The House
The house was built about 1750
and is an architecturally interesting and unusual combination of
gambrel and saltbox roof styles.
In 1771 Woodbury's first Episcopal priest, John Rutgers Marshall of New
York City, arrived with his wife Sarah. By the end of the Revolutionary
War, John Marshall and his family had endured the oppression suffered
by many New England Anglicans who were often presumed to be loyal to
the king, whether or not they were in fact.
Only weeks after American independence was secure, a group of
Episcopalians met secretly at the Glebe House to make a momentous
decision; to take part in the building of a new nation while upholding
their religious heritage. The group elected the Reverend Dr. Samuel
Seabury as the first Bishop in the new world, a decision that assumed
both the separation of church and state and religious tolerance in the
new nation.
After the Marshalls had moved from the Glebe House, Gideon B. Botsford,
a silversmith, lived in the house. Botsford lived and worked at the
Glebe House with his wife and family of eight children through the
mid-19th century. By the 1920s the house had passed through several
owners and fallen into great disrepair.
As plans were discussed to tear down the house, it was saved by the
Seabury Society for the Preservation of the Glebe House, which repaired
the building, began collecting furniture, and raised funds to ensure
continued operations as a museum.
The Glebe House was restored in 1923 under the direction of William
Henry Kent, pioneer of early American decorative arts and the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. One of the early historic house
museums in the country, The Glebe House opened its doors to the public
in 1925.
The Garden
In 1926, the famed English
horticultural designer and writer was commissioned to plan an "old
fashioned" garden to enhance the newly created musuem. Gertrude Jekyll
(pronounced jeek uhl) had a profound influence on modern garden design
and is widely considered the greatest gardener of the 20th century.
Although a small garden, when compared with the some 400 more elaborate
designs she completed in England and on the continent, the Glebe House
garden includes 600 feet of classic English style mixed border and
foundation plantings, a planted stone terrace, and an intimate rose
allee.
For reasons unknown today, the garden Miss Jekyll planned was never
fully installed in the 1920s and its very existence was forgotten.
After the rediscovery of the plans in the late 1970s the project was
begun in earnest and is now being completed according to the original
plans.
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