Friday, July 31, 2009

Book Trails

SELECTED to represent New York on the United State map distributed to kids at the massive National Book Festival in Washington DC in September is River of Dreams, written and illustrated by GreeneLand's illustrious Hudson Talbott. The festival, sponsored by the Library of Congress, drawing thousands upon thousands of visitors to the National Mall, according to its publicist, "celebrates the joys of reading and lifelong literacy." President and Ms Obama will grace the event. An autographed copy of River of Dreams could find its way, via Malia and Sasha, to the White House--augmented perhaps by another tantalizing Talbott tome, United Tweets of America. (Meanwhile, concert versions of the musical adaptation of River will be performed soon by the youthful cast at five Hudson Valley events). ISSUED recently by ace GreeneLand publisher Deborah Allen (Black Dome Press) is a worthy successor to the 2006 guidebook Trails With Tales, by the team of Russell Dunn and Barbara Delaney. Adirondack Trails With Tales does for 26 northerly bucolic attractions what its predecessor did for closer climes (the Catskill, the Berkshires, the Hudson Valley...). Its "History Hikes" provide, as the authors say, a literary "marriage of physical outdoor adventure and historical appreciation." ------Readers can learn, for example, not only how to get to John Brown's farm, but also how he came to settle there and what happened to him and his family in the wake of his and his sons' pre-Civil War on the Federal armory at Harpers Ferry. Then there's Cooper's Cave, with careful directions for hikers along with discussion of its resemblance to what James Fenimore Cooper depicted in The Last of the Mohicans. -----Henry Hudson's discovery of what came to be known as the Hudson River coincided in 1609 with Samuel deChamplain's discovery of his eponymous lake. The story of Coon Lake involves William Gilliland, and Benedict Arnold, and a Declaration of Principles that evoked charges of treason against the British Crown. Paul Smith is a place as well as a name; and therein hangs a tale. Following the fierce Battle of Lake George during the French and Indian War (August 1755), 200 bodies of Frenchmen and Indians were dumped in a place that was known thereafter as Bloody Pond. Col. Ephraim Williams, a hero on the British/colonial side, was the founding benefactor of Williams College. Fort Ticonderoga, strategically placed at the headwaters of Lake Champlain, was captured by Britons and colonials from the French, by American rebels from the Brits, by the Brits from the Yanks, then by the Yanks--sometimes without a shot being fired, eventually without much in the way of fortifications. The Keene Valley in the 1870's was a major target for landscape painters who, imbued with Hudson River School values, sought grander vistas than were afforded by the Catskills. The hamlet of Adirondac, once the home of a thriving iron ore industry, was abandoned, then revived a bit as the Preston Pond Club and then the Tahawus sportsmen's club. Vice-President Theodore Roosevelt was staying there when news came in September 1901 than President William McKinley was dying; he went through quite an ordeal on horseback, coach and and railroad to get back to Washington. ------Those historic notes and many more adjoin solid practical guidance for hikers. Moreover, the book's table of contents gives readers a choice between selecting hikes by "theme" (battle sites, estates, lighthouses, islands, rock formations, historical eras from Colonial through Gilded Age) and by effort level (Easy through Difficult). SIMILAR in character to the Dunn & Delaney "history hikes," and closer to home, is The Hudson River School Art Trail Guide, just published by the Thomas Cole National Historic Site. This 50-page booklet combines straightforward information about reaching eight selected sites (seven in GreeneLand plus Olana, just across the Hudson), with enlightening words and pictures telling why those sites are memorable. The pictures are reproductions of paintings made in the 1800's by Hudson River School artists (Cole, Church, Durand, Cropsey, Gifford, Moore, Bartlett) along with photographs ( Francis X. Driscoll especially) of those scenes today. The words are carefully researched, lucid accounts (thanks to Gregory Rosenthal and Elizabeth Jacks) of circumstances that shaped the site selections, the pictures, and the careers of the painters. ALSO SIMILAR is a historic-scenic comment that occurs in both of these guidebooks. In Adirondack Trails With Tales, we are reminded that "painters and writers were extolling the picturesque scenery [of the High Peaks and of the Hudson Valley] at the same time that entrepreneurs were digging, chopping, and exploiting that very same scenery." In the Art Trail Guide we are reminded that "most Hudson River School artists chose to 'erase' from their paintings the true environmental degradation they found in the Catskills" in consequence of "the effects of industry on the landscape." To devotees of natural landscapes, most of the mountain, woodland, waterfall, rural sites portrayed in these guidebooks look better now than they did in years past.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Out & About

