The 2025 Focus Tour Caramoor & World War II has been extended through September 20! Tours are available on select dates and by appointment

“The necessary gasoline rationing will keep everyone at home and will encourage domestic virtues. We hope to do a lot of music in our spare time and a good deal of reading and simple living.” When Walter Rosen wrote these lines in a letter to a friend in May 1942, he had no way of knowing what the future held for the Rosen family and for all Americans during years of the second World War. This season, in recognition of Caramoor’s 80^th anniversary season which coincides with the 80^th anniversary of the end of the war, the Rosen House Focus Tour theme will be Caramoor & World War II.

Jessa Krick, Director of Interpretation, Collection and Archives, explains the connection, “These two anniversaries are more than just a coincidence. Without the impact of the war on the Rosen family, Caramoor would not exist as it does today. And we hope visitors this this season will come away with a new understanding of that history.” Krick mined the Rosen House archive for the tour, building on research begun in 2024 by Olivia Braia, Caramoor’s first Summer Research Fellow.

All tours follow the standard tour path through the Rosen House, but new content delivered by docents and by special signs relates to the tour theme. The topics of the tour include the British War Relief dance held at Caramoor in 1941, gas and food rationing, the experience of Lucie Rosen’s brother John Dodge who was held as a German prisoner-of-war and managed to escape multiple times, providing Hollywood inspiration years later. Some of the themes will be heart-breaking, Krick acknowledged, such as the death of the Rosens’ son, pilot Walter Bigelow Rosen in 1944, but it was the Rosens’ full experience of the war— the tragic and the joyful events—that provided the inspiration for Walter and Lucie to create public programming at Caramoor, a legacy that is still strong 80 years later. “For the Rosens, Caramoor was a place to retreat, reflect and come to terms with the emotional toll of the war. They didn’t plan for that, but they recognized it, Lucie especially.” Krick said.

Caramoor continues to this day to be a place to escape from daily life, only now many more people feel connected to the site and enjoy the music, the gardens, and the art collection, both in the Rosen House and on the grounds with sound art.  In fact, Lucie’s description of Caramoor in the post-war years is still apt today: “It would seem to be the purpose of Caramoor that [people] will pause here, from all kinds of business, to think and dream, feel joy and pity and hope for humankind.”