MAVA_Farm Complex_RFP_Attachment E_Agricultural Management Guidelines - Martin Van Buren National Historic Site.pdf

“The Whigs would hardly believe that a much larger portion of my time is taken up with devising ways & means to multiply the quantity & improve the quality of manure than in forming political plans or any such matter.”

— Martin Van Buren, 1843

Agricultural Management Guidelines

Martin Van Buren National Historic Site

Prepared by

Alexandra von Bieberstein, Historical Landscape Architect

Margie Coffin Brown, Historical Landscape Architect

Jennifer Hanna, Historical Landscape Architect

The Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation

National Park Service, Boston, Massachusetts, 2018

Agricultural Management Guidelines, Martin Van Buren National Historic Site

The Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation promotes the stewardship of significant landscapes through research, planning, and sustainable preservation maintenance. The Center accomplishes its mission in collaboration with a network of partners including national parks, universities, government agencies, and private nonprofit organizations. Techniques and principles of preservation practice are made available through training and publications.

Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation

National Park Service

15 State Street, 6th Floor

Boston, MA 02109 www.nps.gov/oclp/

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Bieberstein, Alexandra von, author. | United States. National Park Service. |

Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation (U.S.)

Title: Agricultural management guidelines, Martin van Buren National Historic

Site / prepared by Alexandra von Bieberstein, Historical Landscape

Architect, Margie Coffin Brown, Historical Landscape Architect, Jennifer

Hanna, Historical Landscape Architect.

Description: Boston, Massachusetts : The Olmsted Center for Landscape

Preservation, National Park Service, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2018037776

Subjects: LCSH: Van Buren, Martin, 1782-1862--Homes and haunts. |

Agriculture--Environmental aspects--New York (State)--Martin Van

Buren National Historic Site. | Farm management--New York (State)--Martin Van

Buren National Historic Site. | Martin Van Buren National Historic Site

(N.Y.)

Classification: LCC S589.757.N7 B54 2018 | DDC 630.6809747/39--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018037776

Publication Credits: Graphics from sources other than federal repositories may not be reproduced without the permission of the owners noted in the captions. Other information in this publication may be copied and used with the condition that full credit be given to the authors and publisher. Appropriate citations and bibliographic credits should be made for each use.

