Wildcliff

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2002. 15 historic topographic surveys show this location, the earliest from 1891.

From the record

“Wildcliff, also referred to as the Cyrus Lawton House, was a historic residence overlooking Long Island Sound in New Rochelle in Westchester County, New York. This 20-room cottage-villa, built in about 1852, was designed by prominent architect Alexander Jackson Davis in the Gothic Revival style.”
Wikipedia article Wildcliff, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 250 National Register listings published here for Westchester County · listed in 2002 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. 42 Wildcliff Rd., New Rochelle, 10805
When was it listed? December 2002
Category. building
City. New Rochelle city
Architectural style. Tudor Revival architecture, Gothic Revival
National Register reference number. 02001656 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Then and now

1891 to 1995

The ground this property stands on, surveyed 104 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet covering Wildcliff, surveyed 1995

Topographic sheet covering Wildcliff, surveyed 1891

Fires near this property

694 since 2000

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 694 fires within 5 miles of Wildcliff between 2000 and 2020, burning about 268 acres in total. 54 started naturally. 47 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	449
Smoking	78
Natural	54
Arson/incendiarism	47
Recreation and ceremony	29
Equipment and vehicle use	18
Debris and open burning	12
Power generation/transmission/distribution	5
Other causes	1
Misuse of fire by a minor	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
9 September 2016	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	N/A
9 September 2015	Natural	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	N/A
9 September 2010	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	not named
9 September 2010	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	not named
9 September 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	not named
8 September 2014	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	not named
8 September 2010	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	not named
8 September 2010	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Fire Department of New York	not named

Every fire recorded in Westchester County

Storms near this property

6 since 1996

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names New Rochelle, the town this property stands in, in 6 storm reports between 1996 and 2008: 3 lightning, 3 thunderstorm wind. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
August 2008	Lightning	New Rochelle	$15,000	Lightning struck the steeple of New Rochelle High School, causing significant damage.
July 1996	Lightning	New Rochelle	$5,000	no account filed
June 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	New Rochelle	$2,000	Multiple trees were reported down.
August 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	New Rochelle	-	Wires down at multiple locations including: North Avenue at Quaker Ridge Road, Fairview Place, and Franklin Avenue.
August 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	New Rochelle	-	no account filed
April 1999	Lightning	New Rochelle	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Westchester County

Maps showing this location

15 surveys

United States Geological Survey topographic sheets whose coverage includes this point. Matched by taking the coordinate the National Park Service records for this property, then testing that coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet.

1891 USGS Harlem quadrangle1:62500
1897 USGS Harlem quadrangle1:62500 - 4 printings
1898 USGS Harlem quadrangle1:62500
1900 USGS Harlem quadrangle1:62500 - 16 printings
1947 USGS Mt Vernon quadrangle1:24000
1949 USGS New York quadrangle1:250000
1954 USGS New York quadrangle1:250000 - 2 printings
1956 USGS Mount Vernon quadrangle1:24000 - 2 printings
1957 USGS New York quadrangle1:250000
1958 USGS New York quadrangle1:250000 - 3 printings
1960 USGS New York quadrangle1:250000 - 2 printings
1966 USGS Mount Vernon quadrangle1:24000 - 4 printings
1969 USGS New York quadrangle1:250000
1984 USGS Long Island West quadrangle1:100000 - 2 printings
1995 USGS Mount Vernon quadrangle1:24000

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Davenport House	0.3 miles	1980
Lispenard-Rodman-Davenport House	0.4 miles	1986
Pioneer Building	0.7 miles	1983
US Post Office-New Rochelle	0.7 miles	1989
First Presbyterian Church and Pintard, Lewis, House	0.8 miles	1979
New Rochelle Railroad Station	0.8 miles	2009

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 02001656 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Westchester County	All 250 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.