piece of cut black paper. The end result
is the illusion of a wooden screen and the promise of constant golden
light. To reflect light and possibly to mimic some of the Islamic inlaid
metal or wood objects Church would have encountered, the doors at Olana
were stencil with metallic paints. Tiles from Spain, Germany and Mexico
frame the fount door and many of the windows. Mosaic tile work, not
common in America but prevalent in the Middle East, accent the arched
East Parlor windows. Carved wood elements over windows on the building
exterior emulate terra cotta tiles and cast iron decoration found on
brownstones in New York. Green Chinese tiles form balustrades for tower
rooms and Japanese teapots serve as finials for the "Crow's
nest"---innovative locations for these objects. All of these examples
serve to illustrate Church's interests in diverse cultures and his
ability to weave these concepts into his Hudson River home.

Inside his home, Church was to be on the cutting-edge of an
international style. The Centennial Exhibition of 1876 is thought to
mark the beginning of the Aesthetic Movement in America. The
Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition and catalogue *In Pursuit of
Beauty* focuses of the Centennial Exhibition as exposing Americans to
exotic cultures and fostering the American apatite for exotic objects.
Church began building his home in 1870, and by the time of the
exhibition had already created possibly the first great Aesthetic
Movement home in America. His time in London might have exposed him to
the British Aesthetic Movement and he might have heard about or visited
the aesthetic home of British artist Frederic Leighton. But long before
the Centennial Exhibition, on his voyage to Europe and the Middle East,
Church began purchasing Persian rugs, Islamic metal work, and Middle
Eastern costumes and continued to amass Oriental rugs, Chinese
porcelain, and Middle Eastern armor when he returned home. Some items
were bought by an agent in the Middle East and some purchased from
purveyors in New York City.

The house is the jewel in the landscape, and it is both a focal point
and a viewing platform. A 19^th^-century visitor would have glimpsed the
house at strategic points from the entrance drive as they wound through
the property. And then, from the house, the visitor would have gazed out
over the foreground fields and planted trees to the Hudson River and the
Catskill Mountains beyond. This is still possible today.

Church served on the Central Park Committee and would have been exposed
to the ideas of the English landscape tradition though the work of
Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux. Working with these ideas Church
planted trees, designed carriage roads, and created a pond, transforming
Olana into a landscape of his own---a man-manipulated three-dimensional
landscape that summarized the best of Church's world just as his
paintings summarized exotic locales like South America. Church planted
trees to frame views as he often included framing trees in his oil
paintings. A vista of the Catskills was a perfect background for any
foreground Church could create by turning a swamp into a lake or adding
a carriage road to lead the eye.

All of what Church learned about composing a landscape from his mentor,
Thomas Cole, and from viewing the paintings of seventeenth-century
French landscape painter, Claude Lorrain, come alive in the property.
The carefully ordered transitions from foreground, middle-ground and
background through pictorial framing devices that are found in Lorrain's
work, and which influenced subsequent generations of landscape painters,
find their corollaries in the carefully planned plantings at Olana.
These plantings visually lead to the pastoral farmlands on the property
and beyond it, as well as to the majesty of the river and mountains in
the background. The result is a carefully executed idealized landscape
wrought by Church's own hands, but firmly rooted in landscape painting
traditions. Likewise, the manner in which Church composed Olana,
highlights and serves as a viewing platform for sublimely dramatic
atmospheric and aerial displays which resonate back to any number of
paintings by Church's teacher, Thomas Cole.

Olana's landscape and all the elements within it are a fusion of
compositional elements found in landscape paintings; 19^th^-century
landscape design, and Church's own genius as a painter.

**Criteria 3a.vi:**

Church's life and work demonstrate, perhaps more clearly than any other
painter's of the time, how the mores and values of the era shaped
artists' points of view. Church's career is one of the most instructive
examples of how the major international scientific, philosophical and
artistic concerns of the first half of the 19th-century made their way
into landscape painting. Noted art historian Barbara Novak has commented
that Church was "a paradigm of the artist who becomes the public voice
of a culture, summarizing its beliefs, embodying its ideals and
confirming its assumptions." As Church's most personal and fully
realized artistic statement, Olana should also be seen as an expression
of that public voice.

