Hours: There are free house tours at 10:30am, 12:00pm and 1:30pm on Mondays only. Check their website for availability. This is one of the few rare treats of New York if you can snare one of the tours of Gracie Mansion. It is a really interesting tour of the first floor rooms and entrance to the gardens of this historic home and the Mayor of New York City’s residence.
This was really a wonderful tour of the mansion given by a woman who has been a docent for twenty years and has seen the changes of the administrations. We went room by room and discussed how the Gracie’s then the Wheaton’s and the other families who lived here use the house until Robert Moses, the great City Planner, decided this should become the Mayor’s residence.
The front of the mansion at the start of the tour in the Summer of 2025
The formal gardens in front of the house in full bloom
The formal gardens to the side of the house near the parking lot
We started the tour on the front porch of the old Gracie Mansion
The tour consists of the first floor only and you can not take pictures inside with the exception of the Wagner Ballroom. We saw the formal entrance, the Living Room, Library, Dining Room and then the hallway leading to the front of the house to the Susan Wagner Ballroom, the newest extension of the house (the front section is the original section of the home built during the Gracie period).
The front rooms you are not allowed to take pictures so as you tour the Living Room, the Dining Room and Parlor rooms, you can not take pictures. When we left the older section of the home and entered the hallway to the Susan Wagner Ballroom added in the Wagner Administration, then you could take pictures in this room only (outside the gardens).
The inside of the Susan Wagner Ballroom
The Chandelier in the ballroom was from an old mansion downtown
The Bayard Fireplace from the Bayard Mansion once located in lower Manhattan
The Wagner Ballroom details
The corniches in the ballroom
History of the Mansion and Gracie Family:
Gracie Mansion, built in 1799 by shipping merchant Archibald Gracie, is the last of the elegant county estates that once lined Manhattan’s East River shore. Gracie hosted elegant dinner parties at his country estate for visitors including Alexander Hamilton, Rufus King, Joseph Bonaparte and Washington Irving.
Major losses during the years after the War of 1812 forced Gracie to sell his estate in 1823 to Joseph Foulke. In 1857, the Mansion was bought by Noah Wheaton. After Wheaton’s death in 1896, the City of New York appropriated the estate, incorporating ts 11 acres of grounds into the surrounding park that was renamed Carl Schurz Park in 1910.
After years as a comfort station and ice cream stand, Gracie Mansion became the first home of the Museum of the City of New York. When the museum moved to a larger building, Parks Commissioner Robert Moses convinced City Authorities to designate the Mansion as the official residence of the Mayor. In 1942, Fiorello H. La Guardia moved into Gracie Mansion.
In 1966, the Mansion was enlarged with the construction of the Susan E. Wagner Wing, which includes a ballroom and two additional rooms. Under the guidance of the Gracie Mansion Conservatory, major restorations to the Mansion were undertaken between 1981 and 1984 and in 2002.
The 2002 restoration transformed Gracie Mansion into the “People’s House” and increased accessibility to the public and City agencies. First Lady Rosalyn Carter and South African President Nelson Mandela are among the many notable visitors.
Gracie Mansion at the turn of the last century
Gracie Mansion is owned by the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, operated by the Gracie Mansion Conservatory and is a member of the Historic House Trust.
(Gracie Mansion Pamphlet)
Gracie Mansion Conservatory:
After years of neglect and continual erosion of any trace of history, Mayor Edward I. Koch and founding Chair Joan K. Davison, established the Gracie Mansion Conservatory in 1981. as a public./private partnership.. Under its guidance, the first major restoration of the house was undertaken between 1981 and 1984. Besides creating a connection between the original house and the Wagner Wing, this effort included the display of art, furniture and decorative objects either purchased or more often, lent by the City’s many cultural institutions. The Charter mandate of the Conservatory was not to seal the residence in the past (especially as there is no record of how it originally appeared inside) but to protect its history while accommodating change and progress by successive generations of New Yorkers.
The Gracie Mansion Conservatory continues to operate as a charitable organization dedicated to enhancing and enlivening its namesake. Its mission is to preserve and honor Gracie Mansion’s Federal Period origins while also making sure it remains as forward-looking and welcoming as the city it serves. An increasing share of this work focuses on exploring the many different people and cultures whose contributions to Gracie Mansion and the New York at large gone unrecognized for far too long. The Conservatory also works to improve the surrounding landscape and gardens and provide public programming and educational services, including publications and tours for local school students, especially those studying in New York State’s 7th grade social studies curriculum.