“DAZZLING” will do as a characterization of the July/August issue of InsideOut magazine. The thrills in this “second annual Art issue” from Athens-based publisher Owen Lipstein begin with the cover: Pete Seeger in the foreground of a Hudson landscape by Jasper Cropsey. That is just the latest in a series of brilliantly contrived InsideOut covers. Our shrunken copies of the two latest covers do not do full justice to the originals. To see them as they deserve, click http://insideouthv.com, then find the Cover Archives link (down-screen on the left). After clicking Cover Archives, you’ll get a gallery of pictures. For full-sized views, left-click on each picture. (Then find the Subscribe link, and place your order).

TOUTED to investors in financial sector stocks, by international tipster Jake Lynch of TheStreet.com : Catskill-based Greene County Bancorp, parent of the Bank of Greene County, "a full-service bank offering retail, commercial, municipal and investment-management services in upstateNew York. [We] upgraded the stock to 'buy'in October, when the financial crisis was starting to mushroom. Since then, the company has maintained resilience in its asset qualify.Fiscal third-quarter revenue, in the three months through March, increased 9.3% to $6.74 million, and earnings per share jumped 75%. Greene County's financial position remained strong, as reflected by a cash balance of $21.4 million and just $19 million of debt obligations. The shares are cheap on the basis of earnings, sales and cash flow in the thrifts and mortgage finance industry. With a price-to-earnings ratio of 15.4, Greene County is 63% cheaper than its average peer. The stock offers a dividend yield of 4.74%, well above the 3.2% average of the S&P 500 Index. Greene County [Bancorp] has risen 37% this year, outperforming the Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq.” Bank officials here confirm the cited numbers, and foresee an even better earnings report for the April-June period. Moreover, continuation of quarterly dividend of 17 cents per share (for owners other than the parent company) was announced yesterday.

TOUTED in the July-August issue of American Art Review: “River Views of the Hudson River School,” an article, amply illustrated, by Elizabeth Jacks, executive director of the Thomas Cole National Historic Site. Ten years ago, Ms Jacks recalls, the home and workplace of Cole “stood in ruins.” It was “shedding roof shingles with each gust of wind,” the porch was “too dangerous to walk on,” water from burst pipes filled the basement. The daring rescue led by Raymond Beecher paved the way for a “meteoric rise.” People now are learning anew about the man whose approach to art once dominated American “visual culture” and who shaped distinctive American “ideals and assumptions”: “equating nature with a divine presence, …awe for America’s natural wonders, and belief that America is something of a Promised Land.”

MOTHER SUES DAUGHTER? Yes, but. Marilyn Stefans is co-plaintiff and her daughter Donna is a co-defendant in a court-ordered foreclosure auction to be held August 14th in the County Building. The target property at 61 Hunter Drive is called the Club at Hunter Mountain (but is not the once-flourishing Club Hunter that burned down). It includes a 10,000-square-foot clubhouse (now housing Milan’s Perfect Lift restaurant), a pool, and tennis courts on a five-acre site that is close to the Hunter Highlands condominiums. The amount of lien for the whole shebang, in consequence of debts dating from 2000, is a mere $295,000 or so. The sale at auction would extinguish a second mortgage obligation of over $500,000. The Stefans ladies are only nominally adversarial in the case. They are business partners, as Registered Rersentatives of Walnut Street Securities, in Woodbury NY.

DEPARTING from Main Street, Catskill, after four years in business, and after an ongoing sell-off (25-50% discounts) of choice 20th century decorative and artistic objects: Harold Hanson, his Verso gallery, his amiable sidewalk presence. Harold will continue operating his Hudson shop. (Also leaving Catskill at the end of August is Valley Dry Cleaners). ------

GONE already from Main Street in Catskill, after two years of never really settling in, is Tony De Vito, who operated, fitfully, next door to Swamp Angel Antiques, the Catskill Bookee. Tony did not manage to conclude his weekday New York City job as soon as he intended, we understand, and he was hampered by a crippling injury. His AllArtsMatter project, however, is still breathing in Greenville.