Olana is more than an artist's home or personal artistic creation.
Indebted to important contemporaneous figures such as Thomas Cole, John
Ruskin, Edward Burke and Alexander van Humboldt, whose international
influence on art, literature and science are still felt in the world
today, Church and Olana are directly linked to the significant ideals
and beliefs set forth by these "great" men. Evident both in his home and
the several dozen masterful paintings that are still exhibited on its
walls, lies Frederic Church's own interpretation as he sought to create
a new style of heroic landscape that was exacting in its physical
details yet profound in its portrayal of the majesty of nature.

In the first part of the nineteenth century the German naturalist
Alexander von Humboldt's published works about the interrelationship
between the divine, science and art were some of the most widely read in
the world. Humboldt asserted that these connections were most evident in
nature and therefore the landscape painter was the most qualified to
record them in visual form for general public understanding.

Church studied Humboldt's writings and came to regard his landscape
paintings as an illustration of the panoramic art that Humboldt
advocated. In 1853 and 1857, Church went to Ecuador and retraced parts
of Humboldt's South American travels through the rainforest and the
Andes. Like Humboldt, he was deeply moved by the tropical vegetation and
the volcanic mountains of Chimborazo and Cotopaxi. In time, he painted a
large number of pictures dealing with tropical environments, of which
the most famous was *Heart of the Andes*, first exhibited in 1859 in New
York and shortly after in London.

At five-and-a-half by ten feet wide, *Heart of the Andes* portrayed a
complete Andean landscape, from tropical valleys through temperate zones
to Arctic pinnacles, and serves as a masterpiece artistic illustration
of Humboldt's assertion of a divine order and plan in the natural world.
While the large canvas now can be seen at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, it is at Olana that one can view the sketch in which the artist
worked on perfecting his composition. The work's tie to Humboldt is well
documented by Church himself, who sought to have Humboldt see the
painting as it went on tour throughout Europe, but Humboldt
unfortunately died only a week before the painting's arrival.
Undoubtedly anyone who saw the painting exhibited in Europe would have
immediately recognized its relationship to the renowned naturalist.

In evocative paintings like *Niagara* (1857), *Twilight in the
Wilderness* (1860) and *Cotopaxi* (1862), Church created a kind of
heroic landscape that was not only innovative in its expression of
American values and concerns but also able to reach beyond national
ambitions and appeal to a broader international audience. In this sense,
Church's work can be seen within the larger context of romantic
landscape painting put forth in the writings of English writer and
artist John Ruskin, who flourished internationally in the mid-19th
century. The situations and needs that stimulated Church were uniquely
American, but much of his creative vision and painterly results were
driven by these larger artistic, philosophical and scientific currents
that transcended national boundaries. Numerous examples of paintings
that illustrate this, such as oil sketches for iconographic American
images like *Niagara* and *Twilight in the Wilderness* and the more
exotic locales of Petra and the Parthenon, grace the walls at Olana.

As the first student of Thomas Cole, father of the Hudson River School
group of painters, Church can claim direct legacy to those ideals first
laid out in both the writings and paintings of Cole, who is also
credited with establishing the first truly American style of painting.
Paintings created by this group of artists thrust forward a national
identity for an emerging America forever linked with sprawling majestic
landscapes and natural landmarks, which rivaled the historic sites of
more established nations. "When Church looked at American nature, he saw
in it the destiny of the American people . . . American nature itself as
the embodiment of the fundamental strength of the American nation,"
remarks Franklin Kelly of the National Gallery of Art.

In the 19th century, nature was viewed as a manifestation of the divine,
and landscape painters provided the means to not only record all its
wonder, but to distill the quintessential attributes of the natural
world into composed canvases that would convey deeper meanings to the
viewer. Sketching directly from nature, these artists would choose
certain elements and combine them to create a new and more cohesive
representation of the world focusing on three major attributes first
laid out by the English writer Edward Burke: the beautiful, the
picturesque and the sublime. These paintings often contained highly
detailed foregrounds of botanical or geographical features, pastoral
middle grounds and bombastic backgrounds of theatrical sky effects,
dizzying mountains or rushing water---asserting at once the power,
beauty and order of the natural world. The implicit message of these
works was that nature represents a divine plan and order, and that
science and faith are linked. The desire to promote the emerging nation
as a *tabula rasa*, imbued with an untainted and inspiring landscape,
and a reflection of its virtue and promise was made manifest in the
landscape paintings created by Church, and also appears in Olana.

