Neversink Gorge

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Neversink Gorge
Neversink Gorge in winter looking east
Country	United States
State	New York
Major city	Monticello, New York
The Neversink and its two branches

The Neversink Gorge is located in the town of Forestburgh, New York, USA, and is one of the more outstanding features of the Neversink River^[1]. A portion of the western side of the The Gorge, above Denton Falls, through High Falls, to the entrance of Eden Brook, is a private nature sanctuary called The Turner Brook Reserve ^[2]; the entire eastern side and the remaining western property is a New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) controlled "Unique Area" often called the Neversink Gorge Unique Area^[3].

The current borders of the Neversink Gorge Unique Area and the private lands in the Neversink Gorge were amassed as a 10,000 acre private game preserve by Ambrose Monell in the late 1890s through the early 1900s. Monell, who was president of International Nickel and patented Monel Metal, was inspired by the conservation ethic established by John Burroughs and John Muir to purchase farms, tanneries and even entire towns, demolish the buildings and revert the land to its wild state. Within this sportspersons paradise the greatest names in American fly fishing, Edward Ringwood Hewitt, George M. L. La Branche, Justin Askins , Phil Chase ,Theodore Gordon and many others have practiced their passion, refined their techniques and wrote about their adventures^[4].

When Monell died the property passed to the Bradford family and was then purchased by the Wechsler family in 1939^[5]. The Wechsler family, having made their fortune in coffee distribution founded Restaurant Associates that at its peak owned 50 eateries in New York City. With this wealth Philip Wechsler hired architect Eugene Schoen to build 5 homes on Gilman Pond in Frank Lloyd Wright's Usonian style with the turn of the century stone structure that was Monell's mansion as the central "Lodge" named by Monell, The Four Way Lodge. They dubbed this family compound The Philwold Estates (Phil Wold = Phil's Woods in German). ^[6] The extended Wechsler family resided there for a time and gradually sold the homes off. In 1968, Benjamin Wechsler traded his shares in Restaurant Associates to become the owner of the western side of High Falls in The Neversink Gorge and 5000+ remaining acres that had been a part of Monell's estate. Through almost 40 years of often contentious interactions with the DEC and New York State the Wechsler property has been reduced to approximately 2000 acres^{[7] [8] [9]} In 2004, after a decade long legal battle, the courts awarded Benjamin Wechsler more than $2,000,000 to be paid by New York State for improper actions taken by the DEC in the 1980s ^[10].

[edit] References