RETURNING? The empty BRIK gallery in Catskill, so spacious (2200 square feet) and curvaceous (top of the Main Street bend) could become an artists’ co-operative. The collaborators would display their work, sharing costs and sitting duties, keeping the proceeds of sales. That is owner Frank Cuthbert’s dream, as unfolded in the July-August issue of Arts Alive. “My wine glasses,” says Frank, “are getting lonely.”

351= participants in greatest GreeneLand party of 21st century. July 4th. Feasting on tables spread over lawn sloping down to majestic Hudson. Souvenir photographs of revelers in life-sized frame made by Geoff Howell. Troop of bagpipers (via John Gallagher). Full moon. Catskill Village fireworks! Dancing to music of Lex Grey & [Ex-] Urban Pioneers. All done, under supervision of incomparable Lisa Fox Martin, on behalf of Thomas Cole National Historic Site. What with ticket sales (at $100-125 per person), major sponsors, contributors, and huge voluntary efforts, income of $65,000 yielded surplus of 48 (f-o-r-t-y-e-i-g-h-t) thousand dollars.

229=participants in last Saturday’s fund-raising gala for, and at, the Orpheum Performing Arts Center-to-be in Tannersville. The long-closed movie theater is well along the way to planned transformation into a state-of-the-art, 280-seat performing arts destination. Guests at the benefit organized by the Catskill Mountain Foundation quaffed cocktails and hors d’oeuvres in the theater, took part in silent and live auctions of choice items and services, then scattered to host homes for dinner.

92=number of Juniper Woods Campground visitors who took part last Saturday’s national Guiness Book record-setting Skinny Dip.

Friday, July 17, 2009

Making History

THE STEPtep -----On Wednesday night (7/15/09) in Coxsackie, 20 members of the governing board of the Greene County Historical Society gathered around a table in the Jessie Van Vechten Vedder Research Library. They proceeded to act upon a motion calling for approval of a big hand-over of property and responsibility. They voted unanimously in the affirmative. ------In doing so they resolved in effect that a risky mission that had been undertaken ten years ago under Society auspices has reached a point of culmination. Their Thomas Cole National Historic Site has grown into a sturdy young adult. Its further growth and development can now best be sustained, they resolved, by full independence from the parent. The Society’s governors accordingly endorsed “the creation of a separate State-chartered corporation…for the ownership, operation and development of [the Cole Site], to exist and be governed and managed by the new entity independent of the…Society.”

------Those words were part of a Memorandum of Understanding that had been drafted by three of the Society’s board members and three trustees of what is officially a committee of the Society and is functionally a semi-autonomous Cole Site directorate. The MOA frames a request to the Regents of the University of the State of New York. It invites the Regents to grant a provisional charter to a new corporate entity that is endowed with resources transferred from the Society. The new entity would own and operate what is sometimes depicted as the birthplace of the first distinctly American school of art.

If the Regents grant the charter, a new non-profit agency would come into being. It would acquire from the Historical Society, by way of a contract to be approved by both parties, ownership of the several real properties and the many objects, the historical treasures, that physically comprise the Cole Site. It also would acquire full responsibility for operating that Site in keeping with the aims that motivated the start of its restoration--its rescue from oblivion—just ten years ago. It would inherit from the Society the duties that were specified nine years ago, in the Federal law designating the Site as an affiliated area of National Park System:

(1) to preserve and interpret the home and studio of Thomas Cole for the benefit, inspiration, and education of the people of the United States;

(2) to help maintain the integrity of the setting in the Hudson River Valley region that inspired artistic expression;

(3) to coordinate the interpretive, preservation, and recreational efforts of Federal, Stae, and other entities in the Hudson Valley region in order to enhance opportunities for education, public use, and enjoyment; and

(4) to broaden understanding of the Hudson River Valley region and its role in American history and culture.

------The contemplated transition would be a natural step. Restoration of the derelict Cole site and its cultivation as an incubator of art in the 19th century marked quite a departure, a potentially expensive departure, from traditional Historical Society operations. The board’s decision to take on the project was prompted primarily by County Historian Raymond Beecher, who backed his advocacy with a personal pledge of $100,000.

From its earliest days, the Cole Site project was managed by a Historical Society committee which operated in a semi-independent manner. The committee’s members were not all Society board members and, indeed, its chairpersons for the past six years have been ‘outsiders.’ The Site acquired its own bank account, rank-and-file members, paid staff, volunteers, and fund-raising operations. Year by year, by every conventional measure—attendance, staffing, programs, members, sales, new projects, revenues—its performance has improved.

