In 1885, James Roosevelt, a businessman and country gentleman of Hyde Park, New York, built a cottage on this site as a summer retreat for his wife, Sara Delano, and their son Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Franklin spent many of his boyhood summers there. Eleanor Roosevelt was a guest there in 1904. Franklin and Eleanor were married in 1905, and in 1907 Sara Roosevelt purchased the Kuhn cottage and gave it to the married couple. The Kuhn cottage became the now known Roosevelt Cottage. The cottage that stood on this site was removed in 1951.