Wappingers Falls, New York

Wappingers Falls is a village in the towns of Poughkeepsie and Wappinger, in Dutchess County, New York, United States. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 5,522. The community was named for the cascade in Wappinger Creek. The Wappingers Falls post office covers areas in the towns of Wappinger, Poughkeepsie, Fishkill, East Fishkill, and LaGrange. This can result in some confusion when residents of the outlying towns, who do not live in the village, give their address as "Wappingers Falls".

Grinnell Library, located in the village, is the sixth-oldest library in the state.

The Wappinger were an Algonquian-speaking confederacy of Native Americans whose territory in the 17th century extended along the eastern bank of the Hudson River. Primarily based in what is now Dutchess County, their territory was bordered by Manhattan Island to the south, the Mahican territory bounded by the Roeliff Jansen Kill to the north, and extended east into parts of Connecticut. Wappinger means "easterner" in most Algonquian languages.

The area was part of the Rombout Patent. In 1741, two Dutchmen, Nicholas and Adolphus Brewer, purchased 750 acres (300 ha) of land around the falls and built the first stone house in the village near the present Mill Street. In 1742, the Brewers built a mill on the east side of Wappinger Creek. Nicholas Brewer built the Mesier Homestead, which he sold in 1777 to Matthew VanBenschoten, who, in turn, sold it to Peter Mesier Sr., a merchant from New York City.

In May 1777, soldiers and local residents attacked Peter Mesier's house in Wappingers Falls, disputing the price of tea for sale in a small store inside his home. Mesier was a merchant from New York City and a Loyalist. The angry mob struck Mesier, beat his slaves, and drank wine stored in the cellar. They also took the tea and left a small amount of money behind.

The local waterfall was important for early industrial development. In 1819 a small cotton mill was built in the hollow created by the creek as it descends from Wappinger Lake to drain into the Hudson River. By 1856 it had become one of the largest printworks in the country. A fire that year destroyed the original buildings completely, but they were immediately rebuilt and continued in operation until 1931. The streets on the hillside opposite the mill are lined with frame houses, mostly duplexes, built by the mill for its workers. The two halves of the village are connected by an 1884 stone arch bridge that replaced earlier wooden structures.

The village of Wappingers Falls was incorporated in 1871 and included the adjacent community on the west side of the Wappinger Creek, by then called Channingville. The east side was known as Franklindale. In 1885 the Franklindale Cotton Mill, which employed about 130 people, was destroyed by fire. During President Grover Cleveland’s second administration, the Independent Comb Factory on the corner of Fulton and Prospect streets was forced to close. The repeal of the tariff made it impossible for the company to compete with German-made combs. In 1909, the Garner Print Works were sold and became the Dutchess Bleachery. The plant, which at times employed as many as 1,150 people, stopped printing calico but continued as a bleachery and dye works.

On June 3, 2017, downtown Wappingers Falls had a devastating structure fire that left more than 30 people displaced and six businesses temporarily closed. No one was injured during the fire, which spread through a strip of buildings in the East Main Street corridor on the Saturday afternoon.