Many hands . . .

Many hands . . .

Apr 29, 2012 | Tin Horn

. . . make light work, and indeed it was true April 28 when several HSM board members and supporters showed up at our new hall to help reorganize and spruce the place up in preparation for our Open House May 19.

Earlier, Nick Verni had supplied the equipment, and his considerable know-how as a career painter, to coordinate the painting of the interior. Tom Rapin and Geoff Samuels volunteered to help, and in two days the hall was bright and new looking. George Hendricks came early on Saturday to turn on the water and heat.

Turning out for clean-up day to scour the kitchen, empty the garage, wash windows and do assorted other tasks were HSM Board members Diane Galusha, Lucci Kelly and Carolyn Konheim, along with Steve Miller, Brian Ketcham, Alix Travis, and Tina Greene and her daughters Anna and Mary. Jenny Liddle stopped by the discuss exhibit options. (Wait till you see the ingenious exhibition station Steve has devised!) The place is looking great, and we’re excited to show it off. Be there on May 19, 3 to 6!

Lucci Kelly and Caroyn Konheim sorting kitchenware

Steve Miller, Brian KetchamAlix Travis tackles the stove

Diner detective

Diner detective

Apr 1, 2012 | Tin Horn

Bowls Hotel, c. 1920s-30s, Postcard courtesy Roger Davis

Michael Engle, who maintains a site about classic diners at www.nydiners.com, wrote to ask if we knew of any photos of a diner that was incorporated into Bowl’s (Kelly’s) Hotel on Main Street in Margaretville. A bit of searching in the Catskill Mountain News and a phone call to long time resident Alton Weiss turned up an interesting bit of village business history (but so far no photos of the diner — have you seen one?).

Charles Bowl, who was born in England in 1874, came to American at the turn of the century and settled in Walton, where he married another Brit, Louise Fox. They came to Margaretville in the ‘teens and “purchased a lunch wagon” on Main Street. Business was good, so they “enlarged and enlarged it until it became necessary to purchase the adjoining Lockwood property and expand it all into a hotel.”

Charles “was the jolliest of hosts,” and, with Louise’s excellent cooking, the hotel became “one of the most popular places in the county.” 

Claude Kelly takes a drink from unidentified bartender in what may have been Kelly’s Hotel. Can you identify anyone else in this undated photo (courtesy Rudd Hubbell)?

Shortly before his death in 1941, Charles Bowl sold the hotel to Claude Kelly of Delhi. It continued to be known as Bowls for many years. On July 9, 1948, the CMN reported that “The dining room and the present diner will be united with a cashier stand at the junction entrance. Guests may enter the hotel under a modern marquee and make their way to either eating place.”

On October 8, 1948, the CMN hailed another step forward. “Margaretville’s new luxury diner opened last Friday at Bowl’s hotel. Gleaming modern stainless steel greets the eye at every turn. Nineteen roller bearing stools make the most comfortable seating before a long Formica counter top. With the very latest conduction cooking, a hamburger is turned out in three seconds; steaks two minutes. . . There is a 40-cubic foot refrigerator, electric table that keeps food hot without steam, electric breakfast display cases. . . There is nothing like it in the vicinity, the nearest ones being in Utica and Albany.” The story noted upcoming improvements to the hotel – a cocktail lounge with upholstered seats, indirect lighting, and backlit murals of local fishing and forest scenes.

Al Weiss, who came to town in 1949, remembers hearing the hotel referred to as “Ma Bowls’” place, and recalls eating there many times. The diner, he says, “was at the east end of the hotel structure with a gap of about three feet to the adjacent building, which housed the Fred Myers/Dewey Bell barber shop and bakery building. Later the diner part and ground floor of the hotel were revamped again, I think by Schoonmaker. I think the original diner was like a RR car shape, with the narrow ends toward the street and Binnekill stream.”

Al says a grease fire in the diner’s vent fan started a blaze in 1977 that consumed the hotel and neighboring structures. That fire led to the establishment of the MARK Project and its first community redevelopment project, Binnekill Square.