(Gracie Mansion Conservatory pamphlet)
Disclaimer: This information was taken from the Gracie Mansion Conservatory pamphlet press kit given on my tour and I give the Conservatory full credit for it. Please check the website for tour information or call them to find out about group tours.
Hours: There are free house tours at 10:00am, 11:00am and 5:00pm on Mondays only. Check their website for availability. This is one of the few rare treats of New York if you can snare one of the tours of Gracie Mansion. It is a really interesting tour of the first floor rooms and entrance to the gardens of this historic home and the Mayor of New York City’s residence.
This was really a wonderful tour of the mansion given by one of the interns who worked for the Mayor. We started the tour in the extension Wagner Wing addition that was added in the 1960’s by the Wagner Administration. We saw the formal ballroom, library…
*I discovered the Morris-Jumel Mansion on my walk around Manhattan and noted it on my blog site “MywalkinManhattan.com”. This is the only remaining Colonial residence left on the island of Manhattan and is worth the time to take the tour of the house for its significance in the American Revolutionary War and in it’s later history.
The Morris-Jumel Mansion, Manhattan’s only remaining Colonial era residence is unique in its combination of architectural and historical significance. Built as a summer ‘villa’ in 1765 by the British Colonel Roger Morris and his American wife, Mary Philipse, it originally commanded extensive views in all directions: of New York harbor and Staten Island to the south; of the Hudson and Harlem Rivers to the west and east and of Westchester county to the north. The estate named “Mount…
In the late 1700’s, well-to-do dwellers moved to Harlem Heights in the summer, seeking its cool breezes. They also wanted to avoid yellow fever, a summer threat in lower Manhattan, Hamilton and his wife, Elizabeth (of the influential Schuyler family) often visited friends here and decided to build their own retreat.
In 1802, they moved in and Hamilton began commuting to his downtown law office, a 90 minute carriage trip. He and Elizabeth also began to entertain friends, colleagues and leader in their elegant home and gardens. Little did Hamilton know that his time at The Grange would be brief.
Witness to Slavery:
Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804) grew up on Nevis and St. Croix, islands in the Caribbean, where thousands of enslaved Africans labored in…
I recently had some time to visit the Bronx Museum of the Arts when I was visiting Yankee Stadium recently for a football game. The museum is right down the road on the Grand Concourse. It is an impressive little museum.
I had wanted to see the exhibit “Art Versus Transit: 1977-1987” by artist Henry Chalfant who had recorded the graffiti art on the subway cars during the late 70’s into the early 1980’s. This is before the subway investing in the new subway cars that could be cleaned by hosing them off.
“Art versus Transit: 1977-1987”
The art was interesting as it was an expression of the times just when Hip-Hop was becoming popular and the City was going…
I came across the Children’s store, Little Moony, on a trip up Mulberry Street when visiting ‘Little Italy’ in Manhattan for dinner. Right above Grand Street in the area between Houston and Grand Street where “Little Italy” ends ‘Nolita’ (North Of Little Italy). This trendy area is starting to fill with smart boutiques, innovative restaurants and interesting stores that are replacing the older neighborhood establishments.
I love their welcoming store window display
Little Moony is a cute Children’s store that is stocked with handmade clothing, imported handmade toys and an assortment of stuffed animals, small wooden games and infant toys. There is also a small selection of independent author children’s books many of which I had never seen before.
Welcome to my consulting company, Bergecco-Parc Consulting Inc. which is part of my Business 101-Introduction to Business class at Bergen Community College. The students in my December 2019 class presented their project on marketing the City of Paterson, NJ to tourism.
The presentation was a huge success.
The Bergecco-Parc Consulting Inc. Logo for the City of Paterson, NJ.
Esmeraldo Bakery is one of my ‘go-to’ spots when I am up in Washington Heights in Upper Manhattan. This Dominican bakery is very popular in the neighborhood and is in the middle of the busy shopping district between Broadway and Audubon Avenue along the 181st Street corridor. It has the nicest selection of baked goods and hot and cold snacks to choose from. The one nice thing I love about the bakery is that almost everything is a dollar or around that.
The cases are full of delicious doughnuts, turnovers and pastries
I have been the bakery on many occasions and have had a chance to ‘munch’ through a lot of the pastries. The Chocolate and Vanilla topped doughnuts ($1.00) are light, fluffy and have a nice chewy consistency. …
Admission: $5.00 for Adults/$3.00 for Seniors & Students/Children under 12 are free/General Admission is free on Wednesdays. Guided and group tours are available.
