Hours of Operation and Mansion House ToursMontgomery Place grounds are free and open to the public everyday from dawn to dusk. Mansion House tours are given seasonallyon Saturdays, usually beginning directly after Memorial Day andending mid-October. Schedules change from year to year; pleasecontact bard.edu/montgomeryplace for current information. No reservations are required and the cost is $10 per person.

About Bard CollegeBard College is a four-year residential college of the liberal artsand sciences with a 157-year history of academic excellence. Withthe addition of the Montgomery Place estate, Bard’s campusconsists of nearly 1,000 park-like acres in the Hudson River Valley.The College offers bachelor of arts degrees with nearly 50academic programs in four divisions—Arts; Languages andLiterature; Science, Mathematics, and Computing; and SocialStudies—and Interdivisional Programs and Concentrations. Bardalso bestows several dual degrees, including a BA/BS in economicsand finance, and at the Bard College Conservatory of Music,where students earn a bachelor’s degree in music and a BA inanother field in the liberal arts or sciences. Bard’s distinguishedfaculty includes winners of MacArthur Fellowships, NationalScience Foundation grants, Guggenheim Fellowships, GrammyAwards, French Legion of Honor awards, and Pulitzer Prizes,among others. 

Over the past 35 years, Bard has broadened its scope beyondundergraduate academics. The College operates 12 graduateprograms and has expanded to encompass a network of regional,national, and global partnerships—including dual-degreeprograms in four international locations; the Bard Prison Initiative,which grants college degrees to New York State inmates; and BardHigh School Early Colleges, where students earn a high schooldiploma and an AA degree in four years. Bard’s philosophy sets astandard for both scholarly achievement and engagement incivic and global affairs on campus, while also taking the College’smission to the wider world. The undergraduate college inAnnandale-on-Hudson, New York, has an enrollment of morethan 1,900 and a student-to-faculty ratio of 10:1.

As proprietor of Montgomery Place, Janet followed the conventionsof large estate owners in the Hudson Valley in the use of slaves asworkers. During her years at the property, New York was in a state-mandated period of gradual manumission of slaves. Janet’s personalpapers disclose that she bought a female slave, Katie, and her son,Alexander, in 1810. When Janet died in 1828, her younger brotherEdward Livingston and his wife, Louise, inherited the property. The1830 federal census shows that Edward had eight “free colored per-sons” living in his household. Since this was just three years after thestate completely outlawed slavery, some or all of these might havebeen Janet’s former laborers. Slaves worked as domestics, farm hands,chauffeurs, and craftspeople.

After Edward’s death a few years later, Louise, daughter Cora, and son-in-law Thomas Barton transformed portions of the estate from aworking farm into a showplace. Renowned architect AlexanderJackson Davis redesigned the house, adding new wings and porticosin classic revival style to suit prevailing Romantic sensibilities.Landscape designer Andrew Jackson Downing created plans for elab-orate flower gardens, several walking paths, rustic benches, and anarboretum. (Both Davis and Downing were also involved in the origi-nal design and layout of the Blithewood estate, now part of the mainBard College campus.)

In the 1920s, Violetta and John Ross Delafield (a Livingston descendent)inherited the estate. Violetta, a botanist, created multiple gardens,continuing the legacy of Janet, Louise, and Cora. In 1986, Livingstonheir John Dennis Delafield transferred the estate to Historic HudsonValley, in whose hands it remained until 2016, when Bard Collegeacquired the property and a new chapter began.

The LandscapeThe property’s basic layout and contours have remained constantthroughout most of the estate’s existence. Apart from formal gardensand manicured lawns, 45 acres of farmland and 235 acres of woodlandsstretch from the Hudson River to the front of the property on RiverRoad. Much of Downing’s original 19th-century design remains, as wellas gardens, water features, and trails from the early 20th century.Exceptional vistas include the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains,the rushing waters of the Saw Kill’s lower falls, and the 80-acre SouthWoods forest. Montgomery Place’s orchards and agricultural land areanother vital component of the site’s heritage and appeal. Theorchards are a cherished part of the local community, represented bythe popular farm stand on Route 9G.

