This route begins in Hyde Park, a familiar area to visitors, but soon breaks away from the river into the hills of Clinton and Pleasant Valley. Be sure to stop and visit the many historic sites throughout the area.

HYDE PARK was named for Edward Hyde, Lord Cornbury, eccentric provincial governor of New York, who in 1705 presented a parcel of land along the river to his secretary, Peter Fauconnier. Hyde’s name was given to an estate on that property and later to the town. The town, formed in 1821, covers an area of varying terrain compressed into 37.4 square miles. Rock outcroppings separate eastern hills from the river. Swift kills, or creeks, sites of early mills, slice its length dotting the landscape with picturesque ponds and water views. Hyde Park, Staatsburg and East Park are the principal centers. The town is world-renowned as the home of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, descendants of old, Dutch-English “River families,” original landholders and developers of the valley.

CLINTON was named for George Clinton, New York’s first governor. It was organized as a municipality 2 years before New York State established the original townships in 1788. Clinton was larger in its formative years and is the parent body from which Hyde Park and Pleasant Valley were carved. New England Quakers first settled here in the early 1700s. Mill sites along the Little Wappinger Creek and crossroad enterprises became the core of early hamlets: Frost Mills, Schultzville, Clinton Hollow, Hibernia and Clinton Corners. The town’s 37.6 square miles are now mainly devoted to agriculture, horse, sheep and cattle raising.

PLEASANT VALLEY According to folklore, settlers first spying the valley were said to exclaim, “It is a pleasant valley.” The Wappinger Creek wanders between the town’s low hills, watering the land and providing good fishing and manufacturing power in the village of Pleasant Valley. Salt Point is the only other sizeable community. Also established in 1821, much of the town’s 32.2 square miles is devoted to dairying and fruit growing. In early days a plank turnpike between Connecticut and Poughkeepsie provided farmers a route to Hudson River markets. The first Dutchess County Fair, held in 1841, was an annual event in Washington Hollow until the turn of the c. It is still held the third week of August at the Dutchess County Fairgrounds in Rhinebeck.