Campaigns of the past revisited at Historical Society program

Oct 14, 2010 | news archive

The Historical Society of the Town of Middletown will offer a musical journey through spirited election campaigns of the past when it gathers for its Annual Meeting Saturday, Oct. 23 at LaCabana Restaurant in Fleischmanns.

Linda Russell, former balladeer for the National Park Service, will sing and play the songs America voted by in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Her lively program casts a unique look at how we came to know the candidates for political office in the days before mass media.

The public is welcome to the program, which is made possible with support from the New York State Endowment for the Humanities, the NYS Legislature and the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation.

Linda’s free performance at 1:30 p.m. will follow a luncheon of American and Mexican favorites that begins at Noon. Reservations for lunch are required by October 18. Please call 845-586-4973, or email history@catskill.net to reserve your seats at $15 each.

During the business portion of the meeting HSM will unveil its new website, which will contain capsule histories and photos of each of the hamlets in Middletown.

Early medicine topic of March 27 historical society program

Oct 14, 2010 | news archive

The Historical Society of the Town of Middletown (HSM) will present living history re-enactor Stuart W. Lehman on Saturday, Mar. 27, when he will bring a hands-on lecture, “Leeches and Laudanum: Medicine in Early New York,” to Margaretville.

The program begins at 2 p.m. at the Presbyterian Church hall, Orchard St., Margaretville.

HSM members get in free; admission for non-members is $2. For more information, call 845-586-4973 or contact history@catskill.net

Lehman will discuss medicine as it was practiced in the 18th and 19th Centuries. He will bring an exhibit of the herbs, medicines, and implements used from the Revolutionary War to the Civil War. You can take a close look at some fascinating artifacts; however watch out for the leeches!

Explore health care as it was practiced in early America by doctors, midwives, and the everyday housewife. Find out about theories, treatments, home remedies and patent medicines and discover which were surprisingly successful, and which caused more problems than they cured.

Lehman developed his program over many years working at a variety of historic sites, including Schuyler Mansion and Saratoga National Historical Park. He is an Education Coordinator with the Office of General Services where he develops and present programs and conducts research for the New York State Capitol.

Lehman is active in a number of historical associations, including the New Scotland Historical Association, the Friends of Schuyler Mansion and the Capitol District Civil War Roundtable. He lives in Guilderland.

“Remember When” exhibit at Middletown Town Hall

Oct 14, 2010 | news archive

Remember when you could buy a Mexican Sundae at Joe Christian’s Soda Fountain? Remember when hamburger was 49 cents a pound at Bussy’s Store? Or when Stan’s Tavern in Arena and the Cat’s Meow in Fleischmanns were popular watering holes?

If you remember when Flinch and Uncle Wiggly were a way to spend a rainy afternoon, or when you could buy a plaid refrigerator from Doug Kelly of Margaretville, you’ll enjoy the latest history exhibit in the Middletown Town Hall on Route 28, between Margaretville and Arkville.

Town Historian Shirley Davis has put together another fascinating look back at our own times, and an even earlier day, when metal milk jugs, button hooks, and ox shoes predated plastic milk cartons, Velcro and truck tires. Titled “Remember When,” the display features artifacts ranging from kerosene lamps to a Roy Rogers and Dale Evans lunch box, and variety of photographs and advertisements from the early to mid-20th century.

For a look at who went to the Margaretville High School prom in 1963, and how the Flood of 1950 rearranged Arkville, stop by the Town Hall weekdays during regular business hours. “Remember When” will be on view through the end of May.

Cemetery Help Needed

Oct 14, 2010 | news archive

The Historical Society of the Town of Middletown is seeking volunteers to help repair the grounds of the Arkville Cemetery on the Cut-off Road.

A work day is planned for Saturday, May 8 beginning at 9 a.m. If you can help, please contact coordinator Brian Wheaton at 586-2294, or just show up. Please bring shovels, rakes, clippers or chain saws if you have them.

Materials and equipment for the restoration of the cemetery, which dates back to the early 1800s, are being funded by a legislative grant provided by Assemblyman Clifford Crouch to the Town of Middletown. However, volunteers are needed to fill holes, clear brush, trim trees and help right several toppled stones.

