Huntington Village - Todd Atteberry: History travel photographer for commission and stock photos

Fine art prints, photos and posters from Huntington Village, New York

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toddatteberry > Huntington Village photo

toddatteberry > Soldiers and Sailors Cemetery, Formerly the Old Burial Ground and Fort Golgotha, Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > 420 Park Avenue,
Huntington Village Commons,
Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Jarvis-Fleet House
Huntington Village Green, Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Original Richard Latting House
Huntington Village Green, Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Huntington Village Green, Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Huntington Armory
c. 1740
Huntington Village Green, Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Huntington Village Green
Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Kissam House,
c. 1795
Huntington Village Green,
Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > The Kissam House, Huntington Village Green, Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Jarvis House,
Huntington Village Commons,
Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Jarvis House,
Huntington Village Commons,
Huntington Village, New York

toddatteberry > Huntington Village, Long Island, New York

toddatteberry > Huntington Village, Long Island, New York

toddatteberry > Harbor Entrance to Ferguson Castle
Huntington Bay, New York

Ferguson Castle was built like a medieval castle, with heavy walls some three feet thick, and details straight from the Mediterranean. The house was built in 1908 for Mrs. Juliana Armour Ferguson, the mother of seven children who used to push the furniture against the walls and used the great hall for a roller skating rink. In 1916, the house was used for the original silent version of Romeo and Juliet. A litany of furnishing proves breathtaking; a sixteenth century chariot made for the Emporer Maximilian of carved ivory and rubies, two seventeenth century marble lions from Verona, art treasures, some as old as the twelfth century decorating the walls, a fountain made of ancient Persian tiles, a fifteenth century French Gothic plaque with the Madonna and Child, as well as a piece of Egyptian era art. The house had forty rooms, six baths, fourteen fireplaces, a chapel, a servant's room and a gatehouse. The Great Hall measured 64 feet long, 47 feet wide and three stories tall.

Perhaps the strangest though, Mrs. Ferguson collected the gravestones of children from all over Europe, all under five years old at the time of their death, all three hundred years old, then installed in the floors, halls, entranceways and gardens of the house.

She died in 1921 and the house went through several owners, before being purchased by Suffolk County in 1964. In 1970, the house was pulled down. Rumors of the house being haunted and a hefty back taxes bill made it impossible to sell. Today all that is left is the foundations and lower entrance, as well as the gatehouse.

In her book, The Ghost of Long Island, Kerriann Flanagan Brosky relates that Mrs. Ferguson never really left the house, also known as The Monastery. By all accounts, Mrs. Ferguson lived for her children. There was a room in the house with a long, medieval table, which was kept furnished at all time with food and treats for her children, attended to by two Japanese servants, for whom that was their only job.

Her husband had died before they moved in the castle. By the beginning of World War I, things had changed. By then, all the children were grown and had moved away. Then one child died of influenza. Four days later another died in the trenches of the war. Another divorced under hints of scandals which ruined the family name. She couldn't accept the death of her son, and had a wax dummy made in his likeness. Each night she would dine with him then at the long table which once held the bounty for children.

Following her death, she was still to be seen, coming down the stairs each night in her long, flowing white gown to dine with her dead son. While the house was in the process of being torn down, many people driving by at night saw a figure in white, floating among the ruins.

From The Mansions of Long Islands Gold Coast, by Monica Randall

toddatteberry > Huntington Village photo

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Keywords: island art long architecture york photographer prints huntington british century colonial posters occupation era

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