Revolution Records: where the past plays on

Revolution Records in Torrington has the largest selection of vinyl in the area.
Theo Maniatis
Revolution Records in Torrington has the largest selection of vinyl in the area.
On the corner of Willow and Franklin Streets in Torrington, Revolution Records doesn’t announce itself with fanfare. But inside, you’ll find a library of music from a bygone era.
The store bins overflow with records of every genre, while the walls are blanketed with posters from the 1980s —U2, Rush, and other bands that defined a generation. A community board invites local musicians to find bandmates.
“When I opened this store, I wanted it to feel like my bedroom when I was a teenager,” said John Dibella, who founded the shop six years ago before handing it over to his lifelong friend, Ted Pirro. Pirro, a music lover with shoulder-length silver hair, has spent most of his life working in record stores.
More than a retail shop, Revolution Records has become something of a community center. Pirro calls his most devoted customers “hall of famers” — regulars who arrive without fail every week and chat for hours.
“There’s one gentleman here who’s a huge Beach Boys fan,” said Pirro. “He comes in every Saturday at six like clockwork and we’ll talk about the Beach Boys, how he discovered Brian Wilson.” Another regular, “Magic Phil,” comes in Fridays to discuss the Mets.
The store has also become a meeting ground across generations. Parents and grandparents bring in college-age kids getting their first turntables, bonding over their shared love of music.
“A lot of them are basically rebuying their youth,” Dibella said. “They want to hear it the way they remember hearing it.”
Dibella and Pirro remember when vinyl ruled in the mid-80s, with bustling stores on every block of the West Village. But starting in the 1980s, CDs and cassettes upended the industry. By 2006, album sales had plummeted, and famous record stores shuttered.
“We bought albums from those days marked down to $2.99 that are now worth $35, $40,” explained Dibella. “That’s how much people had no interest in vinyl.”
Ted Pirro has spent most of his life working in record stores and now runs Revolution Records in Torrington.Theo Maniatis
Now, from the brink of extinction, vinyl has been revived. Album sales reached 43.6 million last year for the first time since the 1980s.
Part of old-time records’ appeal lies in the treasure hunt. Dibella’s greatest find came from a box someone rescued from the town dump. Most of it was junk. But, he says, “Second to last record in the box is a King Crimson white label promo of their first album.”
Only 300 were ever made, with maybe ten surviving in good condition. Dibella bought it for a dollar. The actual value? Over a thousand dollars.
Vinyl’s other appeal is the warm, dynamic sound that can’t be captured in digital format. “If you’re listening on YouTube or Spotify, the sound is very compressed,” Pirro said. “You’re not getting the full, rich experience.”
Maybe the greatest appeal of records is the tangible, physical experience: admiring the cover, gently placing the stylus, and those few seconds of static before the music plays.
Running an independent record store is not easy, however. Pirro works six days a week, and the worries of the job linger with him on the seventh day too. There are slow periods after holidays when people travel, and the challenge of finding quality collections to buy.
But for Pirro, it is more than worth it. “I put all my energy into this thing because I don’t want to work for anyone else again,” he said. “The fact that I get to discuss my number one love in life every day is just awesome.”
Opulent furnishings and decoration ranging from Asian statues and paintings to Gulf Oil gas station signs adorn the mansion at the Hitchcock Estate.
MILLBROOK — After decades of infamy and just over a year on the market, Millbrook’s Hitchcock Estate continues to exist in relative mystery.
After a notorious few years in the 1960s, little has been heard about the estate recently — a stealthy departure from its past. The appearance of last year’s listing provided the first glimpse inside the property in nearly a decade.
However, correct details about what had become of the house in recent years remained difficult to find. It remained clear, though, that the Hitchcock Estate was no ordinary house for sale.
Billy Hitchcock and his brother Tommy purchased the 2,087-acre property, which is roughly one-seventh the size of Manhattan, in 1963. Psychedelic pioneer Timothy Leary famously came to live in the house after being introduced to Billy through his sister Peggy Hitchcock.
There are so many rooms in the main house that some of the smaller ones lack a clearly-defined purpose.Photo by Charlie Greenberg
Following Leary’s time in the estate’s main house, it fell into disrepair and was boarded up. After undergoing some restoration by historian John Foreman, Tommy finished repairing the house to a liveable but not modernized state.
“My brother did a wonderful job fixing the big house and putting it back together,” Billy Hitchcock said. Tommy handled the maintenance of the estate and lived on it part time. However, upon his death in 2023, there was nobody to coordinate the property’s extensive maintenance needs, prompting the Hitchcock family to list the estate for sale, Billy said.
While the Hitchcock Estate is best known for its role in the psychedelic awakening, that period reflects only a small part of the broader segments of American society between which the estate serves as a nexus.
The estate has attracted numerous illustrious occupants throughout its history. The estate’s builder, Charles F. Dieterich, was a German-born industrialist who made his fortune in the acetylene gas business, building the estate to remind him of his native Bavaria; Charles Mingus wrote the song “Peggy’s Blue Skylight” about Peggy Hitchcock after visiting.