Cover Image Source: Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation

Title Page Image Source: Roxbury Farm

Table of Contents i

Table of Contents

FOREWORD v

PROLOGUE vii

INTRODUCTION 1

Setting 2 Methodology 3

HISTORICAL OVERVIEW 5

HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE OVERVIEW 11

EXISTING CONDITIONS 13

AGRICULTURAL MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORK 17

BEST MANAGEMENT PRACTICES 27

Six Primary Goals of Management 28

Infrastructure 40

ii

Operations 55

AGRICULTURAL FEATURE GUIDELINES 59

Vegetation 71

Views 76

Table of Contents iii

ENDNOTES 91

REFERENCES 97

APPENDICES 99

Conservation Easement 109 iv

List of Illustrations v

List of Illustrations

INTRODUCTION

0.1 Fields, Roxbury Farm, 2014 3

HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

1.1 Voorman Map of Kinderhook, New York, 1805 5

1.2 Upjohn Rendering of Van Buren Mansion, circa 1849 6

1.3 Entrance to mansion, Wagoner ownership, circa 1913 7

1.4 Aerial photograph of upper terrace farm fields, 1978 8

1.5 Aerial photograph of farmland, 1948 9

EXISTING CONDITIONS

3.1 Vegetation at Lower Pond, 2014 14

3.2 Goats feeding at Roxbury Farm, 2014 15

AGRICULTURAL MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORK

4.1 Management Zones, 2015 20

BEST MANAGEMENT PRACTICES

5.1 Sustainable Agriculture Matrix, 1999 27

5.2 Adaptive Management Flow Chart, 2015 29

5.3 Soil Management, adding compost, 2014 30

5.4 Soil Management,soil sampling and analysis, 2014 31

5.5 Soil Management, tilling the fields, 2014 32

5.6 Soil Management, crop rotation, 2014 34

5.7 Soil Management, mitigating erosion, 2014 35

5.8 Water Management, crop diversity, 2014 38

5.9 Water Management, irrigation techniques, 2014 39

5.10 Infrastructure, Meyer Farm Complex, 2014 41

5.11 Infrastructure, Livestock Fencing, 2014 42

5.12 Infrastructure, Lower Farm Road, 2014 42

5.13 Infrastructure, Storage of Chemicals, Meyer Farm Complex, 2014 47

5.14 Pest Management, pest infestation on crops, 2014 48

5.15 Pest Management, weeding in Fields, 2014 49

5.16 Pest Management, barriers in farm fields, Roxbury Farm, 2014 51 vi

5.17 Control of Farm Access, Meyer Farm Complex, 2014 53

5.18 Control of Farm Access, National Park Service Signage, 2014 54

5.19 Operations, Harvest Lanes, Roxbury Farm, 2014 56

AGRICULTURAL FEATURE GUIDELINES

6.1 Historic Lower Farm Road, view southeast, 2018 60

6.2 Historic Lower Farm Road, through Roxbury Farm fields, 2014 61

6.3 Upper Farm Road, view northwest, 2014 62

6.4 Historic Upper Pond, 2018 63

6.5 Historic Lower Pond, 2018 64

6.6 Lower Farm Complex Pond, 2014 65

6.7 Kinderhook Creek, 2014 66

6.8 Agricultural Ditch, 2018 67

6.9 Little Pond, 2018 68

6.10 Historic Farm Cottage, 2014 69

6.11 Shed, on Lower Farm Road 2018 70

6.12 Meyer Farm Complex agricultural buildings, 2014 71

6.13 Meyer Farm Complex greenhouse, 2018 72

6.14 Roxbury Farm fields, crop variety, 2014 72

6.15 Historic Vegetated Escarpment, 2018 73

6.16 Field boundary vegetation, Roxbury Farm, 2014 74

6.17 Spruce and fir plantings, 2018 75

6.18 Poplars along the escarpment, 2014 76

6.19 Figure illustrating views from the Upper Terrace, 2016 77

6.20 View of farm fields from the Upper Terrace, 2014 78

6.21 Van Ness Monument within farm fields, view north, 2014 79

6.22 Utility poles and lines in farm field, Roxbury Farm, 2014 79

6.23 Interpretive wayside exhibits near farm fields, 2014 81

6.24 Figure illustrating historic ditch traces, 2016 82

6.25 Red Hillside Barn Foundation Site, 2018 83

6.26 Black Hay Barn Foundation, 2017 84

6.27 Old Stone House Site, 2018 85

6.28 Site of Historic Dingman Fence, 2014 86

DRAWINGS

1 Agricultural Features 89

Foreword vii

Foreword

In 1839 President Martin Van Buren, in the midst of a tumultuous presidential term, purchased an agricultural estate near the town of his youth, Kinderhook, New York. He named the 220-acre landscape of rolling fields and woodland, “Lindenwald”, envisioning it as a place where he could pursue his interest in progressive agriculture. But “Lindenwald” was more than a gentleman’s farm.

At a time when the country was debating slavery, Van Buren used the estate to demonstrate that progressive agriculture techniques, such as soil fertility preservation and crop rotation, could support financial sustainability with free labor. He believed that progressive farming could make a positive impact on society and was critical to the future of American democracy. The distinctive character of the “Lindenwald” landscape, its rolling hills, narrow farm roads and swaths of dense woodland, is grounded in its historic association with the farming practices of President Van Buren.

This report facilitates active and productive farming of the landscape of

“Lindenwald” as a crucial element in preserving the inherent character of

Martin Van Buren’s “Lindenwald.” The Agricultural Management Guidelines for the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site outlines a strategy that protects resources, supports meaningful visitor experiences, and helps to perpetuate successful farm operations.

These guidelines are the product of a fruitful collaboration by staff of the Martin

Van Buren National Historic Site and the Northeast Region’s Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation, as well as Roxbury Farm Inc. They are offered as a helpful tool, assisting current and future managers to navigate future issues and decisions so that environmentally responsible, active agricultural operations may continue as a defining feature of this cultural landscape.

Megan O’Malley

Superintendent

Martin Van Buren National Historic Site viii

Prologue

Between 2009 and 2012, I had the privilege of working on an Ethnographic

Landscape Study for Martin Van Buren National Historic Site. This was part of a well-constructed sequence of studies supporting the park’s ongoing shift from interpreting Van Buren’s Lindenwald estate as essentially a historic house to recognizing it as a dynamic participant in the past and present farming economy of the Hudson Valley. My study was built in large part on a 2004

Cultural Landscape Report produced by the Olmsted Center that documented the agricultural uses of Lindenwald’s fields over many centuries. These and other projects in turn supported the development of the 2016 Treatment Plan whose supplemental guidelines for agricultural management are contained in this volume.

Both painstaking and remarkably quick, the process of reenvisioning Lindenwald has presented an extraordinary opportunity to integrate landscape preservation, historic interpretation, and contemporary use of land as a resource for food production. This effort is exciting in itself for the way that it addresses long-standing concerns in historic preservation about relevance and the relationship of past and present. But it takes on added urgency in a moment when many park publics and stakeholders are “connecting the dots” among a host of issues that food and farming are linked to: the rapidly changing climate, our continued dependence on fossil fuels, widening economic disparity, increasingly polarized ideas about the role of government in American life, and much more. Food and farming are not necessarily central to all of these questions, but they do provide an exceptionally accessible entry-point for considering the tangle of problems that we face in the present while helping to ground present-day debates in the longer trajectories and broader contexts that historic places and narratives can give us.

That labor of grounding is not a simple one. It requires confronting some of the big contradictions in our food system and our economy—for example, how the combination of agricultural overproduction and low food prices make it nearly impossible for most farmers to recover their costs of operation, or how a system that produces such abundance also contributes to disparities and deficiencies that leave many Americans hungry on a daily basis. For great majority of us who are not farmers, tackling these questions means entering into issues that were once familiar to most people but are now like a foreign language.