------In voting to endorse the bid for a Regents’ charter for the “Cole House Group,” the Historical Society’s trustees concurred with the present Site Committee’s judgment that full autonomy would be mutually beneficial. The Society would be relieved of auditing, maintenance, and overhead costs. The Site Committee would be in a stronger position to win grants and bequests, and in other ways to fulfill its mission.

THE MAN

The contemplated change in Cole Site governance also would bring to pass what had been anticipated by the project’s founding father: Ray Beecher. And that fact provides me with a suitable pretext for recalling what took place on May 9th at the Cole Site, Cedar Grove. The occasion was a memorial service, rich with tributes from a host of speakers, for Mr Beecher. The main speaker was David Barnes, a member of the Cole Site board. Ray Beecher, said Mr Barnes,

He was born in New York City in 1917 with the perfect pedigree to predict a lifelong love of history: he was a 14th-generation descendent of George Baxter, English secretary to Peter Stuyvesant, the Dutch colonial governor of New Amsterdam. At the age of ten, Ray and his family moved to Greene County, and we can only imagine how taken he must have been with his new surroundings, this boy who would stay here for the rest of his life, and grow up to chronicle its history like no one before or since.

Service is a word that would become synonymous with Ray, and he began by serving in World War II, leading men…in the Asiatic-Pacific and European theaters of operation, displaying an ability to get people to do things that would become very familiar to anyone who worked with him on future projects he undertook [including] the battle to save Thomas Cole’s home.

It’s hard to imagine a longer life more full of accomplishments than Ray Beecher’s incredible life. But I think he considered no accomplishment greater than his 50-year marriage to Catharine Shaffer Beecher. And rightly so; after all, there’s no 4-year degree, no masters or doctoral program that will teach you as much about life…as a half century of marriage….

For over 50 years he was a proud member of the Greene County Historical Society, and his love for this beautiful area was unsurpassed: he learned more about it than anyone, and devoted his life to preserving it and educating people about it as historian, preservationist and author. Indeed, “Action” would also be synonymous with Ray Beecher, and it would be hard to find someone working more actively in every capacity for the Historical Society he valued so highly. He was constantly researching and discovering… and making sure when objects or documents were involved that the owners of that history understood its value, both to them and to future generations. He was always cultivating volunteers, donors, people who might leave their estate to the Greene County Historical Society or the Vedder Research Library. He was extremely successful at this, as Ray Beecher was an excellent businessman…. He helped fund construction of the Vedder Research Library on the grounds of the Greene County Historical Society’s Bronck House Museum site in Coxsackie, and served as volunteer librarian there for many years.

I always loved letters from Ray,…written longhand on both sides of his Greene County Historian stationery. They were always chockfull of information – estates he was helping to settle, the countless organizations to which he belonged and volunteered his time, new discoveries from his never-ending research, and always questions – did I know such and such historical figure? had I heard of so and so artist? As he did in person, he always found a way to let you know how old he was – “As I am sure you know old age is creeping up on me and I get tired and weary some days. The cane is helpful. I should be in a retirement home but I dread the thought.” (Jan. 2005). But those were only momentary lapses – then in the next sentence he would return to his passion: “Today the sun is out and I am sitting by the window rereading my six Thomas Cole letters of 1843 to Henry Cheever Pratt. I had forgotten how much information they contain.”

…In the Introduction to his collection of Letters From a Revolution 1775-1783: A Selection From the Bronck Family Papers at the Greene County Historical Society published in 1973 (when Ray was serving as both Trustee and Officer of the Greene County Historical Society) that he edited for the New York State American Revolution Bicentennial Commission, Ray sums up beautifully the quality that made his style of scholarship so special: “…To mention the wars in American history is to conjure up images of pitched battles between uniformed men glimpsed through clouds of white smoke and flashes of orange fire. The American Revolution is a case in point. The confrontation of Minute Men and British at Lexington Green and Concord Bridge, Washington crossing the Delaware to attack Trenton, the Battle of Yorktown – these are the images we first see in our mind’s eye. When one reduces the Revolution to New York State, the process repeats itself. The dramatic capture of Fort Ticonderoga, the Battles of Long Island, Saratoga…--these are the highlights of our first reactions.”

