The long-time caretakers of Grant Cottage, Oliver Pendleton Clarke (O.P.) and his wife Martha Josephine Kelsey Clarke (Josie) began their life on Mount McGregor in the fall of 1889. They would spend the rest of their lives on the mountain dedicating themselves to preserving Grant Cottage and the memory of U.S. Grant’s final battle there in 1885.
In 1889, O.P. was a high-ranking official in the New York State Department of the Grand Army of the Republic (a Union Veteran organization), an attorney specializing in pension law and author. Disabled as a result of his prisoner-of-war experience at Andersonville during the Civil War, he accepted the job of caretaker in the hope his health would improve. Josie was an amateur painter and botanist who grew to love the Cottage and the mountain as much as her husband did.
Living historians Steve Trimm (O.P.) and Melissa Trombley-Prosch (Josie) will share reflections on their life together on Mt. McGregor in the setting of Memorial Day, 1907.