Old and new money, creators of and rebels against the establishment each have passed through the estate, leaving psychedelic artwork and Gulf Oil memorabilia testament to past times behind the open landscapes and ornate architecture.
Some of the smaller bedrooms in the main house are quite liveable and ordinary. TommyHitchcock III’s restoration efforts are visible in the newly-painted walls and trim.Photo by Charlie Greenberg
Often overshadowed by his involvement with Leary is Billy Hitchcock’s prominent lineage. Billy’s mother, Margaret Mellon Hitchcock, was the daughter of Gulf Oil founder William Larimer Mellon and the great-granddaughter of Mellon fortune founder Thomas Mellon.
Billy’s father, Tommy Hitchcock Jr. was referred to in 1956 by the New York Times as the greatest polo player in the history of the sport. Tommy Jr. was also F. Scott Fitzgerald’s inspiration for the character of Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby.
“My father was a pilot in the First World War. He was shot down by the Germans and escaped all by the time he was 19,” Billy said.
In World War II, too old to be a combat pilot, Billy said, Tommy Jr. was a test pilot for fighter planes when he was killed in an aircraft test.
The Hitchcock Estate has its own parallel history with that of the Village of Millbrook, with the scope of events and personalities it attracted seemingly beyond those that unfold on the other side of Route 44. But the estate today has a much quieter appeal about it.
Entering the estate from its far less conspicuous and more frequently used entrance on Valley Farm Road, it is not difficult to see what appealed to prominent people throughout the years looking for a getaway that existed apart from the rest of the world and their substantial places in it.
The main estate house on the Hitchcock estate in Millbrook was constructed in the late 19th century by German acetylene gas magnate Charles Dieterich.
At 14,000 square feet, the main house at the Hitchcock Estate was comparatively modest when architect James E. Ware added onto an existing farmhouse on several occasions to create the Bavarian-inspired building in the late 19th century. At 34 rooms, however, the scale of the house, and indeed the entire property, is not something that is commonly seen in Millbrook today.
Large estates built around distinctive mansions were a more typical sight in Millbrook at the time the Hitchcock Estate was built, but years of structure fires and property subdivision have made them increasingly rare. Regardless, the estate was unmatched in scale even at the time of its building.
The Bavarian influences on the main house and property’s smaller buildings, stone walls and patios give the property a surreal feeling of being in an abandoned fairy tale. Few people see the property today beyond the farmers and caretakers who keep it up — Billy Hitchcock, now in his eighties, lives in Texas and other members do not visit often, he said.
Tommy Hitchcock III’s restoration work is evident. Freshly painted, the main house looks quite tidy with the exception of some overgrown trees around the veranda. Windows broken during the Leary years have been replaced, though the house’s more ornate leaded glass windows remained intact.
It is a one-mile drive, without leaving the Hitchcock property, from the main house to The Bungalow, a second mansion on the property constructed by architect Addison Mizner in 1912. At 10,000 square feet, The Bungalow is not as intimate as the name suggests. It was designed by Addison Mizner of Palm Beach, Florida fame and was the home of Tommy and Billy Hitchcock when they were in residence.
“We all love the property,” Billy Hitchcock said. “We’re sorry to be letting it go after 60 years.” Given the estate’s large size — 900 acres larger than the Village of Millbrook — Hitchcock understands the interest the community has in its sale. “It’s hard to say where this is going to come out,” Hitchcock said, though he is committed to selling the property to someone who understands its value to the community.
Granted, there few more knowledgeable than Mr. Hitchcock about the ways something personal to a small number of influential people can in turn become important to countless others beyond the inner circle.
A large group of Millerton and North East residents turned out for the Tuesday, July 29, meeting, causing a last-minute venue change to the NorthEast-Millerton Library annex on Century Boulevard.
MILLERTON — At their regular meeting on Tuesday, July 29, the Village Board of Trustees addressed two key issues that could affect village governance and planning. The meeting drew a crowd of more than 50 people, prompting a last-minute venue change to the NorthEast-Millerton Library Annex to accommodate the turnout.
While much of the evening focused on public feedback regarding a proposal from village and Town of North East residents concerning cooperation between the Millerton Police Department and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, trustees also discussed several additional items with long-term implications.
One of those was a public hearing on “Local Law X,” a proposal that would allow members of the village’s Planning Board and Zoning Board of Appeals to reside anywhere in Dutchess County rather than within the village limits. The goal, according to board members, is to widen the pool of qualified candidates at a time when interest in these volunteer roles has been low.
Both boards have had vacancies for over six months. Mayor Najdek noted that with the village’s small population, there’s a limited number of potential applicants. She also clarified that, per legal counsel, the board could not limit eligibility to just the Town of North East. “It is not legal to only open it up to the town,” Najdek said. “You have to open it up to the entire county.”
Newly appointed Zoning Board Chair Kelly Kilmer addressed public concerns during the hearing, citing confusion circulating on Facebook. “This does not apply to the village board,” she said, explaining that the change would affect only appointed members of the planning and zoning boards. “It is very crucial that we get people on these boards.”
