Historic Environments

The town of Poughkeepsie consists of a number of intriguing historical locations that pay tribute to the founder of Vassar College, Matthew Vassar. While the most obvious of these is his namesake college, two more of these places are the Poughkeepsie Rural Cemetery and Springside. Together, they provide compelling insights into the life and death of Mr. Vassar.

The Poughkeepsie Rural Cemetery, where Matthew Vassar is buried, has quite a stately entrance, with flowers lining the gates and an elegant sign. Inside, the cemetery is impressive due its 165 acres of sloping hills, neat tombstones, and scattered trees which overlook the Hudson River. While some of the tombstones have a monumental design that clearly belong to an era of the past, there are also plenty of tombstones that are from more recent times. Visitors should find the directions to a specific grave beforehand to avoid the hassle of getting lost in the seemingly endless number of graves and the slightly confusing roads within the cemetery. For instance, visiting the graves of Mr. Vassar and his wife, Catherine Vassar, is much easier with the help of printed directions. However, the Vassars’ graves are quite distinguishable from surrounding graves due to the massive egg-like design of a stone structure with VASSAR etched into the front of part of its square base.

This unique structure also includes carvings of both Matthew and Catherine’s names and the dates of their deaths. Interestingly, Mathew and Catherine’s actual graves are marked by smaller tombstones that are simply marked by M.V. and C.V. Each of these tombstones stands in front of the egg-shaped memorial and is surprisingly topped by a giant stone acorn!

While the spot is shrouded by a few overgrown trees, the unusual egg and acorn designs are likely to catch the eye of any passerby.

Another location that commemorates Mr. Vassar is Springside, which was previously Mr. Vassar’s home. Mr. Vassar purchased the property from the Allen family in 1850 and had the acclaimed landscape designer Andrew Jackson Downing redesign the place to accentuate the beauty of the natural landscape. Unfortunately, many of the buildings that existed during Mr. Vassar’s residence cease to exist. However, old drawings of those buildings are attached to posts at the approximate locations of those buildings along trails at Springside. This gives visitors a unique perspective on the shift from man-made to natural design over time. Despite this distinctive feature, Springside could be improved with better maintenance. A few signs of unkemptness at Springside are the lack of brochures, the overgrown look of some forms of vegetation along a trail, and a brick building that possibly has nails sticking out of its crumbling remains. Overall, though, Springside is well suited for hiking, running, or simply touring.

Together, the Poughkeepsie Rural Cemetery and Springside provide visitors with captivating snippets of Matthew Vassar’s life and death. Clearly, Vassar College is not the only place in the town of Poughkeepsie where Mr. Vassar left his mark!

Additional Resources

https://www.poughkeepsieruralcemetery.com/information.php

Home