Rose Hill Farm, c.1800
In 1747, John Watts, a wealthy merchant in the British colony of New York, purchased
property from present 21st to 30th Streets. Watts had his primary residence
in a townhouse on Pearl Street and purchased this land outside the city to create
a country estate that he called Rose Hill after his family's ancestral home
in Scotland. An estate house and farm buildings were constructed on what is
now 24th Street, just west of Second Avenue.