Kilmer acknowledged concerns about non-residents having influence over village matters but emphasized that limited participation has forced the board’s hand. “Unless village residents step up to the plate and want to have a say in what’s happening, this law has to go into effect,” she said. “Currently we only have four members on our zoning board. So we could have a tie at any point in a vote, and that’s not good. When people are trying to plan things to upgrade the village — whether it be their home, their business, or whatever — we need people who are going to be here and engaged in the village.”
One resident was in favor, urging people to think of the town and village as one community working toward the same goals, rather than separate entities. “We have to think that even though we might live in the town, we might also have businesses in the village, and we have to work together.”
Not everyone was in favor of the change. Ray Nelson, a village resident and architect, expressed skepticism. “It’s a shame we can’t get someone in the village to step up,” he said, adding, “I’m not particularly excited about this idea. Someone from outside might not understand the issues in the village or the nuances of our community.”
As of now, the Zoning Board of Appeals has one open seat. The Planning Board has one vacancy and is expected to have a second seat open in September 2025. Those interested in learning more or applying should contact Village Clerk Lisa Cope at clerk@villageofmillerton-ny.gov
While Local Law X will open up the pool of applicants, the appointments are made by the mayor’s office and candidates would be fairly vetted prior to being invited to join a board.
A motion to adopt Local Law X passed unanimously by roll‑call vote.
In other business, the board unanimously voted to pursue a state designation as a Pro-Housing Community, following in the Town of North East’s footsteps. The certification, granted by New York State Homes and Community Renewal, recognizes municipalities that actively support housing growth and reduce development barriers. Trustees authorized Mayor Najdek to submit a letter of intent — the first formal step in the application process.
The board also voted unanimously in a roll-call vote to finalize two inter-municipal agreements with the Town of North East. The first was for a shared court officer, which the town approved with a 3% increase over last year. The second was for the joint parks and recreation program. While the village had requested a 3% increase for that contract as well, the town approved it with no increase, citing the cancellation of this year’s summer camp due to projected construction of the new community park. Both agreements will be revisited in September to allow more time for negotiation ahead of next year.
In other routine business, the board approved meeting minutes, voted on vouchers and village bills, and heard department and mayoral updates. During public comment, members of Townscape raised the issue of moving forward with tree replacements along South Center Street and Main Street.
Groundbreaking of the new pool planned for Eddie Collins Park is now scheduled to begin in 2026 after the Village of Millerton's 175th anniversary celebration next summer.
MILLERTON – During her mayor’s update at the Tuesday, July 29, trustees meeting, a visibly dejected Mayor Najdek shared a significant delay in the timeline for the community park project — specifically the long-awaited swimming pool.
“I’m sure you’ve all seen that construction has not started,” she began. After meeting recently with project engineers, Najdek said she was told that construction would not be feasible before April 2026.
“With that in mind, it was my recommendation that we wait until after the 175th celebration so that we actually have a physical place to host it,” she said. Najdek, who has championed the park project for years, acknowledged the frustration and added, “It will never be ready in time for our celebration regardless of how hard we push any permitting agencies, so we’ll be waiting on that.” The celebration of the Village’s anniversary is scheduled to take place from July 11-19, 2026.
Originally slated to begin this past spring, construction of the park has now been pushed back more than a year, largely due to a slow permitting process related to wetlands on the property, according to Najdek. Roughly a month ago, she warned of potential delays, though at the time, there was hope the setback would be measured in months — not a full year.
Najdek did not elaborate on the reason for the year-long delay during the meeting, but in July she noted that both the Dutchess County Board of Health and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation were still reviewing the project in connection to septic system placement and wetland buffer regulations.
July 25 — Deputies arrested Vicente A. Mejia, age 48, for Felony Driving While Intoxicated subsequent to a traffic stop on Route 55 in the Town of Dover. The subject is to appear in the Town of Dover Court at a later date.
July 26 — Deputies responded to Fairway Drive in the Town of Pawling for a mother-son domestic dispute. Matter resolved without further police intervention.
July 28 — Deputies report the arrest of Abigail C. Sprague (36) for Aggravated Unlicensed Operation of a Motor Vehicle in the third degree subsequent to a traffic stop in the Dover. Subject to appear in the Town of Dover Court at a later date
July 30 — Deputies report the arrest of Elizabeth J. Meuller, age 71, for Aggravated Unlicensed Operation of a Motor Vehicle in the third degree subsequent to a traffic stop in the Town of Pawling. Subject to appear in the Town of Pawling Court at a later date.
July 30 — Deputies responded to 7 Fish St. in Millerton for a father/daughter domestic dispute. Matter resolved without further police intervention.
PLEASE NOTE: All subjects arrested and charged are alleged to have committed the crime and are presumed innocent until proven guilty and are to appear in local courts later.
If you have any information relative to the aforementioned criminal cases, or any other suspected criminal activity please contact the Dutchess County Sheriff’s Office tip line at 845 605 CLUE (2583) or Email dcsotips@gmail.com. All information will be kept confidential.