But this is not the kind of history Ray writes about. He continues: “Rarely do we view the Revolution in the context of the daily existence of a quiet community where no monumental military deeds took place, where men and women suffered without bleeding and fought without seeing their enemy, where the war was first a series of civilian sacrifices and only occasionally a letter or visit from the man who fought the battles recounted in the histories.”

The Coxsackie-Catskill area of New York State was such a community during the Revolution. No significant military actions took place there, but its role in the Revolution was nonetheless important. The citizens of this strategically located area made distinctive contributions to the American cause through the more than six years the military conflict was sustained. There is no glamour in producing foodstuffs, draft animals, and fire wood, but without heat, pack trains and rations the American army would have suffered even more than it did. And these were the services to the American cause most of the population was called upon to give, not only in this one small area but elsewhere. The life described in the papers published here was disjointed by Revolution in ways that were seldom dramatic but usually representative.

And that was one of Ray’s special gifts: to extract the value and significance of everyday experience from the people that came before us – to bring everyday history to life – and in doing so, to reveal a more universal experience than the history of great figures and events that we read in school. And within that scale, those everyday lives had more than their share of drama and interest. In the history he wrote about most – in his five books that he wrote, edited, or collaborated on, his years of Greene Gleanings columns, newsletters and historical journals, he is a genre painter, sketching those scenes of everyday life that strike us with their universality, rather than a painter of grand historical events.

In the Foreword to his 1977 book Out to Greenville: Historical Sketches of Greene County, Ray states simply why he does what he does: This series of sketches seeks to focus the reader’s attention on events and individuals that helped to shape Greene County’s history. None are of national or even statewide importance. Rather they are part of the daily routine of its residents – they add insight into life in Greene County in the nineteenth century. Why would someone devote a lifetime to this kind of history? Ray tells us himself in the conclusion to the same Foreword: The writing and publication of local history is a service-oriented effort; financial gain is not a goal. The reward comes from the public’s increased awareness of Greene County’s historical background. That is what drove Ray’s passionate, endless curiosity about the history of this beautiful area – the hope that he could help us know more, and appreciate better, the historical background of where we live – and that we might then be inspired, like he was, to do something with that appreciation.

He viewed his scholarship, what it might produce, as he viewed nearly everything he did: as a public service. And the public rewarded him for it: among Ray’s many awards were the Alf Evers Award for Excellence given by the Catskill Center for Conservation and Development, a Doctor of Humane Letters presented by Hartwick College, his undergraduate alma mater, and he became in 2002 the first person ever to be named a “Greene County Treasure” by the Greene County Legislature, whose proclamation reads, in part, “Through his wisdom, hard work and generosity, Greene County has been immeasurably enriched. As a soldier, educator, historian, churchman, writer, philanthropist, and public servant, Dr. Raymond Beecher is truly one of Greene County’s treasures.”

Thomas Cole’s House

The passion of Ray’s last years became Cedar Grove. Once again, as he had done so many times throughout his life, Ray stepped forward – after some convincing (remember, he was an excellent businessman, and no excellent businessman would have looked at the ruin that was Cedar Grove in 1998 and say instantly, “yes, this looks like a great investment.”) But he put up his own money, famously recounted by Ray himself in the shortest acceptance speech in history when we tried to honor him on this very lawn at the 2001 bicentennial of Cole’s birth: “It took all my beer money.” And like everything else he became involved with, Ray knew more about it than anyone else. Once on board, Ray gave us the vision of what Cedar Grove could be today. Ray was adamant that Cedar Grove never become just another “historic home” filled with period furnishings. He wanted Cedar Grove to be a vital, dynamic force in education and scholarship, those touchstones of Ray’s career.

Ray’s Passing

Now I’ve always shared William Saroyan’s view of death, which is that I know “Everybody has got to die, but I always believed an exception would be made in my case.” Indeed, every passing year that saw Ray as productive as ever seemed to confirm my belief that an exception had been made in his case, as well.

My last letter from Ray, in March 2008, found him the same as always. “I plug away on my new book,” he wrote, while still going to his beloved research library three times a week, to earn his “beer money” as County Historian. He would let on how frustrating it was to grow old: “I wish my painful bones and muscles were as good as my mind.” This from the same man who well into his 80s would tie a rope around his waist, secure the other end, then lower himself over the river bank of his property in order to cut the brush back to clear the view!