I admit that when I began to wrestle with this task myself, I did not expect the little-known eighth President of the United States to be such a useful guide.

But Martin Van Buren’s story turns out to be an exceptional starting-point for x unpacking these paradoxes and complexities. Far from being a bucolic retreat from partisan politics, Van Buren’s farming was a direct extension of his career, which was rooted in both a Jacksonian attempt to democratize political life and a

Jeffersonian belief in land ownership and farming as cornerstones of the republic.

Van Buren’s own single-term Presidency foundered largely on the economic panic caused by one of the first major crashes of the still-young market economy, a harbinger of the volatility that has created intractable dilemmas for farmers.

In addition to serving as the base for Van Buren’s two subsequent Presidential campaigns—the final one on the Free Soil Party ticket in 1848—Lindenwald was a test site for ideas about soil improvement and farm productivity that Van Buren was eagerly absorbing from the agricultural press of his day. Those ideas were linked in turn with concerns about the viability of farming in the industrializing northeast, where rural areas were losing population to growing cities and an expanding, contested western frontier. The soil of this old Dutch farm, whose fields had likely been cultivated by indigenous farmers long before Europeans arrived, was literally remade—in ways that we now think of as “sustainable” or

“regenerative”—by a gentleman farmer who was urgently trying to articulate a vision for his country’s future.

The potential for illuminating this piece of the American past is enormously enhanced by the present-day contexts in which the park sits. Enthusiasm for locally- and sustainably-grown food continues to increase, and the Hudson

Valley, with its rich farmland and proximity to the huge urban consumer base in New York City, is an important node in what is sometimes termed “the food movement.” As in Van Buren’s day, contemporary concerns about food and farming intersect with hotly contested ideas about health, labor, land ownership, economic disparity and volatility, and the proper relationship of private enterprise and public oversight of agriculture and the resources we depend on for food and water. These questions are not simply similar to those of the mid-nineteenth century: in many cases they are exactly the same debates, which have never been fully resolved.

Martin Van Buren’s Lindenwald gives us a site where we can begin to grasp what has been at stake in those debates over almost the entire trajectory of the nation’s history, and where we can see—and see ourselves as participants in—contemporary attempts to address the challenges of farming in a market-oriented economy. The land under our feet at Lindenwald is literally a record and an artifact of those efforts over time, right up to and including the present day. The project of preserving, interpreting, and cultivating these fields presents a remarkable opportunity to bring visitors, neighbors, partners, and stakeholders into experiences that are at once civic, educational, and deeply personal, embedded and embodied in a richly resonant place.

The agricultural guidelines that follow are an innovative effort to stabilize this ambitious vision in management policy. The vision itself is for a seamless integration of land management, stewardship, and interpretation, but of course there are inevitably gaps in the seams where the differing demands of historic preservation, working agriculture, and civically-engaged interpretation make themselves felt. In recent years, the National Park Service has experimented with ways of closing those gaps at some of the many other parks and heritage areas that include agricultural land, and this new document builds on those initiatives in many ways. But it also goes beyond them in its exceptionally detailed, thoughtful approach to spelling out precisely what this kind of integration might mean on the ground—and in the ground.

Those at the park and the Olmsted Center who have been involved in creating the guidelines recognize this as an ongoing process rather than a final word—and indeed that is one of the most exciting aspects of what may appear at first to be a rather workaday manual for helping park managers understand the needs of an agricultural partner. By embracing an open-ended, dynamic, collaborative model for land management, these guidelines help to frame the stories of Martin

Van Buren and Lindenwald as part of the much longer, ongoing history of food, farming, and all that they connect to—an unfinished story which concerns and involves us all.

Cathy Stanton, PhD

Senior Lecturer, Tufts University

Introduction

Introduction

Perpetuating agriculture as an active and productive use of the landscape is key to preserving the inherent character of Martin Van Buren’s “Lindenwald.” Martin

Van Buren’s political beliefs emphasized the importance of agriculture to the future of American democracy. Therefore, supporting sustainable active farming on the Lindenwald landscape is vital to the preservation and interpretation of the

Martin Van Buren National Historic Site.

The Agricultural Management Guidelines for the Martin Van Buren National

Historic Site outlines a strategy to protect resources, to support meaningful visitor experiences, and to help ensure successful farm operations. Within the approximately 285 acres of the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site legislative boundary, only 44.77 acres are held in fee simple by the National Park

Service. Roxbury Farm, a biodynamic farm operated as a community supported agricultural facility, currently leases 23.46 acres of this National Park Service owned land for agricultural purposes. Roxbury Farm also owns approximately

171 acres within the park boundary. Of the land owned by Roxbury Farm, 101.89 acres of farmland are protected by a conservation easement currently held by the Open Space Institute, which intends to donate the easement to the National

Park Service at a future date. The remaining parcels within the park legislative boundary, totaling about 70 acres, are privately held, except for a one-fourth acre parcel held by the Town of Kinderhook.

