Haymount House - Notebook Vol. 2018-9
Bob Fetonti – BMSHS Trustee
This house at 25 Studio Hill Road may be more familiar to you as Maison Lafitte, La Petite Affair, Unique Affairs at Mansion Hill, Tara on Hudson, Hudson at Haymount House, or most recently as The Briarcliff Manor/Antipasti di Napoli. Since 1963 these restaurants and catering facilities have operated in this elegant Southern Colonial Georgian-style mansion. The name,Tara on Hudson, came from its resemblance to the mansion in the film “Gone with the Wind.” Unfortunately, while it does look like that iconic house, there is no connection. The inspiration for the house in the film is believed to be a Greek Revival House in Covington, Georgia(1) and the house in the film was constructed on the back lot of the Selznick International Studio in Hollywood.
The original name of the house on Studio Hill Road was “Haymount” and it was built in 1910 by Williamson Whitehead Fuller, a lawyer and the general counsel for the American Tobacco Company. Fuller built “Haymount” on a 200-acre farm known as Ryder Farm between the Briarcliff-Peekskill Parkway (Route 9A) and Old Chappaqua Road. Lynn McCrum field at the corner of Route 9A and Chappaqua Road was once part of this farm and the Fuller estate. Fuller called the house “Haymount” after the section of Fayetteville, North Carolina where he was born. This Southern Colonial Georgian-style house recalled the style of a grand southern plantation of the late 1800s with its charm and grandeur. According to the magazine, International Studio published in 1913, the main house had 26 + bedrooms and 12 baths. The estate had its own wells and powerhouse which provided electricity for the laundry, refrigeration and vacuum cleaners. Every guest room had an electric clock and long distance phone service. An intercom and fire alarm connected the various buildings on the estate which included guest cottages, housing for the farm workers and house staff, stables, garage, cow sheds and a dairy. Today the Tappan Arms Apartments at 18 Studio Hill Road sit on the site of the former garage and stable. The estate also boasted a number of tea houses, arbors and an artist’s studio constructed for William Fuller’s daughter, Dorothy, which is today a private residence. The surrounding grounds contained lawns, flower gardens, vegetable gardens, and an orchard.
The second owner of “Haymount”, Bernard Van Leer, was a Dutch industrialist and the owner of the Holland Classic Circus. The photo below on the left from the collection of the Briarcliff Manor-Scarborough Historical Society is believed to show the elephants of the Holland Classic Circus boarding a train in Briarcliff. While we are not sure of the location of this photo, we do know that Van Leer housed circus animals in the barn on the estate. In 1945 the Briarcliff Manor Volunteer Fire Department was called to put out a fire in the barn and was credited with saving four elephants and sixteen circus horses.
Van Leer thanked the Fire Department and Village by hosting a circus performance in the village which raised money for a new ambulance. The photo above on the right shows Van Leer’s horses performing in the Center of Briarcliff Manor across from Law Park on the former site of the “Crossroads.” Some believe these horses were the famous Lippizaner horses rescued from Germany by the Allies at the end of World War II. This event was made famous by the 1963 Disney movie, The Miracle of the White Stallions. According to the July 17, 1943 issue of Billboard Magazine, the circus was known for its performing horses, which did include pure blood Lippizaners. However, according to the official history of the Lippizaner Horses posted on their website, the horses were moved to safety behind Allied lines, not to the US.(2)
In the 1950s the estate was home to an equestrian center called The Walk, Trot and Canter Club owned by Robert Moran. During this time the estate was broken up, the outbuildings and all but five acres were sold off for development. “Haymount” itself was remodeled after a fire which led to the removal of both side wings to the main structure.
Giovanni Susech purchased the house and remaining five acres in 1963 and converted it into a French restaurant called Maison Lafitte. This was the first of a series of restaurants that operated in the mansion over the next fifty-five years: Tara on Hudson, Hudson at Haymount House, La Petit Affair, Unique Affairs at Mansion Hill, and currently The Briarcliff Manor/Antipasti di Napoli.
Additional information and pictures can be found in the sources listed below and the collection of the Briarcliff Manor-Scarborough Historical Society.
FOOTNOTES
1. Julia Sweeten’s Blog: https://hookedonhouses.net
PICTURE CREDITS
1. The Hudson at Haymount House 2015. Photo Karen Smith
2. Haymount ca 1950. BMSHS Collection
3. Elephants boarding the train. BMSHS Collection
4. Circus Horses at Law Park 1945. Gift of Bill Sharman. BMSHS Collection.
5. Bernard Van Leer's Holland Circus by Willy Sluitter
SOURCES
Billboard, July 17,1943: Holland Circus Reopened July 3rd
Changing Landscape by Mary Cheever
The International Studio, Vol L no 199, September 1935
Wikipedia: “Gone With the Wind”
Julia Sweeten’s Blog: https://hookedonhouses.net
Citizen Register April 28,1970
Unique Affairs brochure
NCPedia.org: Williamson Whitehead Fuller
Wikipedia: Haymount District