1977 blaze destroyed Bowls/Kellys/Schermerhorns Hotel, and adjoining businesses. Masonic Lodge at right was spared. Courtesy Howard Raab Aftermath of 1977 Margaretville fire. Space is now occupied by Binnekill Square.   Photo courtesy Rudd Hubbell

 

Genealogy Roundtables

Mar 1, 2012 | Tin Horn

Mark your calendar for two Genealogy Roundtables happening Saturdays, March 24 and April 14 from 10 a.m. to Noon at Fairview Library Community Room, Walnut St., Margaretville. Sally Elliott Scrimshaw will talk about Elliott, Squires, Long and related families on March 24, and on April 14, Ed Stewart will present on Fairbairn, Todd and related families.

This is a great opportunity to learn more about early local residents, their origins and offspring, the web of families to which they are connected and their influence on farm and community life. Ed and Sally will bring photos, family memorabilia and stories of memorable characters that populate their family trees. Share information on your own genealogical search, learn about new sources and just enjoy a few hours among fellow family sleuths! The roundtables are free, but donation towards the room rental are welcome.

The Irish of Clovesville

Feb 11, 2012 | Tin Horn

There is a small burial ground in Clovesville that harbors a forgotten immigrant history of our area. Known locally as the “Irish” or “Catholic” cemetery, it is located across Old Route 28 from the larger Clovesville Cemetery. Whether those interred wound up there by choice, or because they were denied admittance to the Protestant burial ground is not clear.

Roger Davis took the following headstone inventory of the Irish Cemetery in August of 2001. The cemetery was in bad shape then, and is even worse now, with the steep bank below it cut away by flood and excavator, leaving some of the graves in a precarious situation.

Headstone, 3 children who died within one month in 1877

The annotations in parentheses after each headstone inscription were prepared by Ed Stewart in 2009 in an attempt to provide a little more information about these folks. Says Ed, “I suspect there may be many more people buried in this cemetery than we realize given the significant number of Irish around in the 1840-1880 censuses, and the high mortality rates of those years particularly among the tanneries and the quarries.”

Many Irish immigrant men are known to have worked at the Clark Tannery in Dunraven around 1850, for example, and it can be assumed that the J. D. Elmore tannery, shown on the 1869 Beers Atlas map of Dunraven, employed Irish as well. The coming of the Ulster & Delaware Railroad in 1870 no doubt attracted a later tide of Irish laborers.

Interestingly, the Beers Atlas does not show either of the cemeteries that existed in Clovesville in 1869.

If you have any information about or are descended from these nearly forgotten people, or if you would like to help repair this cemetery, please email us at history@catskill.net.

John M. (Mc) Mullen, d. Sept. 18, 1877 aged 61 yrs. (Listed in the 1870 Census as John McMullen residing Town of Middletown with Bridget his wife. Listed in the 1850 Census as born in Ireland 1818 – probable son of Catherine)

Rachel Kelly, wife of John O. Kelly, b. March 6, 1820 d, Jan. 3, 1864 (Listed in the 1850 census Town of Shandaken as a 26 year old female born in Ireland along with John Kelly, 29 b. Ireland; William, 6, Thomas, 4, Edward, 1, Gerald Grace Kelly, 2, children all born NY)

Edward Kelly d. Oct. 6, 1894 (listed in 1850 census of the Town of Middletown as a farmer born in Ireland age 32 – also in household Thomas 30, Margaret 57, Mary 20, Sarah 14, George 17, and Anna Maria 13 with George being the first listed as born in NY))

William Kelly d. Sept. 18, 1847 aged 63y – 3m – 17d

Margaret Byrne, his wife, d. Sept. 29, 1857 aged 65y – 4m – 8d (in the 1850 census listed with Edward Kelly as a 57 year old female born in Ireland)

Rachel Barker, wife of John Kelly, d. July 8, 1847 aged 95y – 4m – 13d

John Dwyer, d. Nov. 5, 1865 aged 17 years (Listed with parents, James and Mary, both born Ireland, in 1860 census Town of Middletown, aged 13, b NY)