Church had to look no further than the painterly inspiration that lay
right outside his studio and front door. Visitors at Olana have the
unique opportunity to view works as diverse as spectacular sunsets, snow
scenes and orchards in springtime bloom, all of which were painted on
the property, recording various aspects of it. The public is then also
able to directly experience these sites as they walk through that same
landscape or the marvel at the views of those sites visible from the
porches and windows of the main house.

Olana itself has been described as a living landscape painting, one that
conveys significant beliefs about nature first conveyed in the canvases
produced by Church and other painters of the Hudson River School in the
19th century. These paintings sought to assert nature's significance
beyond the purely physical and link it with greater spiritual and
aesthetic meaning. Through their sweeping panoramas, artists of the
period illustrated the divine order of the universe as expressed through
nature, and the harmony that can and should exist between human
civilization and nature. In the miles of carriage drives and views from
the house that Church created as a means of experiencing the foreground,
middle-ground of his property and the vistas of the spectacular
background of the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains beyond, Church was
able to provide physical corollaries to the attributes found in many of
his painted works.

Church famously identified the majesty that he created at Olana as the
"Center of the World." As art historian Franklin Kelly has remarked,
"His favorite subject now became the view from his own land and he
sketched, on a daily basis and through the seasons, the panoramas of sky
and land that lay before him. With the high vantage point of Olana, it
was almost as if Church had taken physical possession of the floating
viewpoint prevalent in such major works as *The Heart of the Andes* and
*Twlight in the Wilderness*. Yet, whereas, the pictorial vantage point
of those great works provided the spot from which he could unfold, in
paint a composite view of the world, at Olana, he saw the same small
portion of the world again and again, but each day he saw it revealed
anew."

The artistic tenets and processes set out by Church and the Hudson River
School artists to establish a first truly American school of painting
still resonate with and inspire landscape painters throughout the world
to this day. The same views and landscape attributes that fascinated
Church in his paintings and in the creation of his home, serve as
inspiration to the numerous contemporary artists who annually dot the
landscape at Olana, paying continued tribute to the tradition of the
great American landscape and its place in pictorial art history.

Uniquely, Church's home and the paintings that hang within it are both
intricately linked with artistic and literary masterpieces, and can
simultaneously claim artistic mastery in their own right.

Ultimately, Olana serves as a place where artists and other visitors can
come to be inspired by unparalleled natural beauty. The artists of the
Hudson River School reveled in and glorified the wonders that existed in
their immediate surroundings---in their own backyards. In Olana, this
statement becomes quite literal. For close to four decades, Church was
inspired artistically by his own property. His surroundings were crafted
by his creative genius, informed by the great artistic and literary
minds of his age, and served to inspire his paintings and other artistic
pursuits. In his property, the ideals of the Hudson River School become
manifest, and serve as a bridge to the past. In its preservation, Olana
serves as a modern-day muse for artists and other visitors who continue
to be moved by its beauty and grandeur.

**3.b. Statement of Outstanding Universal Value**:

When Church purchased the top of the hill in 1867 and decided to build a
larger home than "Cosy Cottage," the small wooden cottage that served as
the Churches' first home on the property, a drawing by William Morris
Hunt may depict his initial idea---a French Renaissance style chateau.
In 1870 Church, working with Calvert Vaux, began building a Persian
Castle. Why Church switched architects is conjecture, but why he decided
on a Persian Castle is documented by his letters home from Europe and
the Middle East.

The architecture from ancient to modern (in this case 19th century) in
Alexandria, Beirut, Damascus, Jerusalem and Rome refocused Church.
Church brought home to America a taste for Islamic architecture and art
that manifests itself in his home in arched windows, a minaret and a
central court. Olana is one of the earliest examples of the Islamic
influence in America.

The Churches' biblically guided tour of the Middle East, motivated by a
need to connect with the sites of Christian history, brought them into
contact with Islamic architecture. And in addition to witnessing the
monuments of the Islamic world first-hand, books on Persian
architecture, notably *Les Art Arabes* and *Les Monument Modern de la
Perse* that are still in Olana's collection today, testify to Church's
continuing fascination with the architecture of the Middle East.
Patterns inspired by plates from both *Les Art Arabes* and *Les Monument
Modern de la Perse* serve to unite the interior and exterior
decoration--- anchored by the spandrels in the Court Hall, where the
original painted stencils have been carefully preserved.

