Idylease Inn

The Inn was built for a group of 11 investors calling themselves The Newfoundland Health Association headed by Dr Edgar Day[1] from Brooklyn, New York.

Idylease is situated on the summit of an 1,000-foot (300 m)-hill in the foothills of the Ramapo Mountains and is located 30 miles northwest from New York City.

On the exterior the most salient features associated with this type are the broad veranda and second story balcony which deteriorated and was removed sometime during the 1930s.

Expansive porches and open air-balconies were an essential feature of the resort hotel, providing guests with vistas of the surrounding wilderness and pleasant public spaces for social gatherings.

Verandas also served as sanitary and therapeutic retreats from which to enjoy the "healthful and moral atmosphere of nature, reflecting the popularity of resorts not only for pleasure and recreational activity but also for escapes from the crowded, disease ridden and immoral conditions of the suddenly industrialized cities of the northeast."

Dr. Day founded The Newfoundland Village Improvement Society in 1902 which was formed to "protect the interest of the residents and property holders of Newfoundland, New Jersey improve the conditions of the roads, secure better railroad service, and in general do whatever shall tend to increase the beauty and attractiveness of our village and its surroundings."

Thomas Edison was a regular guest of Idylease while working on a magnetic ore extracting device at the Franklin/Odgensberg Mine[2] for the New Jersey Zinc Company .

F. Fichter Hoagan, a longtime business manager to previous owner Dr. Daniel Drake often reminisced of the days when “Mr.

As a young girl, Priscilla was a glamorous model whose fun loving and explosive personality and blazing bohemian beauty befuddled and charmed some of the greatest artists of the postwar world.