Within this milieu of land ownership and interests, the guidelines serve as a tool to help park managers perpetuate the historic integrity of Martin Van Buren

National Historic Site through support of agricultural pursuits by collaborative organizations, including Roxbury Farm. Recognizing that the goals of historic preservation do not always reconcile easily with the agricultural processes impacted by climate, pests, and market demand, this document integrates best agricultural management practices with national standards for the management of cultural properties. This document has been developed through collaboration by agricultural, nonprofit, and cultural resource professionals, who understand that the requirements and expectations of park visitors must be considered when defining the responsibilities of land owners and those engaged in agriculture on public land. Specifically, the guidelines are intended to:

• Serve as a platform for communication and collaboration for present and future land stewards.

• Present an approach for integrating best management practices for sustainable agriculture with the preservation of the historic setting of a nationally significant presidential home and farm property.

• Articulate a shared vision, recognizing the challenges of balancing resource preservation and active agriculture.

• Define historic farmland features and describe associated best practices for sustainable agriculture.

• Identify opportunities to expand visitor experience and understanding through partnerships and programs.

Perpetuating agriculture at “Lindenwald” is central to resource management and visitor experience goals at as articulated in the General Management Plan (2015) and the Cultural Landscape Report: Volume II Updated Treatment Plan and Record of Treatment for the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site (2016). Actively farmed acreage within the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site includes lands owned in fee simple by the National Park Service, lands under agricultural easement, and lands owned by others unencumbered by conservation easement.

While the guidelines included in this document could be applied to any actively farmed land within the park boundary, the primary focus is on National Park

Service lands and interests in lands under short-term special use permits, long-term agricultural leases, or conservation easements (DO-53, 10.4: Agricultural

Use).

SETTING

Lindenwald was the home of Martin Van Buren (1782-1862), the nation’s eighth president. Upon acquiring the property in 1839, President Van Buren managed it as a working, experimental farm. Continuing active farming within the park is key to effectively meeting park resource management goals and preserving the historic landscape character and historic setting surviving from the time of President Van

Buren’s occupancy (1841 - 1862). Martin Van Buren National Historic Site is located twenty miles south of Albany and two miles east of the Hudson River in

Kinderhook, New York. Located in the rolling farmland of Columbia County, the park lies between the Berkshire Mountains to the east and the Catskill Mountains to the west (Figure 0.1).

This document focuses on the agricultural lands under National Park Service fee-simple ownership, and land owned by Roxbury Farm Inc. subject to an conservation easement. All lands within this spectrum of legal interests fall within the authorized boundary of the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site. The

National Park Service preserves President Van Buren’s two-and-a-half-story brick mansion and surrounding acreage including a semicircular tree-lined entry drive.

Roxbury Farm utilizes the surrounding fields, most of which are actively farmed.

Introduction

METHODOLOGY

This document builds upon the 2015 General Management Plan for the Martin

Van Buren National Historic Site, as well as the Cultural Landscape Report for

Martin Van Buren National Historic Site , Volume II: Updated Treatment Plan and Record of Treatment published in 2016. The management guidelines are a product of multiple conversations with park staff and collaborators. Workshops attended by staff from the National Park Service’s Northeast Regional Office’s

Olmsted Center for Landscape Preservation, the Martin Van Buren National

Historic Site, and the owners of Roxbury Farm Inc. have been instrumental in defining sustainable agriculture and best practices. A major component of initial research involved the identification and analysis of relevant case studies, to better understand best management practices and to build off those employed by Roxbury Farm. In addition, information was gathered from various reference materials, as well as the reports and manuals of other National Park Service sites, educational institutions, and federal and state agencies involved with active agricultural management. To address the successful integration of park operations with agricultural operations, this document identifies the significance of the agricultural portion of the property, appropriate interface with park visitors, and recommends specific landscape management practices related to cultural resources, natural resources, visitor experience, interpretation, and recreation.

The report is organized into six sections. The first two sections provide an overview of the agricultural history and significance of Martin Van Buren’s historic farm within the context of the Hudson Valley region. The Existing

Figure 0.1. Active farming of the agricultural landscape contributes to the preservation and interpretation of the landscape’s historic significance

(MAVA, 2014).

Conditions section describes the ecological systems present on site. The

Agricultural Management Framework section describes the legal and regulatory basis of the guidelines, and outlines the agricultural management philosophy of the National Park Service and its multiple collaborators to align the cultural and natural resource management goals of a national park with the requirements of actively farmed land. The Best Management Practices section describes sustainable farming techniques and methodologies within the context of a

National Park Service historic site. The final section of this document identifies agricultural features, both historic and non-historic, and cross-references the management of those features to related best agricultural management practices.

This document was developed specifically for the collaborative management of the historic Lindenwald farmland, therefore specific guidance found here may not be applicable elsewhere. However, the collaborative and multidisciplinary approach used to develop the guidance may serve as a useful example to those involved in perpetuating sustainable agriculture.