Ray passed away peacefully at his family home overlooking the Hudson River in Coxsackie. Of course, when someone lives to be 91 years old, as Ray did, we’re not supposed to feel cheated. But because of the kind of person Ray was, I think he could’ve lived to be 191 and we’d still feel cheated. I don’t think we feel too differently today than William Cullen Bryant felt when he said, in his funeral oration for Thomas Cole, that

His departure has left a vacuity which amazes and alarms us. It is as if the voyager on the Hudson were to look toward the great range of the Catskills, at the foot of which Cole, with a reverential fondness, had fixed his abode, and were to see that the grandest of its summits had disappeared – had sunk into the plain from our sight.

A historian to the end, found on his desk after he died were four shining paragraphs of what would’ve been a superb article he was writing about Cedar Grove for our Winter Newsletter.

I met Ray at the same time I began learning about Thomas Cole, and for me, the two are forever linked – kindred spirits, if you will. For as surely as Thomas Cole is the father of the Hudson River School, Raymond Beecher is the father of the Thomas Cole National Historic Site.

Consider how alike they are, Thomas Cole and Raymond Beecher: they both had beautiful homes on the west side of the Hudson River; both men were gentle souls, loved by those who knew them, but with a fire inside. They both astonished their contemporaries with their incredible energy, their extraordinary capacity for hard work. And they were both prolific in their accomplishments.

Thomas Cole drew our attention to the natural wonders around us, and hoped to raise awareness of its value before it was too late. For the last fifty plus years, Raymond Beecher drew our attention to the natural and historic wonders still around us, and not only raised our awareness of their value, but saved them from the wrecking ball when he had to.

And just as Thomas Cole inspired generations of artists, so has Raymond Beecher set an example that inspires not only those of us here today, but generations to come.

But for me, what these two wonderful men share most is a passion for life that goes right to the heart of who Thomas Cole and Raymond Beecher are. For as Thomas Cole was an artist, so Raymond Beecher was an artist, too.

The most visible creators I know of are those artists whose medium is life itself.

The ones who express the inexpressible – without brush, canvas, clay or guitar.

They neither paint nor sculpt – their medium is being.

Whatever their presence touches has increased life.

They see and don’t have to draw.

They are the artists of being alive.

Indeed, Ray’s life was a masterpiece. But the greatest legacy he left us – greater than the treasures his beer money secured, and arguably greater than the history he uncovered for us – is right here under this tent. Where there was one Ray Beecher – and there will never be another like him – there are now hundreds of us, here and elsewhere, capable of service and action. I think he saw that the work he began was going to be continued, that he’d left it in hands that were capable, enthusiastic, and appreciative of all he’d done.

But don’t take my word for it. If you see the interview with Ray in the documentary playing in the gift shop, when he’s asked about the future, you’ll see that beautiful smile spread across his face, and that twinkle come into his eye, as he says, “I’m optimistic.” It’s because of us. We should be optimistic, too – because with Ray as our guiding spirit and inspiration, we can not only complete the dreams

Ray ran out of time to finish, we should believe we can accomplish anything.

Thursday, July 09, 2009

Greene and Bare It

------Tomorrow (7//11) GreeneLanders who are looking for action can choose among farmers’ & artisans’ markets (with versatile musician Paul Slusar playing at Historic Catskill Point), a Windham High Peak hike (starting from Mountan Top Historical Society headquarters; www.mths.org ), a workshop on pruning deciduous trees (www.mtarbor.com) , a community-wide yard sale in Coxsackie, “Happily Ever After—A Cinderella Story” (Doctorow Center, Hunter; www.catskillmountain.com) , youth baseball games everywhere, Second Saturday strolling in cat-augmented Catskill, bear & butterfly-touring in Cairo, classical music concerts in Windham ( www.windhammusic.com ) and Jewett (www.grazhdamusicandart.org), a fund-raising progressive dinner for the Zadock Pratt Museum (www.prattmuseum.com ), a performance of the play “Thomas” at Catskill Point, a campaign kick-off party for County Legislator Forest Cotten (support@forestcotten.com ; 947-0018), movies at two outdoor and two indoor movie houses, a splendid street festival (www.athensstreetfestival.com), and local observance of National Nude Weekend. Venue for the latter is Juniper Woods Campground where, in co-sponsorship with Northern Exposure, admission for the day is free. Visitors are invited to “cool down…while setting a hot new record,” nation-wide, starting at 2:30 pm, for number of simultaneous skinny-dippers. (www.juniperwoods.com)

