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Mohonk Lake

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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A summer settlement at the northern end of Lake Mohonk, Ulster county, New York, U.S.A., about 14 m. N.W. of Poughkeepsie. It is served from New Paltz, about 1 m. S.E. (about 52 m. by stage), by the Wallkill Valley railway, a branch of the West Shore. The lake is a small body of water, picturesquely situated 1245 ft. above the sea-level, on Sky Top Mountain (1542 ft.), one of the highest peaks of the Shawangunk range. The highest point of Sky Top lies just east of the south end of the lake; close by, to the west, Eagle Cliff rises to a height of 1412 ft. The development of this beautiful region into a summer resort and the holding of Indian and arbitration conferences here have been due to Albert Keith Smiley (b. 1828), a graduate of Haverford College (1849), who conducted an English and classical academy in Philadelphia in 1853-1857, was principal of the Oak Grove academy at Vassalboro, Maine, in 1858-1860, was principal and superintendent of the Friends' school at Providence, Rhode Island, in 1860-1879, and became a member of the United States Board of Indian Commissioners in 1879. In 1869 he bought, at the northern end of Lake Mohonk, a tract of land on which he built a large hotel. Here, in October 1883, the first Conference of the Friends of the American Indian met; these conferences have since been held annually, their scope being enlarged in 1904 to include consideration of the condition of "other dependent peoples" - i.e. the natives of the Philippines, Porto Rico and Hawaii. The first conference on international arbitration was held here in June 1895.