Manhattanville College - Tower Yearbook (Purchase, NY)

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[ Twenty-one COLLEGE SONG On the heights so proudly standing, Strong against the blue, High her tower gleams commanding. Loyal hearts be true, For Manhattanville sing loudly, Swell the mighty song Till the echoes ring out proudly, All the ages long! Loretta Bremner, ’29. I A i t A I 4 A i

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[ T wenty] Battle of Harlem Heights was fought here on the sixteenth of September in 1776. Accounts of the battle tell us that Washington’s troops were camped on the heights at Manhattanville, while the British lines were drawn up on the other side of the Hollow Way (about 125th Street). For the first time in the course of the war the patriots met the British on equal footing and showed their spirit and strength. The American victory not only frustrated the British plan of campaign in the Northeast, but it gave our men that confidence which they had hitherto lacked and which enabled them to carry the war to a successful end. This battle is usually called the Battle of Harlem Heights and it is rightly named, since Manhattanville, where the colonial army was en¬ camped, was a part of New Haarlem. James Riker’s “History of Harlem’’ (New York City) tells us that early in the 17th century Peter Van Oblenis, a member of one of the Dutch families which had come to New Haarlem in 1658, bought the 100 acres lying at Manhattanville for his own use. At the time of the Great Division of the Common Lands in 1712 he was certainly the recognized owner of them. These acres com¬ prised the meadows in the Hollow Way and the land north as far as Joachim Peter’s Hills (134th Street). In 1712 seven plots were laid off along the more rugged southern hills. These sloping fields were first used as pasture lots. Later, when more people had crossed over from New Haarlem, they built dwellings and barns on these little farms. Thus this section of New York gained its first settled population. The year 1658 is a relatively ancient date in America, but Manhat¬ tanville can look back into a yet more distant past—even into a legendary era. The story has it that when Henry Hudson came to America in 1609, he had some trouble with the Indians and, in order to let the disturbance blow over, he sailed a short distance up the Manahatta River and anchored for a few days in the quiet cove, which eventually came to be known as Manhattanville, or Harlem, Cove. Thus the old world is still part of the new. Though Manhattanville to-day seems very remote from colonial struggles and pioneer civilization, historic tradition is fittingly preserved on the Campus of the College of the Sacred Heart, with its age-old rocks and stately trees. Genevieve Brislin, ’30.

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