Not just a copyist, Church was inspired by these designs but applied
them in his own way with his own flavor, often altering the material and
colors to suit his personal aesthetic. Hundreds of architectural
sketches by Church illustrate his virtual transformation into an
architect as he worked and re-worked elements as varied as stair rails
and stencil designs. The designs that in the Middle East would have been
executed on a white background in shades of blue and turquoise with
accents of red, become purple, yellow, salmon and violet with accents of
gold and silver. In the end the decorative schemes at Olana find roots
in Islamic culture but are transformed by Church in an incredibly
innovate way.

Through paintings like *Niagara* and *Twilight in the Wilderness* Church
celebrated the greatness of America; with Olana he chose to pay homage
to Islamic design in his own home. Church's 1874 *El Khasné, Petra*, on
view in Church's Sitting Room, has been interpreted as a metaphor for
Olana. The carved façade in the ancient city of Petra was thought in the
19^th^ century to be a treasure house, and Olana built of stone was
Church's treasure house for his family, paintings and collections. A
home that through arched windows captured the view west to America's
Promised Land, yet has roots that travel east to draw inspiration from
the Islamic world and the cradle of civilization.

**3c. Comparative Analysis:**

"Church's Olana is justly renowned as the finest surviving artist's
studio-house from nineteenth century America" concludes William Rhoads
in his essay *The Artist's House and Studio in the Nineteenth-Century
Hudson Valley and the Catskills*. While other artist's homes exist, it
is a confluence of factors that make Olana unique. Church's creation---a
Persian castle in a landscape of his design and housing a collection
that reflects his diverse interests. Olana is the home and landscape of
Church's own design and a source of artistic inspiration for Church, an
internationally recognized painter.

In the 20th and 21st centuries, Church's international significance as
an artist has been documented in numerous exhibitions, essays and books,
including some that look beyond American art or place American art in a
world context. The exhibition (and the catalogue) *New Worlds From Old:
19th Century Australian & American Landscapes,* a joint venture of the
National Gallery of Australia and the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford,
Connecticut, compared Frederic Church and other Hudson River School
artists to the 19th century landscape painters of Australia. This
groundbreaking exhibition explored the differences and similarities of
these traditions that grew from European landscape painting, and then
developed further, reflecting the natural wonder of the two countries.
Numerous Church paintings were selected for inclusion: *Niagara* (1857),
*Natural Bridge, Virginia* (1852), *Coast Scene, Mount Desert* (1863),
and *West Rock, New Haven* (1849).

Church was also very well represented in *American Sublime: Landscape
Painting in the United States 1820-1880*, organized by Tate Britain for
an international audience to illustrate the importance of this period in
American painting. This exhibition was met with rave reviews.

Today, Church is represented internationally in such major museums as
the Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid; *South American Landscape* (1856) and
*Tropical Landscape* (1855) and the National Gallery of Scotland,
Edinburough; *Niagara Falls, from the American Side* (1867).

Olana is the creation of Church's extraordinary artistic mind. It allows
the visitor to experience Church's world*. "Artists' houses that have
survived the vicissitudes of history and the neglect of time more or
less intact are all too rare,"* comments Gerard-Georges Lemaire in his
book *Artists' Houses*. Olana stands out in Lemaire's book of European
artist's homes as the one example chosen to represent the United States
of America.

One of the most renowned artist's home and studio in the world is Claude
Monet's Giverny. The gardens at Giverny fully represent Monet's vision
and keen interest in gardening; and most importantly still today allow
the visitor to experience Monet's painted landscapes by standing in them
or by standing in the very spot from which he painted. A visitor to
Olana today can also stand and look out at the view that Church painted
of the Hudson Valley and the Catskill Mountains. In contrast to Olana,
the house at Giverny was purchased by Monet---not designed and built to
reflect his thoughts on architecture. The concept for Olana grew in
Church's mind as he traveled in Europe and the Middle East: *The
Dwellings are often quite grand. They have a large room called the court
in the center often 30 x 50 feet or larger---and perhaps 30 feet high
and smaller rooms on each side...I have got new and excellent ideas
about house building since I came abroad,* wrote Church in Beirut. While
Calvert Vaux was the consulting architect, Church's approximately 600
architectural drawings attest to his interest and vision, as do his
letters: *I designed the house myself. It is Persian in style adapted to
climate and requirements of modern life---the interior decorations and
fittings are all in harmony with the external architecture*. Olana is a
synthesis of elements from many cultures that Church chose and
reorganized into his own creation.

