The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-03-18
HUDSON CASTLES M-THE AIR.
QUEER PROJECTS STARTED IN
THE HIGHLANDS FOREST.
Boss Tweed's Mountain Park-Dunder-
berg's Spiral Railway and Hotel-Fine
Roads Leading NOwhcrc-Deauty OF n
Little known Region Near the City.

NNVOH UphoN ~ AA0
proposed teroentennial celebration.
Castles In the air?" asked some one.
"They were doubly that, answered the
first speaker. "They we're all designed
for mountain tops or slopes. Also they
were the substance of things hoped for
"To come down to plain prose, did you
ever hear Of the many strange money
making projects Of the Hudson River
mountains2 Boss Tweed was responsible
for one OF them.
1T was in the trap rock hills, extending
from the Palisades near Sparkill, N. Y,
northward through Hook and Ball noun
tains and High Tor to Haverstraw-the
section which the State is now considering
as an addition to the Palisades park. Far
up on the side Of South Mountain, above
Piermont, there is q curious, grass-grown
road. Like the Uganda Railroad in Africa,
made famous by the sarcasm Of Sir Harry
johnson, 1t leads from nowhere to no.
where
st Is noteworthy not only because OF
the beauty Of rock and wood through
which 1t winds for four or five miles, and
the views 1t offers, but also for the sub
stantial character Of it's building. 1t has
been abandoned for years, and was never
fully completed, yet to-day only one great
rocky obstruction prevents the passage
Of a carriage its entire length. Tweed,
says local tradition, built this road, con-
templating the development of n great
residence park. He also laid out q wind
ing drive to the mountain top, where, from
a fine log tower, moss-grown and worm
! eaten, but still stable, one may look across
West chester county and half way down
Long Island Sound. With his downfall
the work stopped.
Further north, where the Highlands
begin, lie buried, on Dunderberg Mountain,
the hopes and money invested in an ambi
tious scheme Of improvement. Thousands
OF dollars were sunk before the project vas
finally given up.
"A fortune had previously been sunk
at the base Of the mountain in searching
for Capt. Kidd's treasure. The second
money making scheme was to build a mon
ster hotel on the summit Of Dunderberg.
Il was proposed to connect the hotel with
the West Shore Railroad by a ~switohback
gravity railroad, oiroling the mountain
again and again and afording splendid
outlooks in every direction.
$50 far did the work progress that nearly
the entire roadbed for the railway was
graded. Traces of this work may be seen
from river steamers even now. Bids were
submitted for powerful steam engines to
operate the cables which were to haul the
cars to the summit after their trip by gravity
down the long slopes Of the mountain.
Work on the great hotel was about to start.
Then came the financial panic Of the early
'90s.
six inch trees now grow over the track
bed on the summit.
"The failure Of an undertaking quite diff
ferent in character is recorded in the forests
diagonally across the river. Between Mani
tou Mountain and Anthony's Nose on the
eastern shore, travellers by boat will re-
member a picturesque brook which tum-
bles into q tiny, cove. This Is called the
Broecken Kill and rises far back in a wild
swamp said to be infested with rattlesnakes.
Should one care to explore this swamp by
following up the mountain stream-a charm
ing ramble-he will be astonished, just about
the time he is wondering II he is not lost
in the wood, to come upon a broad, splen-
did roadway.
Its graded, we'll rolled surface is macad-
amized, or at least looks so; its retaining
walls, high and broad, are built with care;
it Is protected by a fence, painted and Of
squared timbers, and is drained by cutters
Of Belgian blocks. Except for some slight
growth Of underbrush 1t looks as though 1t
might nave been built within a year. 1t is
much older than that.
Not a wheel track marks its surface.
Follow it north and you will reach a noun
tain road leading to Garrisons. Follow it
south a long distance and you will come
to q halt against the rocky face OF Manltou.
1t does not end abruptly. 1t peters out,
Like Nessmuk's trail, II. degenerates into a
path, gets tangled in the underbrush, be-
comes a shadow, runs up a tree, and dis
appears into @ knothole;
'"This splendid road, already costing
thousands Of dollars. was laid out as a
noble driveway from Garlisons to the State
camp near Peekskill. Two miles of pre-
c~ipitous rocks still separate 1t from it's
goal. Who fathered the scheme and why
did it fail? Some persons blame politics,
but for the most part people don't know
the road is there.
always attract attention, was in danger
last year Of becoming the site of a sani-
tarium. 1t was proposed TO locate there
the much m%Rligned State hospital for con-
sumptiyes. The whole countryslde about
Peekskill, five miles away, rose In wrath
and the hospital went else where.
Sew ever ascend the mountain. With no
path to the top it still remains in the phrase
ology of the Revolutionary commlttee, on
the Hudson Notifications: A steep prom
ontory, inaccessible to anything but goats
and men very expert in climbing.
"A worse fate than a lungers' retreat
threatened the Highlands near here not
long ago, when Elijah II. came up the
river searching for a site for an Eastern
Zion City, and was reported to have de-
cided upon Highland Lake, a beautiful
sheet of water which nestles like an Adiron-
dack pond In the side Of Bear Mountain.
That danger passed, and then it WAS learned
that a church association had purchased
the ground for camp meeting purposes.
Many good people thought that but little
better, but the property has returned to
private hands.
aAn engineering work Of great importance
was planned at this point of the river, being
nothing less than a double tracked cantilever
railroad bridge to cross the river in a single
epan, Consid cradle work has been PER-
formed, although it all happened nearly a
generation ago. Before the Poughkeepsie
bridge was built, excavation was begun
for the piers Of this structure, and the EVIL
dence OF this may be seen in the scar near
the base OF Anthony's Nose.
Five miles inland, in the heart OF the
highlands, in q region Astounding in lakes,
near the entrance to a curious hole in a
mountain side, lie dozens Of small cars,
rotting on improvised tracks. On the
other side OF the mountain is another curious
hole and more rotting cars. These holes