Haight family visits site of ancestor’s estate

By Ginny Privitar
GOSHEN — Recently, descendants of the Haight family of Goshen came back for a visit to the former 1800s family summer estate, now known to most as Salesian Park.
The extensive grounds formerly owned by the Salesian Order, and now owned by the village of Goshen, were once the summer home and estate of David Henry Haight of New York City. Haight was famous for building Manhattan’s St. Nicholas Hotel, a place that rivaled the Astor Hotel in luxury and high-society clientele.
The Haight family has been gone from New York State for decades. But on Sept. 9, four direct descendants came back for a visit and to see what had been done. The visitors included Barbara Haight Lawler, who grew up in Chappaqua, but has made her home in Colorado since the 1970s, along with her cousins: Ed Fiander, Christi Van Horn and William Ahlert. They were given a tour of the premises by members of the lodge.
“It definitely exceeded my expectations when I saw it," Lawler said. "When I first drove up, the grounds had been cleaned up so well and the outside of the building looked good.”
Inside, she was equally pleased with the transformation. It is now a building the family — and Goshen — can be proud of once again.

The property, also known as the Haight-Brown estate, after its two most famous owners, was originally owned by the Carpenter family (and four others). In 1834, it was passed through the Carpenter line down to Mary Ellen Haight, the wife of David Henry Haight. The original mansion reportedly dated to 1840. Over a period of years, D.H. Haight purchased surrounding land. The mausoleum was built in 1872, and the caretaker’s cottage probably sometime before 1875. Later owner Grant Hugh Brown enlarged the mansion in the early 1900s.

Over time the family’s fortunes declined and the estate, and the mansion, since demolished, passed from one owner to another. Today the Haight Family Cemetery Association owns less than five acres of the original estate, comprised of the family’s mausoleum, the estate’s caretaker’s cottage and a few acres. In the 1960s the buildings fell into disrepair and were overgrown with brush. Under the guidance of former County Historian Harry H. Smith, the grounds were cleared of dead trees and brush in 1963.
Later, the VFW met in the caretaker’s cottage and tried to maintain it. The veterans group has since left and Goshen Lodge 365 of the Free and Accepted Masons now uses the building for meetings. In return, the Masons have made a successful and costly effort at refurbishing the cottage. A tour of the interior shows the derelict state of the upper floors and the remarkable transformation of the restored rooms on the bottom floor. Where restoration was out of the question due to cost, appropriate reproductions were installed: original plaster moldings were replaced with accurate wooden ones, new floors were installed and the rooms have been painted and furnished to make the old new again. The outside looks almost new, and the grounds have been carefully cared for and maintained, including a small but charming English knot garden.