Bard

MONTGOMERY PLACE: A DESIGNATEDNATIONAL HISTORIC LANDMARK AND SIGNIFICANT REPOSITORY OF HUDSONVALLEY HISTORY

An American TreasureMontgomery Place, a 380-acre estate adjacent to the main Bard Collegecampus and overlooking the Hudson River, is a designated NationalHistoric Landmark set amid rolling lawns, woodlands, and gardens,against the spectacular backdrop of the Catskill Mountains.Renowned architects, landscape designers, and horticulturists workedto create an elegant and inspiring country estate consisting of amansion, farm, orchards, farmhouse, and other smaller buildings.Montgomery Place was owned by members of the Livingston familyfrom 1802 until the 1980s.

The HistoryOriginally, the land was occupied by Native Americans who used it forhunting and harvesting wild foods. During the 18th century, Europeansettlers farmed the area and harnessed the power of the Saw Kill creekfor gristmills and sawmills. In 1802, 58-year-old Janet LivingstonMontgomery, widow of Revolutionary War hero General RichardMontgomery, purchased the land to create a fashionable countryhouse. In 1804–5, she built a Federal-style mansion on the property.Janet’s true passion was for plants and botany, and she established andran a commercial nursery for fruit trees, shrubs, berries, and seeds.

Bard College:The Montgomery Place Campus

The mansion’s Montgomery Room

bard.eduPhotos courtesy of Historic Hudson Valley. ©2018 Bard College. All rights reserved.

River Road (Route 103)ANNANDALE

Orchards

Farm Complex

Farm Stand

Parking

TheLake

VisitorsCenter

Arboretum

NORTH WOODS

BathHouses

PowerStation

TivoliSouth

Bay

Hudson River

LowerFalls

Pond

Mansion

RoughGarden

SquashCourt

FormalGardens

Greenhouse

CoachHouse

SOUTH WOODS

Ellipse

Saw Kill Creek

Saw Kill Trail

South Woods Trail

Saw Kill Trail

North

ENTRANCE

Bard CollegeMain Campus

Route 9G

The ArchitectureMontgomery Place has incorporated numerous styles of architectureover the years. The original Federal-style mansion was built by JanetLivingston Montgomery with help from her nephews, William Jonesand Lewis Livingston, who employed local laborers (including slavesowned by the family), stonemasons, and carpenters. The end resultwas a stucco-clad, rectangular, neoclassical structure. In 1841, Louiseand Cora, the next generation, discussed the transformation of themansion with the architect Alexander Jackson Davis, marking thestart of a program of design and construction that would span 30years. The mansion is considered Davis’s finest neoclassical countryhouse, significant for both its design excellence and its rarity. OtherDavis-designed buildings on the property include the Coach House,farmhouse, and Alpine-style Swiss Cottage. Davis’s original cottagedrawings are in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In 1839, Louise and Cora commissioned architect Frederick Catherwoodto design an opulent wood-and-glass conservatory. Andrew JacksonDowning designed formal garden beds and manicured paths tosurround the gothic revival-style conservatory, framed by a forest tothe north and an allée of locust trees to the south. From its constructionin 1840 until its destruction circa 1880, the conservatory was the mostcommanding structure on the Montgomery Place landscape asidefrom the mansion. In 1935, Violetta Delafield designed the first“wayside stand” for a garden club display and as a way to encouragelocal farmers to sell their produce and make roadsides more attractive.Eventually, it became a farm stand which still exists, selling theestate’s apples and other fruit.

Montgomery Place TodayMontgomery Place illustrates Americans’ changing relationship withnature and landscape over time. As the attitudes of the people wholived and worked there shifted, the estate changed from productivelandscape to ornamental showcase to recreational retreat. Today, theMontgomery Place setting functions as a microcosm of Americanlandscape history, from the early wilderness to its latest reincarnationas part of the integrated campus of Bard College. Bard is committedto conserving Montgomery Place’s significant historic and culturalassets as well as preserving its landscape and maintaining its publicaccess and farm.

For Your Safety and EnjoymentPlease help us maintain the beauty of these grounds by carrying outwhatever you bring in. Trash bins are located only at the Visitors Center.

Please do not disturb or collect our plants, animals, or rocks.

When walking the trails, please remain on the paths to assist us witherosion control and reduce incidents of Lyme disease.

The Saw Kill Trail and South Woods Trail have uneven terrain and areoccasionally steep and muddy. The West Lawn Trail features slopingterrain.

Pets are not allowed on the property.

Westward view of the groundsThe Coach House