Program

NYS Historic

Subject

Government, Site

Location

6 Katonah Crossing Ct, Katonah, NY 10536, USA

Lat/Long

41.258925, -73.684029

Grant Recipient

Katonah Village Library

The hamlet of Katonah in Westchester County, New York was originally located in the Croton Watershed, a part of the water supply for the City of New York. When New York City reservoirs were being constructed, the community was deemed too close to the city’s water supply and forced to relocate in 1897. Instead of abandoning the hamlet, citizens of Katonah built a large trestle and moved their buildings on log rollers pulled by horses to Katonah’s new site, just south of its former location.

In a February 25, 1897 edition of The Great Round World and What is Going on in it, Genie H. Rosenfeld described how Katonah’s buildings were moved:

When a house it to be moved, a carpenter puts beams across in all the weak spots, the ceilings are shored up, and all is made snug inside. Then the house is raised off the foundations on beams, and made all firm underneath, and then is made to slide off its foundations on some huge rollers that are laid in the high road.

Ropes are then fastened to some of the heavy beams under the house, and horses are brought. The ropes are tied to the horses, and as they pull, the house slips from one roller to another.