Historical Overvview

Historical Overview

Prior to European settlement the Mahicans, part of the Eastern Algonquian, occupied the Hudson River Valley. In the 1600s, Dutch and English settlers transformed the Kinderhook landscape into a patchwork of working farms. The land that would later become Lindenwald was part of the Powell Patent of 1664, a portion of which was acquired by the Van Alstynes in the 1600s. The Van Alstynes constructed a stone house on the terrace above Kinderhook Creek. Peter Van

Ness purchased 260 acres from the Van Alstynes in 1780 and seventeen years later constructed a Federal-style brick house on the upper terrace by the Old Post Road

(Figure 1.1). The property passed to the two sons of Van Ness, who in turn sold

137 acres to President Martin Van Buren in 1839, a Kinderhook native who was then serving as the nation’s eighth president.

Van Buren named his estate “Lindenwald” and envisioned it as a place to pursue his interest in agriculture, as well as a place to receive dignitaries, politicians, and other guests. After a tumultuous term as President, including the Financial

Panic of 1837 and an extended economic depression, Van Buren lost his bid for reelection in 1840, forcing an early return to Lindenwald in 1841. As a figure of national importance, Van Buren sought recognition for his progressive management of Lindenwald as a model country estate and farm, emulating

Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello and Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage. Van Buren chose Lindenwald for its highly visible location on the Old Post Road and for its

Figure 1.1. The 1805 drawing on the

1762 Voorman Map of Kinderhook depicts the location of several buildings on what was to become the Van Buren property, including the mansion, outbuildings, and the Old Stone House in the lower terrace (MAVA).

distinction as the former home of Peter Van Ness, a member of an established

New York family.

While serving as president in Washington, D.C., Van Buren began improving the deteriorated property immediately after acquiring it by issuing directives to his foreman in Kinderhook. Stables, wood houses, fish ponds, and a hothouse were added in the early years, and improvements to the estate continued after his return to Kinderhook. He increased the size of the farm to approximately 220 acres by 1845 with the purchase of adjacent parcels, and built two large barns and a dwelling for his farm foreman. Intending the farm to be self-sufficient, Van Buren planted field crops, predominantly potatoes, hay, rye, corn, and oats, and tree fruits including pear and apple, to sell at market.

In creating a prosperous working farm, Van Buren’s property did not assume the highly designed and manicured appearance inspired by the popularity of Andrew

Jackson Downing and Alexander Jackson Davis’s adaptations of English pastoral landscape structures and garden designs. However, Van Buren did hope to portray the refined appearance of a country gentleman, fitting his station in life (Figure

1.2).1

Van Buren launched two unsuccessful campaigns to regain the presidency in 1844 and 1848. Throughout this time and the 1850s, Van Buren relished being “a farmer in my native town,” and kept busy managing the farm, writing his memoirs, and entertaining at Lindenwald until his death in 1862. He willed the property to his three surviving sons, although none chose to live at Lindenwald. His second eldest son, John, purchased the estate shares owned by his brothers in 1863 but did not occupy or improve the estate. After less than a year, John sold the financially burdensome property to Leonard Jerome.²

Figure 1.2. Circa 1849 Richard Upjohn rendering of the mansion, showing the 1850 improvements that altered the Georgian-Federal style home to an Italianate villa during Van Buren ownership, (Columbia Avery Library/

MAVA).

Over the next ten years, the property changed hands numerous times and suffered from absentee owners. This ended with the Wagoner brothers’ purchase of the 220-acre estate in 1874 and their subsequent forty-three year ownership.

Known locally as industrious and successful farmers, the Wagoners maintained the property well and managed the area immediately surrounding the home as mowed turf with a scattering of informally placed trees. They farmed the property intensively, as evidenced by their use of a portion of the front lawn as a corn field.

Along with several new buildings erected by the Wagoners, many of Van Buren’s farm buildings west of the main house remained in use during this period.

In 1917, the Wagoners sold the property in two parcels. They first sold 185 acres to Dr. Bascom Birney, retaining 36 acres on the southern end of the property.

The Birney family, of Yonkers, New York, purchased the farm as an investment but later occupied the property full-time. Several members of the Birney family held title to the property, but the longest term owner was Clementine Birney deProsse, who lived on the site with her family from 1930 to 1957. The Birneys and deProsses farmed the land throughout the 1920s and 1930s during a difficult economic period. Many of the aging agricultural buildings fell into disrepair at this time but the main house remained well-tended thanks to Clementine’s appreciation of the property’s historical significance (Figure 1.3).

Early in the tenure of the deProsse family, Clementine encouraged the federal and state government to acquire the property as a memorial to Van Buren, unsuccessfully proposing that the state use it as a summer residence for the

Governor of New York.

During the 1930s and 1940s enormous change occurred in the landscape. In 1930, the alignment of the Old Post Road was altered by the construction of Route 9H.

Figure 1.3. In this photograph dating from the Wagoner ownership, circa

1913, the entrance of the mansion is visible (MAVA).

The new road bed was located just east of Old Post Road, leaving a new triangular piece of land buffering the northeastern portion of the property. During the later years of the deProsse tenure, less care was given to the vegetation around the mansion, and shrubs, grass, and trees became overgrown. Deterioration of farm buildings, limited maintenance of orchards, and loss of old trees somewhat changed the property’s character. The deProsse family sold the farmland in 1946 to local farmer Dudley Ray Meyer, Jr., retaining thirteen acres and the mansion, where they resided until 1957.

