Elixir Spring House has been welcoming visitors to the Mid-Hudson Valley since 1790, just as our family still does today.
About the elixir spring house
Welcome to the Beautiful Elixir Spring House, a Historic estate dating back to 1790 in the heart of the Hudson Valley. Set on 2.5 parklike acres with centuries old trees, there’s plenty of room to relax and enjoy the beauty of this area. Minutes to New Paltz, the Shawangunk mountains, wedding venues, restaurants, wineries, orchards and farms. Enjoy over 6,400 square feet, 14 private rooms(including two beautiful one bedroom apartments), and a total of 22 beds sleeping up to 37 guests. Three fully stocked kitchens(one gourmet) and a kitchenette will care for all your cooking needs. The Bridal Studio is perfect for hair and makeup or can be used as a multipurpose room for a group meal, work/meeting space or anything you need it to be. This stunning and unique property is the perfect place for wedding groups, family reunions, getaways with friends, corporate retreats and more!
The Elixir Spring House located in Clintondale, NY was built in 1790. It has a wonderful rich history from being a fruit farm, exporting water from the spring, being a large beautiful residence, a popular summer place for many boarders, an inn and a bed & breakfast.
Long the home of one of Clintondale's most prominent Quaker families, the Victorian edifice flourished as a resort during the late 19th and early 20th centuries but had lately fallen on Hard Times. Now rescued from abandonment, it is once again beginning to shine.
The removal of the portion of its verandah has revealed an extensive stone structure sitting beneath three stories of nineteenth-century additions and exposed a previous stage of its history that can forms its essential antiquity.
HISTORY of elixir spring house
An early postcard from the Elixir Spring house
An original elixir bottle found in the house
Early ledger from 1856
According to an early account, the first house on the site was built by Elias Ostrander, son of Wilhelmus Ostrander and Sarah Relyea, married in 1771. Although the Ostranders and Relyeas were originally Dutch reformed, they seemed to have assimilated with a prevailing Quaker community and joined the Society of friends like so many of the other inhabitants of this portion of Clintondale. The house and much of the land had become part of the extensive network of the Relyea family Holdings when in 1856 John Thorne purchased the Jeremiah Relyea Farm. His son, Solomon p., b. 1845, married Katherine M. Hasbrouck, B. 1844, daughter of Richard and Rachel Hasbrouck and the couple continue to live in the Thorne family house and carried on farming and fruit growing. Solomon enlarged his residence to its Ultimate Grand scale to accommodate summer boarders.
When in 1897, a mineral spring was discovered on his property, he started bottling the water, that he claimed was "particularly beneficial for kidney troubles and useful for other complains and is prescribed by physicians in the neighborhood" (New Paltz Independent July 30, 1897). Thorne change the name of his home/ boarding house from "Locus Farm House" to "Elixir Spring House."
Today, entering the foyer, the visitor is greeted by a grand three-story staircase, evidently created when the first floor ceiling was removed from the central portion of the Stonehouse to create a reception area. In the room to the right, however, the large beams and plank flooring on the ceiling remain as evident of that section's possibly pre-revolutionary age; sadly, it's old fireplaces have long lost their early form. Decorative elements such as a Japanese style rosettes carved in the stairway and Elsewhere on the front floor point to that resorts aesthetic movement inspired construction. The south-facing windows are converted to French doors that could open to The Veranda that formally extended along the entire front of the house.
The 1969 Junior League survey detail the following other features:
"10 Dormers, 25 rooms with 9-foot ceilings, 5 baths, 5 fireplaces with four original mantels. Most floorboards or wide except in four of the bedrooms. This ceiling beams are rough-hewn and exposed in the cellar and living room. The window panes are original with 8in to 20 in Wheels. The hardware is original. The walls are mostly 20 in stone. Some of the other notable features are: a dumbwaiter, very old barn, Carriage stop."
The very old barn across Crescent Avenue belongs to other owners. The back portion is a late three bay Dutch Barn dating ca. 1835-40. The addition fronting on the road is ca. 1870-90.
The famed spring, located Southwest of the barns, operated from 1900s to 1917. Its water was shipped to New York City and Europe. Today The Elixir Spring bottles are considered quite collectible.
Reposted, courtesy of the Wallkill Valley Land Trust