I visited the Van Cortlandt House Museum for the their Annual Christmas Decorated House event. The mansion was decorated for Christmas in the 1700’s so it was not overdone as it would during the Victorian times. The front of the house entrance was done with sprays of holly, mistletoe above the door and garlands of pine around the banister and fireplaces. The windows had candles in them and the dining room was set for Christmas luncheon in post-Revolutionary War era.
Van Cortlandt House for Christmas is Post-Revolutionary War
While most of the house is represented during the Dutch…
There has been a lot of visits to my other blog on my visit to Woodstock, NY for Christmas. I wanted to share this earlier one with everyone as well. The parade on Christmas Eve should be experienced once and you will see the magic of Woodstock, NY at the holidays. It is amazing!
The Woodstock Square at Christmas time after the parade and lights are over. A relaxing evening after everything is over. The parade ends by 6:45pm and church services at the Dutch Reformed Church end by 8:00pm. Then all is quiet outside.
The Woodstock NY right before the start of the Christmas Parade
There is always excitement in the air from the crowds that come to see the parade and how Santa will make his appearance. I look forward to this like everyone else in the crowd.
I put my walking project in Manhattan on hold to participate in other activities that I was organizing during the month of December. Trips in the city became day trips to the museums, walking tours and many holiday events that was I was invited to or helped organize for other people.
Some of the memorable events I had was organizing my holiday party at work. I work with the disabled who are a very active bunch of people. I make sure that there is always exercising, stimulating speakers and lively engaging conversation. These are not people who will ever sit on the back of the bus if I can help it. I always want them to know you can get better and make better of any situation.
We had a lively party with exercise, music and good food. As I do every year, I have the Bamboo House 28 South…
This annual Dutch Christmas festival has become part of my Christmas tradition since I visited Rhinebeck for the event in 2010. Rhinebeck, New York is the true Currier & Ives town at Christmas time and one of the most quintessential Hudson Valley town that retains it charm being so close to the City. I love coming up here not just for the event but as you have noticed by my most current blogs, I have spent a lot of time here in the Summer and Fall letting readers know of all the wonderful events and happenings in the area.
I have to say I was not used to Christmas creeping up on me like this. It had only been five weeks since we had the Halloween Parade in the City and puppet rehearsals had only been five and a half weeks earlier when I visited Rokeby. That and it had been 71 degrees on Halloween night and Sinterklass night it was more like 25 degrees. I could really feel the drop in temperature that evening.
Having just returned from Florida over the Thanksgiving break, I had been in class giving a quiz to my students that morning and reviewing over their group project and various chapters in the book for the upcoming exam. So I did not head Upstate until almost noon. I got up to Rhinebeck at 2:00pm and that is when it set in that the snow storm that had hit New Jersey was very different from the one Upstate. The storm had been worse Upstate than it had been in New Jersey and there was still a foot of snow in Rhinebeck. I didn’t get to the main street until 2:30pm.
The side streets were closed off on one side because the snow was still piled high. So it was an eight block walk on snowy paths to the Main Street of Rhinebeck which had fully cleaned up for the parade. What was nice this year was the first three blocks of the downtown area were closed off so you could enjoy the bands and acts walking around.
Rhinebeck when the sun goes down at Christmas
The Rhinebeck Christmas tree
It was a cold afternoon and I noticed that the crowds were not as large as they usually were for the event. Still Rhinebeck at Sinterklaas is festive and engaging environment. There were crowds weaving in and out of the restaurants and stores and the windows were decked out for the holidays with interesting holiday displays and lit stars from the parade. All around town there bands playing, people on stilts singing and grumpuses (Sinterklaas’s helpers) dancing around and chanting. You could see that people were freezing but still having a really good time.
The Grumpuses, Sinterklaas’s helpers dancing in Downtown Rhinebeck, NY
I was able to get to see some of the musical performances at the churches before the start of the parade and warm up. Even the audiences did not seem as busy as they had in the past but still people were enjoying the performances and stopped shivering.
Don’t miss this performance of Uptown Lowdown in downtown Rhinebeck that afternoon. The ladies were wonderful!
Sitting in the church pews and listening to groups was enjoyable. There was only about two hours before meeting at the Starr Library for the parade so I chose my shows by groups I had not heard in the past.
I started at 3rd Evangelical Lutheran Church listening to the Bard College Georgian Choir, who sang traditional Georgian Christmas music, which was interesting. I did not understand the words but the music was enjoyable. The students did a nice job.