Using farm tractors and earth-moving machines, Meyer made substantial changes to the farm to modernize the fields, orchards, fences, and buildings that had deteriorated over the previous twenty years. He removed hedge rows, cut down orchards, burned unstable buildings, enlarged drainage ditches, altered topography, and built new farm roads and barns. Meyer transformed his farmland, which until this time retained many character defining features from the nineteenth century. In 1957, Ken Campbell purchased the mansion and the surrounding thirteen acres from the deProsse family. There he operated an antique business out of the historic south gatehouse and new shop building located near the gatehouse.

In 1973, the National Park Foundation purchased the approximate thirteen-acre

Martin Van Buren mansion property from Campbell (Figure 1.4). The remainder of the Van Buren’s historic estate was then owned by two separate local farmers, and some acreage had been developed as a residential subdivision. A year later, the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site was established and the National

Park Service obtained the property from the National Park Foundation. The

Figure 1.4. Aerial photograph of the mansion and upper terrace farmland, 1978 (MAVA).

National Park Service emphasized the importance of the agricultural legacy for the Martin Van Buren property in its early plans to protect and interpret the property. Prior to National Park Service acquisition, Director George Hartzog noted the importance of preserving the agricultural land and the site’s scenic viewsheds, and preventing inappropriate development along Route 9H. Following establishment, the park completed landscape projects including the restoration of the formal entry drive and locust allée, replacement of aged white pines along the Old Post Road trace, and installation of screening plants around the visitor parking lot and park office temporary structure. During the 1990s, the National

Park Service prepared two cultural landscape reports on the mansion property, and one in 2004 that focused on historic agricultural acreage. ³

Following a boundary adjustment study in 2003 and the Omnibus Public Land

Management Act of 2009, the park authorized boundary expanded from 40 to approximately 285 acres to allow for the acquisition of lands that would facilitate protection of the surrounding property that was once part of the historic farm, and to protect the park’s western viewshed (Figure 1.5). Within the enlarged authorized boundary, approximately 44 acres remain owned in fee simple by

National Park Service; 18.24 acres are held in conservation easements; 171.21 acres are owned by Roxbury Farm Inc, with 101.89 acres protected under a conservation easement held by the Open Space Institute which is to be donated to

Figure 1.5. Aerial photograph of the farmlands and meadowlands encompassing the historic site, 1948

(MAVA).

the National Park Service at a future date. In addition, approximately 70 acres are privately held of which 7.64 acres are under conservation easement. A one-fourth acre parcel is owned by the Town of Kinderhook.

Within the expanded park administrative boundary, the former Van Buren property supports the missions of several organizations, notably the National Park

Service, Open Space Institute, and Roxbury Farm.

Historic Significance Overview

Historical Significance Overview

The Lindenwald Mansion and thirteen surrounding acres became a

National Historic Landmark in 1961 and was administratively listed without documentation in the National Register of Historic Places in 1966 with the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act. Documentation for the historic site was accepted by the Keeper of the National Register on February 8, 1980.

As described previously, Congress approved the expansion of the park’s authorized boundary in 2009 to include an additional 261 acres of land encompassing all of President Van Buren’s historic farmland northwest of

New York State Highway Route 9H and Albany Avenue (County Road 25) and additional lands intended to provide protection for its setting. On July 11, 2012, the Keeper accepted an amendment to the National Register documentation evaluating all resources within the expanded boundary. The amendment identified historic significance for a portion of the property, a 176.95-acre historic district under National Register Criteria A, B, C, and D in the areas of politics/ government, architecture, and archeology.

The historic district derives its primary significance under Criterion A and B at the national level in the area of politics/government for its association with President

Martin Van Buren (1782–1862) and his political career during the years between

1841 and 1848. During that period, Van Buren, who moved to Lindenwald after his single term as President of the United States (1837–1841), launched two unsuccessful but historically important campaigns to regain the presidency in

1844 and 1848.

The district is also significant under Criterion B as the only surviving property associated with the life of Martin Van Buren. Lindenwald, the only home that Van

Buren ever owned, represents the culmination of a remarkable political career that saw him rise from meager beginnings as a Kinderhook tavern-keeper’s son to become the eighth President of the United States. His subsequent development of Lindenwald into a country estate and working farm reflected his Jeffersonian beliefs in the value and virtue of agriculture to a democratic society.

Lindenwald is locally significant under Criterion C in the area of architecture as an important example of a Federal-style mansion that was redesigned by architect

Richard Upjohn in the Italianate-style of the mid-nineteenth century. The district is significant under Criterion D in the area of archeology and the subcategories

“Prehistoric” and “Historic-Non Aboriginal” as a property that has yielded, or may be likely to yield, information important in prehistory or history. Surveys and excavations conducted on the property to date have identified four sites that address substantive research questions regarding Native American usage of the land, Van Buren’s occupancy of Lindenwald, and development of the property by previous and subsequent owners.