SUDDEN DEATH in GreeneLand came recently, according to local news reports, to Jeremy W. Mullins, 32, a visitor from Savannah GA who, while hiking in street shoes next to Kaaterskill Fall, slipped on the muddy trail and took a fatal 70-foot plunge; to Kevin E. Ryan, 44, a visitor from Yonkers and a volunteer firefighter who, attemping to come to the aid of a motorist who had been trapped in a rollover accident, tried to jump over the space the separates the eastbound and westbound overpass lnes of Route 23 above Catskill Creek, fell 47 feet onto rocks and concrete; to Lucian Haid, a recent resident of Palenville, who died of gunshots that were fired, police charge, by fellow resident Robert Wilkinson, 23; and to John Wieninger,45, who died of carbon monoxide poisoning (according to County Coroner Richard Vigilo) after being overcome by smoke in a fire that struck an apartment building on Thompson Street in Catskill.

Meanwhile, an obituary following the death from natural causes of a venerable Catskillian said the deceased “was born in Manhattan on Nov. 28, 1920 to the parents of the late Max and Jenny Pasternak.”

IN PROSPECT: a walk-in medical care facility, for southeast GreeneLand (near Walgreens in Catskill) resembling the admirable Emurgent Care facility in northeast GreeneLand (Coxsackie). The applicant, whose project is being reviewed hospitably by the Village Planning Board (as reported in The Daily Mail of 7/7/09), is Urgent Medical Care PLLC, headed by Dr Robert Schneider.

MENDING after quadruple heart bypass surgery on Tuesday at St Peters Hospital in Albany: Lewis O’Connor, Catskill Village superintendent of public works, Catskill Town Councilman, exemplary citizen. Tubes are out. He’s already standing, shuffling, running the place.

IRISH LUCK II. Darby’s pub in East Durham is on the block. It is slated for sale at a foreclosure auction on August 5th, in the County Office Building, on the basis of a State Supreme Court decision citing a referee’s calculation that the defendants owe $162,020 plus “costs and disbursements and attorney’s fees” and “legal interest.” The debt stems from Small Business Administration-guaranteed loan from Commercal Capital Corporation of $180,000 provided in July 1999, at a variable interest rate of, initially, 10.5 per cent, with monthly payments of $1912. At 2500 Route 145, Darby’s is just down the road from the Irish Cultural Centre at 2119 Route 145 and from bankrupt Shamrock House (at 2338). Darby's is the business arm of, ahem, I Haven’t Got a Clue Inc., whose principal, ahem, is Susan Frey.

ADVICE DEPT. For fitness at an advanced age, “maintaining a healthy weight, getting regular exercise, avoiding tobacco, and drinking excessively makes a huge difference.” Such is the counsel offered by the new Vivacity magazine, sub-titled Living the 50plus Lifestyle in the Capital Regio, and billed as“complementary [sic] to our readers.”

GREENELAND is “home to people of every possible age, sexual orientation, and background, and all of them were represented at the Populist Barn Dance [last week in Athens]: those who were born here, those who came “up the country” ten or fifteen years ago, and many who chose to leave the big city after 9/11, or even more recently. It is an organic community, an anti-Hamptons….”