Olana is more than an artist's home; it is a fabulous and innovative
example of an Aesthetic Movement house---an artistic movement that
celebrated diverse and exotic cultures. Other Aesthetic Movement homes
designed are no longer extant. Laurelton Hall, Louis Comfort Tiffany's
home on Long Island, is being featured in an exhibition at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art *Louis Comfort Tiffany and Laurelton Hall:*
*An Artist's Country Estate*. This exhibition helps to recreate the
magic of Laurelton Hall, which contained so many of Tiffany's designs,
and collections. Unfortunately, Laurelton Hall is no longer extant---it
was destroyed by fire. In the exhibition catalogue, Olana is compared to
Laurelton Hall: *"Few artists' houses---even in comparison with Frederic
Church's Olana, overlooking the Hudson River or Frank Lloyd Wright's
early house in Oak Park, Illinois*---*more fully express a single
artistic vision than does Tiffany's estate."* But Olana can be
experienced today; the home, the landscape and the collections are
intact. Laurelton Hall only exists in a few architectural fragments,
scattered collections and old photographs. Like Laurelton Hall, Olana
reflects Church's interests in a myriad of cultures: Mexican Baskets,
Japanese scrolls, a pre-Columbian matate, a society of the Cincinnati
plate, Indian painted chairs from Kashmir, Persian metal work, Old
Master paintings and Shaker rockers all work together in Olana to
demonstrate Church's international interests and taste.

Closer to Olana---in physical proximity and relevance---is Cedar Grove,
the home of Thomas Cole, which opened in 2001 as a historic house
museum. Church studied at Cedar Grove with Cole. It was this period of
study that served as Church's first introduction to the Hudson Valley
and the Catskill Mountains, a location that would inspire him to build,
not once but twice. Even though Cole died only a few years after their
initial meeting, the Churches and the Coles had already forged a
life-long friendship.

While the view from the porch at Cedar Grove is still a breathtaking
panorama of the Catskill Mountains, the land that would have extended to
the River is now a 20^th^-century suburban development. The original
contents of the house were disbursed by 20^th^-century sales and only a
handful of items original to the house have been returned. Olana is
astonishingly intact with the house and grounds almost as Church left it
in 1900.

In October of 1885 Lizzie Champney wrote an article for Century Magazine
describing "The Summer Haunts of American Artists" found most striking
the "picket line of studios" bordering each side of the Hudson River,
ranging from the "imposing" residences of Church and Albert Bierstadt to
the more modes quarters of Thomas Cole and the "mere gyps booths, or
bivouacs in barns and venerable canal-boats which have outlived their
days of commercial usefulness and now luxuriantly devote their declining
years to Art." A visitor to the Hudson Valley today is able to make
further connections to the Hudson River School by visiting the
Newington-Cropsey Foundation comprising Jasper Cropsey's second home,
Ever Rest, and attached studio in Hastings-on-Hudson and then visit a
modern building housing a large collection of Cropsey's painting in a
gallery setting. Cropsey's first home, Aladdin, which he designed
himself, is no longer extant. Many of the 19^th^ century artist homes of
the Hudson Valley have been lost, making those that remain---especially
great examples like Olana---all the more important to America's cultural
heritage.

Olana is an outstanding example of an artist's home and Church was an
outstanding American artist---a combination that today draws visitors
from around the world.

**3.d. Authenticity / Integrity:**

While certain modern day changes to the historic fabric have been
necessary to accommodate visitor amenities and safety concerns, the
hundreds of acres, multiple buildings and thousands of collections that
comprise Olana remain authentic to Frederic Church's original vision.
The intact nature of Olana makes it unique among many other historic
sites open to the public.

The property today retains its original design, materials, workmanship
and setting. The property passed very quickly from Church descendents to
state stewardship, helping to insure minimal dispersal of and compromise
to the elements that constitute Olana. During the six decades of their
ownership, Church's heirs made only small changes to the house and
property. Many of these alterations are minor compared to the overall
historic fabric of the property, and can often be reversed without a
need for major recreation efforts. Examples of changes made by Church's
heirs include the enclosing of the basement area beneath the piazza (a
situation that remains today) and brick paving on the north side of the
house, which today serves as a handicap parking area. Lawn sprinklers
and connecting hoses were installed on the terraces to aid in
irrigation. A modern, 20th-century flower garden was planted, which has
now been restored to the original nineteenth-century plan designed by
Church.