The physical integrity of the landscape is evaluated by comparing landscape characteristics and features present during the two historic periods of significance

(1797, 1839–1862) with current conditions. Many of the landscape’s historic characteristics and features remain intact. The spatial organization of the formal mansion grounds, with the imposing home, semi-circular lawn, and gracefully curved entry drive, is still distinct from the open farmland west of the mansion.

Vegetation patterns remain similar through the restored black locust allée, mowed turf lawn, and cultivated acreage of the farm fields. The Italianate-style mansion has been restored and remains the focus of the historic core, as it was during Van

Buren’s time, and the extant south gatehouse contributes to the presentation of historic conditions. The Van Ness monument is still visible in the field to the west of the mansion, and one of the fish ponds remains. Importantly, the historic setting is largely intact due to the retention of views of the Catskill Mountains and the preservation of actively farmed land in the park’s viewshed. However, much has changed since 1862. Notably, many of the historic structures known to Van Buren are no longer extant, including all of the barns, the farm office, and the north gatehouse. This alters the spatial arrangement of the area behind the mansion that was once the center of the working farm. Other key features such as the orchards and formal garden are gone, further altering the character around the mansion. Additionally, the dense north wooded area, once Van Buren’s north orchard, encroaches on the formerly open yet organized landscape.

A more detailed summary of the property’s significance and integrity with respect to the National Register is contained in the 2012 National Register documentation for the property by the Public Archeology Lab.¹

Existing Conditions

Martin Van Buren National Historic Site, including farmland owned in fee simple by the National Park Service and land owned by Roxbury Farm, comprises the majority of the former historic extents of the Lindenwald property. The remaining approximately seventy acres are privately held of which about eight acres are under conservation easement. A one-fourth acre parcel is owned by the Town of

Kinderhook.

The historic site is located twenty miles south of Albany and two miles east of the

Hudson River in Kinderhook, Columbia County, New York. Less than thirty miles east of the Catskill Mountains and adjacent to Kinderhook Creek, the historic Lindenwald property features fertile soils, striking scenery, and a variety of habitats along a riparian corridor.

The landscape continues to be defined by its historically rural Hudson Valley setting, upper and lower river terrace topography, and the distant Catskill

Mountains visible in the park’s western viewshed. The surrounding woodland and farmland within the park’s nearly 300-acre authorized boundary remains undeveloped and actively farmed.

The park continues to preserve much of the original Van Buren estate within its boundary. Resources include the Lindenwald mansion, South Gatehouse, North

Gatehouse foundation, Farm Cottage, and the Farm Office site. A semi-circular driveway lined with locust trees leads to the 2.5-story brick Lindenwald mansion built in 1797 and enlarged by Van Buren in 1849 – 1850. A remnant segment of the Old Post Road is located near the east edge of the property. A portion of the circular front garden has been restored near the front entrance to Lindenwald.

Specimen trees continue to dot a well-manicured law as they did during the historic period. Remnants of Van Buren’s fish ponds remain. The approximate site of the carriage barn, located northwest of the mansion is marked with scattered foundation stones. In addition to cultural features, Lindenwald also possesses natural systems and features which influence the management of the agricultural lands. The following paragraphs describe these systems and features.

GEOLOGY AND SOILS

The geomorphology of the site is illustrative of the last Ice Age, when the area was flooded by the glacial Lake Albany. The lake drained about 13,500 years ago, leaving behind terraces and lake shore delta deposits of sandy loam in the

Kinderhook area. The Lindenwald property consists of two steps, a lower terrace along the creek and an upper terrace surrounding the mansion and extending to the Old Post Road. The lowest elevations of the lower terrace consist of muck filled swamp areas and seasonally wet meadows. The Kinderhook soils are deep and fertile due to the alluvial floodplains, which are replenished by periodic spring flooding. Germantown shale, conglomerate, and limestone lay to the north, east and west of Lindenwald, resulting in calcareous soils. East of the upper terrace, the land continues to rise, and the fertility of the soil diminishes.

WATER COURSES AND PONDS

Water courses generally flow southwest toward the Hudson River. Numerous tributaries including Kline Run, Valatie Kill, and Stuyvesant Brook flow into

Kinderhook Creek before it winds along the western edge of the Lindenwald property. A network of non-historic constructed ditches within the lower terrace of Lindenwald drain the wet meadows into swamps that seep into Kinderhook

Creek. Kinderhook Creek continues southwest to Stockport Creek, which flows into the tidal Hudson River. Within the Lindenwald property, five ponds hold water for most of the year. Upper Pond and Lower Pond, both part of a Van Buren area fish pond, are historic and contributing. The remaining ponds, collectively called the Lower Farm Complex Ponds, were constructed by Meyer after the period of significance.

HABITATS, FLORA, AND FAUNA

Due to its fertile soils paired with wet areas, the Lindenwald property contains of a mix of habitats. These include a predominance of upland meadow, some upland forest, an edge of hardwood swamp, pockets of wet meadows, vestiges of shrubby oldfield in transition between meadow and young forest, ponds, and sandbars.