--Brigit Binns, www.roadfoodie.com

Friday, July 03, 2009

Independently Greene

IRISH LUCK DEPT. According to a published foreclosure order, the venerable Shamrock House of East Durham will, next Wednesday (7/8/09) at 9am, in the interim county courthouse that formerly was St Patrick’s Academy in Catskill, be placed on the auction block. That event would be ruinous for what is touted on the establishment’s web site ( www.shamrockhouse.com) as “the nearest thing to Ireland this side of Galway Bay!!” Defendants in the action (lien amount said to be $514,000) are descendants of Patrick Kellegher, who worked on the Long Island Railroad and co-owned a bar in Queens NY before he ventured north back in 1938 and bought what then was called The Central Hotel. But that auction evidently will not take place, at least in the near future. Contacted by telephone by a Seeing Greene reporter, Jon Kellegher, who is one of the cited defendants, denied that the auction will occur, referred his caller to “Albany attorneys” that he did not name, and abruptly hung up. The court-assigned referee, Daniel W. Peckham of Prattsville, said today that he had just received notice that the auction has been postponed, owing to the fact that the trustees of Shamrock House Incorporated have filed for bankruptcy. -----The plaintiff in the foreclosure action (advertised as an “SEQ Chapter sale”) is not a bank but rather a New Jersey company, Gaffken & Barriger Fund LLC, that is itself the target of lawsuits by investors who claim they were bilked in connection with the sub-prime mortgage crisis. IN SUSPENSE: The project of transforming Catskill’s former Washington Irving Elementary School into a residential condominium complex. According to the County Clerk’s office, as reported in The Daily Mail (6/27/09), Rhinebeck Savings has sought court judgment requiring sale of the property in aid of recovering at least part of Estate Capital LLC’s mortgage debt of more than $2 million. Various sums also are owed in taxes and in debts to contractors. The project had envisioned 11 one-bedroom units along with penthouse units, facing west to the mountains, on the fourth floor. It was not far away from completion. The Flach brothers made a success of that kind of project in Coxsackie. ALSO DEFUNCT is the Eddie Bauer clothing store chain. And no wonder. They put out a catalog whose cover says “ULTIMATE SALE” and, below, in smaller letters, “Only happens twice a year.” Which is the only reason it is mentioned here. GAY PRIDE. The “River Pride” march down Catskill’s main street (to whose renovation gays have contributed heavily) and the subsequent party at Dutchman’s Landing last Saturday was the first of its kind in a surprisingly large territory: south of Albany, north of New Paltz, and looking far to the east and west. Overt hostility was absent. Some elected officials attended and made themselves conspicuous. One attended from inside his car. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND evidently will face at least two Democratic challengers in her bid to win a full term in the United States Senate. Her main challenger would be Carolyn Maloney, who represents “silk stocking” constituents (upper East Side plus part of Queens in New York City) in the House of Representatives. Her candidacy was virtually declared, first to the New York Daily News, by Paul Blank, her newly hired campaign strategist (from Trippi & Associates). A formal announcement is foreshadowed in about ten days. ------The other prospective challengeris Jonathan Tasini, 53, whose political keyword is “progressive” and whose background is treated on his website (www.jonathantasini.com ) and in a (more enlightening) Wikipedia entry. His June 11th announcement of candidacy attracted scarcely any publicity at the time. According to a fund-raising appeal circulated on his behalf earlier this week by a Michael Leone, Mr Tasini is running for the Senate "to both support [President Obama] and to push him to steer our country in an even more progressive direction.” And Mr Tasini aims to replace in the Senate “someone who has taken money from Big Tobacco, embraced the NRA, and who is awash in corporate cash.” -------This bid for senatorial eminence would Mr Tasini’s second try. In the 1990 primary elections he ran for the Democratic nomination for Senator. He received 17 per cent of the votes; the others went to Hillary Clinton, Ms Gillibrand's predecessor. ------Bill Clinton will be the keynote speaker, according to news reports, at a July 20th fund-raiser for Representative Maloney, but has said he is not taken sides on the nomination battle. He headlined a Gillibrand fund-raiser last year. -----Rep. Charles Rangel has stoutly defended Ms Maloney’s right to run in the primary (a right that nobody has denied) without explicitly endorsing a candidate. He also has wondered aloud why President Obama takes an active interest in this New York contest (on behalf of Ms Gillibrand). Politically, says Mr Rangel, such activity is “not astute.” -----That assessment is wrong. A politically astute President tries to forestall any contentious, expensive primary election battle that could damage the winner sufficiently to cause a loyal co-partisan to lose the general election. Among political events in 2010, Republican capture of a United States Senate seat from the State of New York would be, for the Obama Administration and for the Democratic Party, the most shocking. ------Astute Republicans will try to recruit a moderate, attractive, electable senatorial candidate, quelling internal clamor for a “true conservative.” They may also funnel money to quietly to Maloney and Tasini. ------Astute Democratic strategists will decide that if Maloney does enter the contest, then support should be funneled quietly to Tasini, while additional contestants—including Rep. Carolyn McCarthy of Long Island—should be recruited. HENRY HUDSON’s voyage of discovery aboard the Halve Maen, with his crew of about 18, “gave the Dutch a claim to land between the French areas to the north and English colonies to the south. In 1614 Fort Nassau, a trading post, was built near present-day Albany; in 1624 New Netherland was formed, the only 17th century colony n North America with a diverse population, and the only one in which women had legal rights to own property.”