Hendrick Martin House facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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Hendrick Martin House
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East elevation, 2013
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 Location in New York
Location in the United States
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| Location | Red Hook, New York |
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| Nearest city | Kingston, New York |
| Area | 7.5 acres (3.0 ha) |
| Built | 1750 |
| NRHP reference No. | 07000776 |
| Added to NRHP | August 2, 2007 |
The Hendrick Martin House is a historic home located in Red Hook, New York, in the United States. It's a stone house that was built in two main parts during the mid-to-late 1700s. In 2007, it was officially added to the National Register of Historic Places. This means it's recognized as an important historical site worth protecting.
Some people believe this house is the oldest one in the town of Red Hook. Hendrick Martin, who might not have been the very first owner, was from a German family who settled in the area. The older parts of the house show building styles from Germany. These styles are not as common in the Hudson Valley as Dutch ones. Later parts of the house mix in designs from other cultures living nearby. Over time, the house changed owners. The most recent owners have worked hard to fix it up. They have made it modern while also bringing back its original look.
Contents
Exploring the House and Its Land
The Hendrick Martin House sits on a piece of land about 7.5 acres big. It's on a dirt road called Willowbrook Lane. This road is about 1,000 feet (300 meters) from a main road, U.S. Route 9. The house is in the town of Red Hook, New York. A small part of the property is actually inside the nearby village of Red Hook.
The land around the house is gently hilly. To the east, you can see open fields and the Catskill Escarpment across the Hudson River. There's a small pond and an old farm road between the house and a stream called the Saw Kill. This stream forms the eastern edge of the property.
The house is built into a gentle slope. This means the basement floor is visible from the back of the house. The current owners have added a small garden on the southwest side. This garden is a new addition and not part of the original historic listing.
Outside the House
The house is shaped like a rectangle. It is about 49 feet long and 33 feet deep. It looks like it has one and a half stories, but the exposed basement makes it feel like more. The walls are two feet thick and made of local stone. Larger stones are used at the corners to make them stronger. There's also a wooden addition on the front (east side) covered in wooden siding.
The roof is covered in asphalt shingles and slopes down on the sides. Two brick chimneys stick out from the middle of the roof. On the front of the house, there's a main door in the center. It has two modern lights next to it. On each side of the door are two windows with wooden shutters. Three small windows with pointed roofs, called dormer windows, stick out from the main roof above.
The north side of the house is all stone. It has two windows on each floor. The south side is stone up to the roof. Above that, it changes to brick. There's a door on the west corner with wooden stairs leading up to it. Next to it is a modern glass room, like a sunroom, and another window.
On the back (west side) of the house, there are two more doors. One leads to the basement, and the other goes to the first floor with wooden stairs. You can see a clear line in the stone wall next to the first-floor door. This line shows where the original part of the house ends and the newer part begins.
Inside the House
When you enter the main door, you step into a central hallway. On one side is a stone wall. On the other side, there's a wall with a hidden staircase leading to the basement and attic. The floors are made of wood. The ceilings have wooden beams that you can see. Some of these beams were smoothed down to make more space. There's a large living room to the north and two smaller rooms to the south.
In the living room, there's a big brick fireplace. It has a special design called a Rumford fireplace, which helps it heat a room well. The fireplace mantel, which is the shelf above the fireplace, is in an old Greek Revival style. It has thin columns and a wide, plain top. The other walls in the room are covered with plaster over the original stone.
The larger of the two southern rooms also has a fireplace, but it's simpler. Next to it is an original wooden cupboard. Its doors were made by hand and hung with old iron hinges. A door on the east side of this room leads to a small bathroom in the front addition. In the smaller room to the west, the ceiling beams were left in their original, rougher state.
The basement also has a central hallway. The large space on the north side is used as a kitchen. Its fireplace has a brick firebox and a large wooden beam above it. The ceiling beams in the kitchen are also original. In the south room of the basement, where the house's heating system is, there's another fireplace. Next to it is an original brick oven for baking.
Upstairs, the attic area is used for bedrooms. The ceilings here follow the shape of the roof. You can see a slight change in the floorboards upstairs. This matches the seam in the stone wall downstairs, showing where the house was expanded. There's also evidence of an older smoke hood for the large downstairs fireplace. The north bedroom shows where a staircase used to be on that side of the house.
History of the Martin House
The Martin family were likely among the German Palatines. These were people who left their home region in Germany and moved to London in the late 1600s. They were fleeing wars, like the Thirty Years' War and the Nine Years' War. About 30,000 people from this area went to London. In 1710, the British government decided to help some of them move to other parts of the British Empire.
One plan was to send these refugees to the Hudson Valley in America. The idea was for them to produce things like tar and pitch, which were used to build ships. However, the plants needed for these products didn't grow well in the cold winters of New York. So, after a year or two, the plan was stopped. But the settlers stayed. They saw that New York had good farmland. Some moved to other areas, but many stayed along the Hudson River. They started farms next to the Dutch and British settlers already living there.
Among those who came to the Hudson Valley in 1710 were Johan Heinrich Mertens and Catherine Esenroth. They got married in West Camp, across the Hudson River from Red Hook. Their first son, Hendrick, was born there five years later. In 1736, Hendrick married Elizabeth Emmerich. At that time, they lived in Kaatsbaan, also in Saugerties.
An old history book from 1882 suggests the Martin house was built as early as 1730. However, records show that all four of Hendrick Martin's children were baptized in Kaatsbaan, the last one by 1743. This suggests the family didn't move across the river before that year. In 1751, the official paper for the land where the house stands was recorded. So, it's likely the house was built closer to 1750.
When it was first built, the house was only the section north of the current main entrance. It had just one room on each floor. This design was common for other German stone houses built around the same time in the area. Examples include the Stone Jug in Clermont, New York and the Kocherthal House in West Camp. All three of these houses were also built into a slope, so their basements were partly visible.
Other features, like the original fireplaces, were also found in Dutch and Belgian-influenced houses in the area. This shows how different building styles mixed together.
The Martin family grew and became successful. By 1770, they needed more space. They decided to expand the house. This was different from other German-built houses, which often didn't get bigger. The Martins followed a Dutch building custom. They extended the house sideways instead of adding a new story or a separate wing. They also added a wooden section to the front, which had a porch. The new fireplaces in this section were built in English styles. This shows how different cultures influenced the house's design.
In his will, Hendrick Martin divided his property between his two younger sons, David and Gottlieb. By the 1790s, records show that Henry, the oldest son, was living in the original house. Gottlieb lived nearby in a newer house that is still standing today.
It's not clear who owned the house for much of the 1800s. But around 1810, the original fireplace mantel in the main living room was probably replaced with the one you see today. The 1882 history book claimed the house always stayed in the Martin family. However, records from that time show that a different family, the Travers, lived in the older house. The Martin family member, Edward Martin, seemed to be living in the newer house Gottlieb had built.
By the 1940s, photos show that the front porch had been closed in. This gave the house its current look. The Martins had sold the house by then. It passed through several owners, and sometimes it wasn't kept up very well. At the end of the 1900s, the current owners bought it. They spent ten years fixing it up and restoring it. After all their hard work, the house was added to the National Register of Historic Places.