Figure 3.1. Since Van Buren’s era, the farmland has been supported by natural and constructed water features, including the Lower Pond, Ongoing agricultural use of the property preserves the upland meadow habitat, which supports a mosaic of flora and fauna (Figure 3.1). 1

Plants inventoried on the property are a mix of native and introduced, naturalized and cultivated, non-invasive and invasive. A complete list is contained in

Hudsonia’s biological survey. Common plant species associated with the upland meadow include grasses and forbs, such as orchard grass, tall oatgrass, timothy, Queen Anne’s lace, and goldenrods. Trees found in the upland deciduous forest include black locust, black cherry, white ash, white pine, elm, and eastern hemlock.

A patch of forest by the southern swamp also contains bitternut, pignut, and shagbark hickories, plus American beech, black oak, and bladdernut. The swamp contains trees tolerant of flooding including red maple, green ash, slippery elm, yellow birch, black willow. Wet meadow areas too wet for cultivation contain purple loosestrife, goldenrod, and path rush. The shrubby oldfield area contains cottonwood, staghorn sumac, hawthorn, and multiflora rose. The constructed ponds contain abundant floating plants, such as watermeal and common duckweed.

The sandbar in Kinderhook Creek supports species such as silver maple, boxelder, sycamore, and black locust. Wetland areas contain plants typically associated with limestone formations and calcareous or circumneutral soils in the Hudson Valley, such as pale jewelweed (Impatiens pallida) and lakeside sedge (Carex lacustris).

A number of regionally and statewide rare plants in wetland areas including sedges (Carex squarrosa, lacustris, trichocarpa, grayii, and davisii), ostrich fern

(Matteuccia struthiopteris), false-mermaid (Floerkea proserpinacoides), and pale

St. Johnswort (Hypericum ellipticum).

Figure 3.2. Goats contribute to weed or invasive species management

Mammals observed on and near the Lindenwald property include white-tailed deer, striped skunk, river otter, long-tailed weasel, raccoon, red fox, coyote, muskrat, American beaver, woodchuck, meadow vole, star-nosed mole, eastern cottontail, gray squirrel, and eastern chipmunk. Additional mammal species likely on the property but not fully documented include opossum and several species of bat, shrew, mouse, vole, and squirrels. In addition, domesticated animals form an integral part of the agricultural experience on the farm. (Figure 3.2).

Numerous fish species reside in Kinderhook Creek. Amphibians recorded at

Lindenwald include four species of salamander, seven species of frogs and toads, snapping turtle, painted turtle, plus two species of snakes. Most were seen in and around wetland areas, though frogs and snakes are infrequently seen in the window wells of the mansion.

The open fields, water sources, coniferous shelter-belts, ditches, hedgerows support an array of bird species typically associated with fields, woodlots, thickets, swamps, and forest edges. The survey by Hudsonia between 2002 and

2004 documented 78 bird species as common, uncommon, or rare. Examples of common bird species include mallard duck, mourning dove, American crow, black-capped chickadee, American robin, gray catbird, European starling, common yellowthroat, song sparrow, and American goldfinch. Uncommon species observed include Canada goose, northern flicker, red-eyed vireo, blue jay, American tree sparrow, and chipping sparrow. Rarely seen species include great blue heron, green heron, great egret, American black duck, wood duck, osprey, American woodcock, spotted sandpiper, least sandpiper, and many more bird species. Twenty of the species observed on the property demonstrated breeding activities including singing, carrying nesting material, and carrying food for young.

The diversity and abundance of invertebrates is not fully documented for the

Lindenwald property. Species observed during the 2002-2004 biological survey included the American rubyspot, a rare damselfly; the checkered skipper, a regionally rare butterfly; a snout, another rare butterfly; tiger beetles; and phantom crane fly, an uncommon species that is locally distributed in the Hudson Valley that is associated with the wet, organic, calcarious or circumneutral soils.

agricultural Management Framework

Agricultural Management Framework

This chapter describes the management framework that has guided the development of the Agricultural Management Guidelines for the Martin Van Buren

National Historic Site. The management framework articulates the legal and regulatory foundation upon which the management of the short and long-term care of the cultural landscape of the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site is based. It describes the management zones defined in the General Management

Plan for the Martin Van Buren National Historic Site (2015), as well as the organizations and agencies that work with the National Park Service in the management of the agricultural lands. Finally, it outlines a strategy to facilitate effective communication and collaboration among organizations.

The agricultural management framework addresses agricultural land within three management zones, as defined in the General Management Plan for the Martin Van

Buren National Historic Site. The Historic Transition Zone, which encompasses the upper terrace fields and the Meyer Farm Complex, is owned in fee simple by the National Park Service. The Natural Resource Zone includes the riparian corridor along Kinderhook Creek, the Vegetated Escarpment, and wooded areas bordering the Upper and Lower Terraces. Land within the Natural Resource

Zone is owned by Roxbury Farm, and subject to a conservation easement held by the Open Space Institute. Finally the agricultural management framework addresses land within the Agricultural Zone in which the National Park Service currently possesses a legal interest, or may acquire a…