New Kingston to get Historic Marker

Oct 14, 2010 | news archive

NEW KINGSTON – The Historical Society of the Town of Middletown (HSM) and the New Kingston Valley Association will unveil a historic marker near the Post Office in the hamlet of New Kingston on Sunday, June 20 at 1 p.m.

Everyone is welcome to the event, which will include remarks by Bill Birns, historical columnist, retired teacher and former resident of New Kingston.

Those wanting a closer look at the picturesque hamlet, which was named to the State and National Registers of Historic Places in late 2007, are invited to take a guided walking tour after the unveiling. A display of photos, artifacts and memorabilia will be on view from 1:15 to 3 p.m. at the New Kingston Presbyterian Church, which is itself on the State and National Registers.

Refreshments will be available at the church.

New Kingston got its name after Chancellor Robert Livingston’s 1782 donation deed of a 5,000-acre tract in the valley to the homeless citizens of the City of Kingston which had been burned by the British during the Revolutionary War. Livingston was an owner of a large section of the 1,500,000-acre Hardenburgh Patent that included the New Kingston Valley. Fifty-acre parcels were given to 100 displaced “sufferers,” but neither the 1790 nor the 1800 federal census shows that any of them took up their lots. Some of their descendants, however, did eventually transplant to the New Kingston Valley.

By the 1840s, Samuel Ackerly, who had acquired some of the valley land, sold pieces of it to members of the Reynolds and Birdsall families, who, between 1855 and 1889, sold most of the house lots that now form the hamlet of New Kingston.

The hamlet became a trading and service community for the many farms that were established in the valley. Today, the last three dairy farms in the Town of Middletown are located in the New Kingston Valley.

The Grand Hotel will be subject of Historical Society program

Oct 14, 2010 | news archive

“The Grand Hotel, An Economic and Architectural History,” is the title of an illustrated talk by Annon Adams, who will speak Sunday, July 25 at 2 p.m. at Skene Memorial Library, Main St., Fleischmanns.

Sponsoring the program on the former Highmount landmark is the Historical Society of the Town of Middletown (HSM) in conjunction with Skene Library and the adjacent Greater Fleischmanns Museum of Memories which will be open from before and after the program.

Program admission is free for HSM members, $2 for non-members. There is no admission to the Museum, but donations are encouraged. Those who wish to bring photos and artifacts from the Grand Hotel are encouraged to do so!

The slide talk will cover the design, construction and opening of the Grand Hotel in 1881, and will include several images of its interior taken by photographer Bob Wyer many years later, in 1947.

TThe hotel, accommodating up to 500 people and more than 600 feet long, was a showplace high on Monka Hill. Following its construction it was owned by railroad and steamboat magnate Thomas Cornell to cater to a socially prominent clientele, and had its own stop on the Ulster & Delaware Railroad. It also boasted a telegraph and post office, restaurant, bowling alley, croquet grounds, swimming pool, tennis courts, a nine-hole golf course and the famous Diamond Spring, whose waters flowed into a marble fountain in the rotunda.

From its expansive piazza, guests got a magnificent view of Slide Mountain, highest in the Catskills. Straddling the Delaware and Ulster County line, the bar in the hotel was reputedly moved whenever local liquor laws changed. The Grand Hotel has been gone since the mid-1960s; many area residents claimed its furnishings and accessories at a 1964 auction of the contents.

Historian Annon Adams is working on a book about the hotel’s architect, John A. Wood. The Grand Hotel was an important project for Wood (1837 – 1910). It built his reputation as a hotel architect and led to a number of projects in the south, including the National Landmark Tampa Bay Hotel. He also designed several Kingston buildings, including the Ulster Savings Bank, the Stuyvesant House Hotel and the NY State Armory; and the Tremper House in Phoenicia.

Adams lives in Poughkeepsie. She has served on the Boards of the Bardavon Opera House, Dutchess County Historical Society and Theatre Historical Society of America. She has researched the history of the Bardavon and other theatre buildings, and recently published an article on the history of Bowdoin Park in Dutchess County.

For more information on the Fleischmanns program, and other events planned by HSM, contact Diane Galusha, 845-586-4973, cybercat@catskill.net. For information on Skene Library and the Museum of Memories, contact John Duda, royalzrus@aol.com.