12. The Blackwell House Is One of the Only New York Farmhouses From Immediately After the American Revolution
A descendant of Robert Blackwell, James Blackwell, built a house called the Blackwell House, now on Main Street, in about 1796. When the city bought Blackwell’s Island, the island became less agricultural and more institutional. When a penitentiary was erected in 1829, the wooden house became a residential place for institutional administrators. The house was abandoned during the 1900s and restored in the early 1970s.
In addition to being one of the few New York farmhouses from the period immediately following the Revolutionary War, it is also the only surviving building on Roosevelt Island from the time period when the island was still private property. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.