Four threads that guide us
The passions of the people who shaped these properties still shape the work we do today.
Historic Preservation
The passion for discovery that inspired the Henry Bird family and drove them to the ends of the earth, combined with our passion to preserve the legacies of William Voris and the Birds, puts historical discovery and preservation at the heart of our mission.
Biology and Earth Sciences
Given the diversely passionate men of the Bird family, we struggle with how to qualify their contributions to science and human experience. Their adventures are too broad and their accomplishments too great to define in a single word.
Biology refers to Henry Bird’s work in entomology and encompasses coastal ecology, a natural aspect of our properties. Earth sciences gives us the space to build on Roland and Junius’ paleontological and archaeological feats through our own work discovering and preserving their past right here in Rye, New York.
Homesteading and Hands-On Learning
As preservationists, one of the most important things to know is the era to which you are trying to restore. We focus on the mid to late 19th century, when the Bird family was in full bloom, William Voris was building his dynasty, and the Rye Meeting House went by the name of Grace Chapel.
Homesteading was a lifestyle focused on self-sufficiency and sustainability. In the late 19th century this meant producing your own food, raising small livestock, fishing, and learning traditional life-sustaining skills that included scratch baking, canning, dehydrating, fermenting, composting, rainwater harvesting, sewing, and basic carpentry. Henry Bird and his family were very much living “off grid” before the term became fashionable.
Making our educational programs hands-on is an intentional connection to the craftsmanship and care taken by Henry Bird, who was not only a world-renowned entomologist at the American Museum of Natural History, but a studied and avid woodworker and horticulturist.
Entrepreneurship
William Voris built multiple lucrative business ventures from his home on Milton Road, and accomplished this in a time when most African Americans were still enslaved or in servitude to their neighbors.
While we know that Mr. Voris ran a saloon and ice cream parlor near what is now Rye Playland, we continue to research and discover additional information on his businesses and home life.