This is some of their work at another concert
After that, I took a short walk to the other side of the downtown and heard the Vassar Devils at the Reformed Church Sanctuary. They were lively, peppy bunch that sang traditional Christmas carols with a jazzy spin.
This is the Vassar Devils at the 2015 Sinterklaas event
After the concerts, it was a quick walk to the Starr Library to get ready for the Sinterklaas Parade. There is always a lot of excitement to the beginning of the parade and getting ready to march down the hill. For some reason, I don’t remember it getting so cold so early in the season.
The temperature dropped as the sun went down. Everyone was excited as we lined up for the parade and got ready for the walk through the downtown. All I could think about is how fast the year had gone and how I had this conversation with myself when I walked the parade last year. Were the years getting quicker between the parades?
There is an exhilaration when the parade progresses down the hill into Downtown Rhinebeck and the whole town is lit with white Christmas lights and illuminated stars that represent the parade. It may have seemed quiet in town that afternoon but the crowds were out for the parade. There must have been about a thousand people lining the street on both sides. It was a big crowd filming the parade.
There is always such excitement to this parade. Similar to the Barnacle Parade that I attended in October (Day One Hundred and Fifty One The Barnacle Parade see below), this is a home grown parade that just keeps getting bigger. When I first starting coming to the Sinterklaas Parade back in 2010, it was more local people. Now you have people coming from many states to join in the festivities. Even the cold kept people from the day’s activities, they came for the parade.
Marching toward the end of the parade with Mother Nature, this is the second year of carrying the ‘star forest; puppet (I am not pulling my back out for something heavier as in the past), we get to see the other puppets, floats and bands head down the hill. You can see the multiple lights from the other puppets and the raging sounds of the bands and the Chinese Dragons as they head down the hill to town.
You can see me in the corner holding the Star Forest puppet by Mother Nature with my Cornell Pom-Pom hat on marching to keep warm. It is an exciting night!
There is always a delay as you get to the Route 9 crossing near the Beekman Arms Hotel for the performance of the “Wild Women of Rhinebeck”, who perform their annual dance and for the ‘Dragon Dance’ that the Chinese dancers perform. It is really fun to see up close if you get the chance.
When we entered the downtown, all the kids were excited to see the Mother Nature float winding by. The parents were just as excited as they high-fived Mother Nature as they passed by groups of people. The drum line was going in full beat just behind us followed by a large group of parade goers marching in the parade with their lit stars. It was exhilarating and fun to watch from the marcher’s point in the parade. On such a cold night (by this point it was 25 degrees), I could not believe that many people were lining the parade route.
As we rounded the corner into the Rhinebeck Municipal lot to end the parade and drop the puppets off, we were greeted by a huge roar of people and the announcements from the stage for the final part of the parade. I just dropped my puppet off and enjoyed the stage show as the drum line passed by.
The stage performance was with all the main characters of the parade, Sinterklaas, Mother Holly, the Snow King and Queen, the Mermaid Queen, the Midnight Moon Princess and various members of the Sinterklaas Parade Committee who run the parade. it is a ceremony that honors the children, ‘The Kings and Queens of Sinterklaas’, for the evening.
The Closing ceremony
There were musical performances, dancing, prayer and then the fire jugglers entertaining us. The audience had thinned out by this point and about a hundred and fifty people were standing in the parking lot watching the ceremony. It was getting even colder by the time the fire jugglers started. After the last announcement for the parade events next year, the crowd started to disperse. It did not take long to watch crowd leave as it got so cold.
I walked around downtown Rhinebeck for about twenty minutes letting the crowds thin out and the traffic leave but by that point the town really quieted down and most of the cars were gone as I did not see that much traffic.
It was fun to walk the town one more time and admire the beautiful Christmas windows of all the stores and the sparking white lights that lined the trees on both sides of the main street of Rhinebeck. It is really is picturesque.
Downtown Rhinebeck is so beautifully decorated for Christmas
I had full day of work the next day that including decorated houses to visit, historical society events to attend, an Afternoon Tea at the Newark Museum (see review on TripAdvisor and VisitingaMuseum.com) and then an evening selling Christmas trees for the Hasbrouck Heights Men’s Association (see blogs on Christmas on MywalkinManhattan.com) so staying overnight in Rhinebeck was not possible this year. It was going to be a long ride home.
It was worth it and a lot of fun!
Happy Sinterklass and Merry Christmas!
Check out the videos online on the Sinterklaas Parade on YouTube. It is an exciting night!
My Halloween Blog on the Halloween Parade in October:
mywalkinmanhattan 