Where in the ADK? Riparius in Warren County
This week’s challenge takes us to Riparius, NY, on the Hudson River
This week’s “Where in the ADK?” is definitely one of our more obscure challenges. But we had to find a way to use the cool drone footage, and Riparius has always been oddly fascinating to us. It sits on the banks of the Hudson River and seems so unassuming, but it has a lot of history behind it. We love crossing the bridge over the Hudson with guests. Like them, we can’t believe we are crossing the same mighty waters traversed by the George Washington, Tappan Zee or other notable Hudson River bridges.
Riparius straddles the towns of Johnsburg and Chester. It was originally known as Folsom Landing, named after Jonathan Folsom, who owned land on both sides of the river. Folsom knew a good thing when he saw it and quickly established a ferry on his well-positioned property to take travelers across the Hudson as a shortcut from Chester.
Riverside Train Station. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1997. Photo by Steve Ackerman
Around 1870, the Adirondack Railway Company established a stop called “Riverside” on the western side of Folsom Landing (you can see the train station's roof on the lower left side of the video). The Adirondack Railway was a vital artery that linked Saratoga to North Creek and helped convey materials and people to and from the Adirondack towns north of Riparius.
Two years later, in 1872, the townspeople had enough of Folsom’s ferries and agreed to build a one-lane suspension bridge, naming it the Folsom Landing Central Bridge, with wooden towers at each end at the cost of $15,000 and operated as a toll bridge. So the townsfolk were tired of Folsom’s ferries but still named the bridge after him? Go figure.
Photo by Steve Ackerman
Fourteen years later, on February 24, 1886 (now they get all specific about dates?), Riverside got its first post office, established in the D&H Railroad Riverside station. And it appears one of the first things the officials at the Post Office did was change the town’s name to Riparius. Apparently, by that time in NYS, several towns were using the name “Riverside,” most notably in Buffalo and Long Island.
In 1919, Warren County purchased the original bridge and replaced it with a single-lane 309-foot-long camelback truss bridge. In 2003, that bridge was replaced with a two-lane truss bridge that could better accommodate vehicles, bicycles, and pedestrians. It’s a really good-looking bridge if you haven’t seen it in person.
For more about Riparius’s tale, check out our feature article from last December.
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