The Alfred B. DelBello Muscoot Farm in Katonah marked its golden anniversary Friday, Sept. 12, with a kind of suburban hoedown that saw attendees slip on cowboy-style boots and straw hats along with their late-summer casual Friday finery. Among those honored by The Friends of Muscoot were Kathy O’Connor, commissioner of the Westchester County Department of Parks, Recreation and Conservation; naturalist Paul Lewis and Westfair’s own Dee DelBello, publisher of the Westchester County Business Journal, the Fairfield County Business Journal and its sister e-newsletters Morning Brief and Noons at Noon.
O’Connor received The Muscoot Legacy Award for her dedication to the county-owned site’s mission – to preserve and interpret a Westchester farm, circa 1880-1930, for the public’s education and enjoyment. Over the years, Muscoot’s Friends have raised more than $1.5 million to renovate and expand the farm complex with the purchase of livestock, events like Sheep Shearing and Pumpkin Picking Weekend and the refurbishment of the Visitor Center and the Farm Museum. Proceeds from the Sept. 12 birthday party will go toward the $15,000 purchase of a handicapped-accessible hay wagon.
Lewis accepted The Muscoot Spirit Award for a curiosity and devotion that The Friends said in the accompanying program inspired everyone to care more deeply for the land, animals and one another.
It’s fair to say, however, that there might not have been a Muscoot Farm or any such event if not for Dee DelBello, who accepted the award on behalf of her family and her late husband, Alfred B. DelBello, former mayor of Yonkers, Westchester County executive and New York state lieutenant governor under Mario M. Cuomo.
DelBello was the incoming county executive when his predecessor, Edwin Michaelian, suggested he and his wife, Dee, take a tour of Westchester, paying particular attention to its parks. So, Dee DelBello told the Muscoot audience, she, her husband and son Damon piled into the county executive car – it was a white Cadillac, a detail that drew laughter from attendees — and did just that. When they arrived at last at Muscoot – slated to be turned into an ice-skating rink – “we just couldn’t believe it.” The urbanites from Yonkers were enchanted by Muscoot’s bucolic beauty (and would later become farmers themselves in neighboring Waccabuc).
“It was at that point we had the vision that this should be just what it is today,” DelBello said in her acceptance speech, “because of the passion and dedication of the team that works here and The Friends of Muscoot….We are one of the government-owned parks in the nation, and we are lauded as one of the best.”
Visiting Muscoot for the event made it easy to see why the DelBellos were so charmed. The 777-acre site — which began life as the Hopkins family’s summer estate and dairy farm in the shadow of the Muscoot Reservoir, part of the Croton Reservoir system – boasts a complex of white clapboard buildings that give it the air of a country inn and store. They include a colonnaded Main House, a dairy barn and milk house for the cows, an icehouse and a blacksmith shop, along with more than seven miles of hiking trails.
Muscoot proved the perfect setting for a buffet dinner from Great American BBQ in White Plains, beverages by Captain Lawrence Brewing Co. in Elmsford and the country stylings of the Citigrass band, accented by floral arrangements by Kingston’s Hops Petunia and all sponsored by the Westchester Parks Foundation; the General Maintenance Group; Green Core; Judith Behler Howells; KayBar LLC; Molly Maid’s David Behler; Snow Hill Farm’s Laura O’Donohue; the Sterling Sanitary Supply Corp.; Waste Management Reduction Services; Wogies Bar & Grill in Katonah; the Bedford Bee; Bob Cilia; Clark Associates Funeral Home; Kitley Covil; Mary and Rich Troy; Muscoot Tavern; Priscilla Hopkins and Putnam County Savings Bank.
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