Yes, as unbelievable as that may seem in today’s real estate market, such was the dictate given in the 1800s in New Rochelle when it was decided to develop some 70 acres of farmland, woods, orchard and un-drained marshland what was the then the outer edge of New Rochelle in Westchester County.

It is always interesting to find out how an area was developed. And New Rochelle’s Historic District is no different. In the early 1800s, an insurance company found that it had inherited through foreclosure, some 70 plus acres of land, and was then faced with the predicament - “what do we do with it?” The insurance company contemplated personal sacrifices in order to escape from the heavy tax burden of the property. They had thought to create small city lots but the grading of that would have been too expensive, and they didn’t know whether there would be interest in residence properties there, but with mounting interest charges, they realized that some form of action was required. It was decided to convert the land into a park, a well thought out community where there would be standards of size, and so they consulted with a landscape architect, Nathan P. Barrett, and civil engineer, Horace F. Crosby whose determinations were that if additional monies were spent to create the community, then success would surely follow. The cost at that time was reputed to be about $75,000 and it was believed that much money had been saved by allowing the natural rock formations to remain where possible. Quite astutely, they realized that the businessmen would wish easy access to the trains, and so rather than have a central entrance on North Avenue to the park and community, they utilized the southwest corner which would offer the most direct route to New York.