Libbey Castle

 United States > New York > Manhattan Community Board 12

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Woodcliff Castle, later and better known as Libbey Castle, was the crown jewel of northern Manhattan's landscape. It was built in the 1850s near what is today the cul-de-sac at Margaret Corbin Drive, and according to an 1895 "Gossip of Gotham" piece in the New York Times, it was "the only dwelling of its kind ever built in America. It was known as 'The Castle' and was built by its owner to imitate a castle he had seen in Austria." Owned by a succession of prominent figures that included William "Boss" Tweed, the famous residence was eventually razed for the initial development of Fort Tryon Park.