History & Culture · Catskills
Roxbury's Big Names Sit in a Small Mountain Town
Roxbury's history carries Jay Gould, John Burroughs, hamlets, mountains, and a village-scale Catskills feel.
Published July 6, 2026 · Last verified July 6, 2026
Roxbury carries big names without losing its mountain-town scale. Jay Gould was born on a West Settlement farmstead in 1836 and became a railroad magnate and financier. John Burroughs was born in Roxbury in 1837 and became a naturalist-essayist whose old home ground still matters to readers and walkers.
The two men point in different directions. Gould’s story runs toward railroads, maps, money, and Gilded Age controversy. Burroughs’ story runs toward birds, weather, woods, essays, and Woodchuck Lodge.
Roxbury’s built landscape holds the stories in place. Main Street was listed on the State and National Registers in 1986 after citizens pushed back against a road-widening plan. A hamlet-wide historic designation followed in 2003.
The place names are part of the pleasure: Jay Gould Memorial Reformed Church, Kirkside Park, Woodchuck Lodge, mountain roads, and the East Branch of the Delaware River.
A person can spend a day there noticing architecture, then end up thinking about writers, railroad money, and the shape of the valley.
Roxbury feels layered instead of quaint. The town can carry famous lives, local preservation, and Catskills road life at the same time.