In 1906 the first
Marist Brothers postulant (an applicant to the Marist Order) was
sent from Poughkeepsie to Canada for his training. He could not
speak French and soon left as he found it impossible to adjust.
It was obvious that an English-speaking American Novitiate would
be needed. Thanks to a $28,000 interest-free loan, the Bech estate,
which was on 75 acres south of the Waterworks Road, was purchased.
Edward Bech had contracted
with Detlef Lienau, a prominent architect, to construct, in stone,
a series of buildings which would serve as a homestead,
a stable, a gardener's house and gate house. The homestead, the
main building on the Bech estate, was used as a Novitiate by the
Marist Brothers. It housed the postulants and the novices. The original
house had two towers as seen in the accompanying photo.
The
stable (Greystone), the gardener's house
(St. Peter's) and the gate house (Kieran House) were built in the
style of Gothic Revival architecture. The main house was never built
because Edward Bech died before it was started.
The buildings were
in good condition and with an additional loan of $4,500 some needed
renovations were carried out. While the brothers occupied the main
homestead, the top floor was completed by joining the two towers.
In 1908 this Novitiate was formally opened with 12 postulants. As
part of this property a dormitory called St. Mary's was built separate
from the main building. There was also a bee house with apparatus
to extract honey from the 30 beehives which were tended by the novices.
An interesting aside with respect to this bee house is that it was
constructed with lumber salvaged from the roller coaster from the
Woodcliff Amusement Park which burned in the mid 1940s. This had
been a popular amusement park for people coming from New York City.
The dayliner, a tour
boat from New York City, used to leave, stop at West Point, Poughkeepise
at Woodcliff Park and go on to north of Kingston. Passengers were
dropped at each of these stops and picked up by the boat on its return trip to NYC. The property occupied
by this amusement park was later purchased by Marist College and
now is the location of Gartland town houses which are occupied by
resident students of Marist College.
In August 1949 the
novitiate was moved to Tyngsboro, Massachusetts. In the early 1950s
the building was used to house the Marist Brothers who were spending
their summers building Marist College. This building, now demolished
was located on land which is now to the north side of the entrance
to the McCann parking lot.