Much of the historic landscape, including, the spring-fed ten-acre lake
remains as configured by Church. The rampant growth of vegetation, and
heavy rootstocks have raised the levels of this lake bottom. In 1996, a
major dredging operation was conducted. The wooded grounds, carriage
road, and views surrounding the lake remain reflective of the historic
intent and situation.\
\
Although a new asphalt road system was laid when the site was opened to
the public, efforts are made to have visitors follow a similar route
through the park to the main house, experiencing views of the lawn
terraces on the south side of the house en route, as was intended by
Church for his visitors in the 19th century. Ongoing replenishing of the
warm, reddish brown shale of the driveway and several paths is conducted
to maintain a historically accurate appearance.\
\
In accordance with responsible protection of the site, and its visiting
public, a number of incidental anachronisms such as small signs, metal
and wooden posts, a red fire hydrant, and wooden sawhorses aid with
plowing, irrigation, and the restriction of pedestrian access. The
former stable, just north of the main house, has been adaptively reused
to operate a visitors' center with gift shop, ticket counter, and public
restrooms.

A list of restoration projects has been provided in the original
application; a detailed chronology of the site's history and development
has been provided in Question 2.b. of this addendum.

A great deal of the restoration work has been performed in recent years
to mitigate inherent deterioration, reverse the effects of natural
transformation, and provide ongoing site maintenance, in contrast to a
need to undo changes that were made to the site. When restoration and
preservation projects are undertaken, they are guided by the Secretary
of the Interior's Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties, as
well as internal standards set forth by the New York State Office of
Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. The main tenet of the
approach is the retention of historic fabric. Outright replacement is
avoided unless it is deemed absolutely necessary for the continued life
of the building. In most instances "reversibility of process" is also
sought, keeping restoration, conservation and preservation efforts in
line with current field philosophies. Primary and secondary research is
always conducted, proposed work reports are written, and the work itself
is scrupulously recorded for future reference.

Many of the sketches, letters, and other documents in Olana's collection
provide precise historical guidelines that are referred to when
undertaking restoration and preservation projects. Much time and expense
is expelled to achieve historical accuracy in every way possible,
including the production of materials, re-creation of colors and
patterns and repair. The extensive details of the brick restoration
project have been put forth in Olana's application. The same scrupulous
research is conducted, study reports assembled and intensive labor
performed for each major project. We hope the details of this example
will inform the panel of the particular considerations that arise and
the approach we consistently take to retain the authenticity and
integrity of the property.

Olana is Fredric Church's greatest work of art, and its stewards strive
to maintain, preserve and restore it to the exacting elements so
carefully specified by the master painter himself.

**5.b. Protective designations**

***Olana has been owned by the State of New York since 1966 and is
operated as a State Historic Site.*** This ownership and designation
provide the highest degree of protection for this resource. Although the
property is operated though a cooperative agreement with The Olana
Partnership, the State of New York is responsible for the maintenance of
the facility and the care of all collections. Olana is considered to be
one of the very finest resources in the State Historic Site system, and
the likelihood of the property ever passing out of state government
ownership and protection is nil.

***Olana, because it is on the National Historic Register, is subject to
the State Historic, Preservation Act (SHPA), Parks, Recreation and
Historic Preservation Law Article 14, and its implementing regulations
at 9 NYCRR Part 428.*** These laws require all state agencies to protect
New York State's historic resources.

SHPA § 14.09(1) requires state agencies to consult with the Office of
Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation ("OPRHP") before approving a
permit for any private action:

\....concerning the impact of the project if it appears that any aspect
of the project may or will cause any change, beneficial or adverse, in
the quality of any historic, architectural, archeological, or cultural
property that is listed on the national register of historic places or
property listed on the state register or is determined to be eligible
for listing on the state register by the commissioner.

SHPA § 14.09(2) requires that agencies such as DEC work with OPRHP:

\... for the purpose of exploring alternatives which would avoid or
mitigate adverse impacts to such property consistent with the policy and
provisions of this article and other provisions of law relating to
historic preservation. To the fullest extent practicable, it is the
responsibility of every state agency, consistent with other provisions
of law, to avoid or mitigate adverse impacts to registered property or
property determined eligible for listing on the state register by the
commissioner.