Mary, wife of Hugh Riley, d. Feb. 26, 18(65) aged 80y – 8m – 1d (Listed 1850 census Town of Shandaken, female born Ireland, aged 65, with Thomas, aged 24, laborer born Ireland)

Maggie d. Oct. 14, 1877 aged 10y – 14d, John d. Nov. 1, 1877 aged 5y – 1m, Burnie d. Oct. 22, 1877 aged 6y – 9m – 23d, Children of John and Bridgett McGuire (John possibly listed 1850 census, Town of Shandaken, as male born Ireland 1822)

Julia, wife of John White, d. April 14, 1846 in her 27th year

Julia, daughter of John and Julia White, d. Oct. 22, 1845 aged 4y – 4m – 2d

Alexander McMullen, d. Nov. 29, 1844 (Connected to the family of Catherine McMullen, see below, listed 1840 census, Town of Middletown, Delaware County)

John McMullen, Native of Ireland, d. May 7, 18(38) aged 51yrs

Catherine McMullen, Native of Ireland, d. Feb. 2, 1869 aged 95yrs (Listed 1850 census Town of Middletown, female aged 72 born in Ireland with John McMullen, farmer aged 32 b. Ireland, Sally McMullen, aged 25, b. NY; and Bridget McMullen, aged 34 b. Ireland)

Augustine Quinn, d. March 18, 1872 aged 20y – 11m – 2d (Possibly listed 1860 census Town of Colchester, male, age 9, with Timothy, 45, b. Ireland, and Mary A., aged 18, housekeeper b. NY) 

Michael McCormick, d. Feb. 12, 1873 aged 50 yrs (Listed in the 1850 and 1860 census town of Middletown as a 32 year old farmer born in Ireland along with Mary 32 b. Ireland, Catherine 12, William 10, Nicholas 8, Mary 5, Michael 3, Bridget 6/12, children all born NY)

Thomas Dwyer, Native of Roscommon County, Ireland, d. June 25, 1868 aged 34 yrs (Listed 1850 Census, Town of Shandaken, 18 year old, b. Ireland, listed with John Dwyer, Catherine Dwyer, Michael Dwyer, and Dennis Dwyer, all born in Ireland. Prior family listed is that of John Dwyer, 35, b. Ireland, Margaret Dwyer, 28, b. Ireland, Mary Dwyer, 7, b. Ireland, John Dwyer, 3, b. NY, and Michael Dwyer, 1 b. NY)

John Dwyer, d. June 10, 1886 aged 71y – 6m – 16d

Mary, wife of John Dewair (Dwyer) d. Sept. 6, (1859) aged 37yr – 6m

Michael Macan, d. July 12, 1859 (Listed in 1850 census Town of Shandaken (present Hardenburgh) as a farmer age 55, b. Ireland, along with Jane, 60, b. NY, Edward, a farmer, 23, b. NY, Abraham, a farmer, 21, b. NY) (On prior page is Peter McCan, 27, b. NY; Sarah, 39, b. NY; Mary, 2, b. NY; Patrick, 1, b. NY)

Jane, wife of Michael Macan, d. March 7, 1855 in her 68th year

1950s CMNews now online

Jan 25, 2012 | news archive

HSM is pleased to report that the latest batch of Catskill Mountain News microfilm has been scanned and posted online. They run from Sept. 2, 1949 through Jan. 28, 1955. What a wealth of history these newspapers contain! And they’re searchable! http://history.catskill.net

Phase 1 of this project involved microfilming and digitizing bound volumes of the CMN from 1902-1937. The second phase is digitizing microfilm of the years 1938-73 held by the NYS Library. The work is being done by Hudson Microimaging in Port Ewen, in cooperation with Northern New York Library Association. Funding for the current phase has been generously provided by the O’Connor Foundation of Hobart and an anonymous donor.

The next five years – through 1960 – is expected to be available by spring.