Lindley Thomasset, a Caramoor volunteer since 2012, remembers the night she met Caramoor’s founder, Lucie Rosen, in June of 1966. The temperature that day reached 107 degrees in New York City, where she was home from Bennington College for the weekend. She drove up to Caramoor in an air-conditioned car with her father, four siblings, and adopted mother, the beloved coloratura opera singer Beverly Sills, who was opening Caramoor’s 11th season with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and Maestro Julius Rudel. The program included Poulenc’s Gloria and Debussy’s L’Enfant prodigue.
“It was wonderful. It was just a marvelous concert,” Lindley recalls wistfully. “I sat on the back steps during the concert (that was before the Venetian Theater had a tent) and Lucie was at the top of the steps in her motorized wheelchair.” (Lucie had been in a car accident near the end of her life, leaving her immobile without the chair). “I don’t remember what we talked about, but she was very kind.”
“They had a reception after the concert, and the light bulbs were strung up all over the place. It was very dark, and there were lots of spiders and black flies and stuff ... Caramoor was kind of spooky back then. It was an amazing atmosphere.” Lindley pauses and shares an aside: “One night, while mom was singing, a mosquito flew into her mouth. That was kind of awkward ...” (Note to singers on Caramoor’s current calendar: we now have bug spray in good supply!)
“Lucie was very, very gracious to me because she and my grandmother were close friends,” explains Lindley. She is referring to Clara Fargo Thomas, the grandmother on the side of her birth mother, whose family owned the white farmhouse that is now The Harvey School, right down the road from Caramoor. While their respective summer homes in Katonah were less than a mile apart, Clara and Lucie had befriended each other years earlier in New York City; they shared an admiration for the same portrait artist, Cecilia Beaux, among many other things in common.
The friendship between Clara and Lucie continued through three generations. When Clara’s daughter, Jane (that’s Lindley’s birth mother), and father, Peter Greenough, were newly married in 1944, they spent a weekend with the Rosens at Caramoor. Peter was a WWII pilot like Walter Rosen Jr., so the two guys “hit it off.” They played tennis together on the grass court (where the pavilion is now) only a few weeks before Walter Jr. died of wartime injuries.
Somehow, Lindley — who was separated from her mother’s side of the family early in life due to Jane’s severe mental illness — did not know that her grandparents had owned property practically next door to Caramoor. Lindley and her husband Paul (now married 52 years) moved to Bedford in 1976 simply because it seemed a good fit. “I felt completely at home here and didn’t understand why,” she explains. Only later did she uncover the deep Bedford-Katonah roots in her DNA.
Lindley has enjoyed a rewarding 38-year career as a speech language pathologist in Westchester and beyond. In addition to volunteering at Caramoor, she donates her time to several other local organizations including the Bedford Hills Women’s Club (for 47 years!) and the Hudson Bells (for 40 years!), in which she sings first soprano (trained long ago by her adopted mother).
While she enjoys her ushering and program/fan-distribution roles in each of Caramoor’s concert venues, the Spanish Courtyard is her hands-down favorite. "I know where all the seats are. And I know that when people come in, I can show them to their seats quickly. Also, it’s easy to retreat to the sides and listen to the concert. It’s just a really nice venue.”
And Lindley is a really nice volunteer! We thank her for her time and for sharing her deep connection to Caramoor.
NOTE: Kidney Donor Needed
Like many people, Lindley is in search of a kidney donor. If you're willing and able to make a life-saving organ donation, please consider giving the gift of life. You can take a survey to determine your eligibility here, and you can learn more about living donations here.