***Catskill-Olana Scenic Area of Statewide Significance (SASS) 19 NYCRR
602.5(c), designated 1993.*** This contains regulations governing the
designation of scenic areas of statewide significance in the coastal
area of the Hudson River Valley. The Catskill-Olana SASS is one of the
designated areas.

***Olana, because it is part of the Catskill-Olana Scenic Area of
Statewide significance, is subject to New York's Coastal Management
Program.*** New York's Coastal Management Program (CMP), enacted in
1982, is the mechanism through which the Federal Coastal Zone Management
Act of 1972 is administered. When a proposed action requires a federal
permit, the action is subject to review by the NY Department of State
(DOS), which administers the NY CMP. The DOS must determine that the
action is consistent with the 44 policies in the CMP. The CPP includes
three policies which provide for the protection and enhancement of
Olana. Policy 23 requires New York State to protect, enhance, and
restore structures, districts, areas or sites that are of significance
in the history, architecture, archaeology, or culture of the State, its
communities, or the nation. Policy 24 provides for the designation and
protection of Scenic Areas of Statewide Significance. Policy 25 requires
that proposed actions located outside a designated SASS must protect,
restore or enhance the overall scenic quality of the coastal area. The
policies call for agencies to determine if a proposed action would
impair scenic quality.

***Olana is subject to SEQR***---***Environmental Conservation Law (ECL)
Article 3-0301(1)(h) and ECL Article 8 State Environmental Quality
Review Act, ("SEQR") and SEQR regulations.*** ECL § 3-0301(1)(h)
requires DEC to "\[a\]ssure the preservation and enhancement of natural
beauty and man-made scenic qualities."

The State Environmental Quality Review Act, ECL Article 8, ("SEQR")
provides that "objects of historic or aesthetic significance" are part
of the environment to be protected under SEQR. ECL § 8-0105(6).

The SEQR regulations at 6 NYCRR § 617.11(c) provide that:

No involved agency shall make a final decision to \... approve \...an
action that has been the subject of a final EIS, until\... the agency
has made a written findings statement.

***Olana is a NYS Open Space Plan priority project.*** The State
Legislature, in 1993, created the State Environmental Protection Fund
(EPF), which among several other environmental purposes, provides funds
for the acquisition of priority projects identified in the New York
State Open Space Conservation Plan (the Plan). The EPF is now funded at
\$225 million annually, and provided \$50 million in 2006 for
State-level land acquisitions identified in the Open Space Conservation
Plan.

***Olana is designated as part of the Hudson River Valley National
Heritage Area (1996).*** Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area.
Title IX. Public Law 104-333. Recognizes the importance of the Hudson
River Valley and assists communities within the boundaries in
preserving, protecting and interpreting the area.

#### *Olana is designated as a community that is part of the Hudson Valley American Heritage River (1998)*. *GSA Executive Order 13061: Federal Support of Community Efforts along American Heritage Rivers*

\(a\) The American Heritage Rivers initiative has three objectives:

natural resource and environmental protection, economic revitalization,

and historic and cultural preservation.

***Olana is within the Hudson River Valley Greenway area (1991).*** The
Hudson River Valley Greenway Act was created to facilitate the
development of a voluntary regional strategy for preserving scenic,
natural, historic, cultural and recreational resources while encouraging
compatible economic development and maintaining the tradition of home
rule for land use decision-making.

***Olana is designated as a National Historic Landmark (1966).***
Section 110(f) of the National Historic Preservation Act requires that
before approval of any Federal undertaking which may directly and
adversely affect any National Historic Landmark, the head of the
responsible Federal agency shall, to the maximum extent possible,
undertake such planning and actions as may be necessary to minimize harm
to such landmark, and shall afford the Advisory Council a reasonable
opportunity to comment on the undertaking.

> Code of Federal Regulations\
> Title 36 Parks, Forests, and Public Property\
> Chapter I National Park Service, Department of the Interior\
> Part 65---National Historic Landmarks Program

The purpose of the National Historic Landmarks Program is to identify
and designate National Historic Landmarks, and encourage the long range
preservation of nationally significant properties that illustrate or
commemorate the history and prehistory of the United States. As part of
these regulations, The National Park Service is required by statute to
monitor the status of NHLs and to report back to Congress and the
Advisory Council periodically. Finally, the NHL Bulletin indicates that
NHL designation is a recognized criterion in selecting properties for
nomination to the World Heritage List.