Adirondack Museum Celebrates Hunting and Fishing

The Adirondack Museum is planning to celebrate National Hunting and Fishing Day tomorrow Saturday, September 27, 2008. The museum is planning &#8220A Sportsman’s Paradise,&#8221 a day-long extravaganza of programs, demonstrations, and music &#8211 just for outdoor enthusiasts. Activities are scheduled from 10:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. All are included in the price of general admission.

Demonstrations will include &#8220Casting a Line&#8221 with licensed guide and fly-fisherman Patrick Sisti, &#8220Fly Tying&#8221 with Geoff Schaake co-owner of the fly-fishing and fly-tying web site www.theanglersnet.com, and &#8220Fish Decoys and Lures&#8221 from mother-of-pearl as made by Peter Heid.

Members of the American Mountain Men will return to the museum campus, creating a living history camp that will feature the traditional equipment and gear that would have been typical of a nineteenth century hunting excursion in the Great North Woods. The group will discuss historic hunting and trapping techniques and demonstrate target shooting with Flintlocks as well as knife and tomahawk throwing.

An Author’s Corner and Book Signing will be held in the museum’s Marion River Carry Pavilion from 10:00 a.m. until 2:00 p.m. Participants will include: Dan Ladd, whose book Deer Hunting in the Adirondacks serves not only as a guide to public lands open to hunting, but also looks at the history and lore surrounding hunting in the Adirondacks- Robert Elinskas, author of A Deer Hunter’s History Book &#8211 a collection of tales from the Blue Ridge Wilderness Area- and Donald Wharton whose collection of Adirondack outdoor stories about trout fishing, bush pilots, deer hunting and more is entitled Adirondack Forest and Stream: An Outdoorsmen’s Reader.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation booth will provide information and answer questions about hunting and fishing in the Adirondacks throughout the day.

Adirondack musician and storyteller Christopher Shaw will delight audiences of all ages with music celebrating the great Adirondack outdoors at 1:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m.

At 2:00 p.m. an illustrated presentation, &#8220Images From Trail Cameras,&#8221 will be held in the Mark W. Potter Education Center.

The day will conclude with &#8220Adirondack Pond Fishing 101&#8243- with Patrick Sisti. Sisti specializes in fly-fishing, fishing trips on the Indian River and Adirondack ponds in central Hamilton County as well as hiking camping, canoeing, and nature walks. His presentation will take participants through the steps taken to locate an Adirondack pond, get there, and fish. Handouts will be provided.

&#8220A Sportsman’s Paradise&#8221 visitors should not miss the exhibits &#8220Woods and Waters: Outdoor Recreation in The Adirondacks,&#8221 the &#8220Buck Lake Club: An Adirondack Hunting Camp,&#8221 and &#8220The Great Outdoors&#8221 &#8211 an interactive space that is perfect for family adventures.

The Adirondack Museum tells the story of the Adirondacks through exhibits, special events, classes for schools, and hands-on activities for visitors of all ages. Open for the season through October 19, 2008. For information call (518) 352-7311, or visit www.adirondackmuseum.org.

A Call for Quilts from the Adirondack Museum

From Blue Mountain Lake in the Adirondacks comes this &#8220Call for Quilts,&#8221 forwarded here for your information:

Blue Mountain Lake, N.Y. Do you have an exceptional quilt, comforter, or pieced wall hanging made after 1970 that was used in, inspired by, or depicts the Adirondack region?

The Adirondack Museum at Blue Mountain Lake, New York is seeking six to ten contemporary quilts to borrow for a new exhibit, &#8220Common Threads: 150 Years of Adirondack Quilts and Comforters,&#8221 scheduled to open in May 2009.

The Adirondack region has nurtured a vibrant pieced-textile tradition for over a century and a half. From bedcovers, plain or fancy, meant to keep families warm through long Adirondack winters, to stunning art quilts of the twenty-first century, the quilts and comforters of the North Country mirror national trends and also tell a unique story of life in the mountains.

&#8220Common Threads&#8221 will combine the scholarly approaches of social history, art history, and material culture studies to explore themes of women’s work, domestic life, social networks in a rural area, generational continuity among women, and women’s artistic response to life in the Adirondacks.

Curator Hallie Bond will develop the new exhibit that will include quilts from the museum’s textile collection that are rarely on display. Bond has identified the historic pieces, but now needs help in collecting modern examples of pieced work to bring the exhibition up to the present time.

A panel of three quilters and quilting scholars &#8211 Lee Kogan, Edith Mitchell, and Shirley Ware &#8211 will select pieces for the exhibit. For additional information please contact Hallie Bond at the Adirondack Museum, Box 99, Blue Mountain Lake, N.Y. 12812 or (518) 352-7311, ext. 105.

Those interested in the project will receive a complete description of the exhibition, details about the themes that contemporary quilts should illustrate, and an entry form. Submissions will be by photograph and must be received by the Adirondack Museum no later than October 1, 2008.

The Adirondack Museum tells the story of the Adirondacks through exhibits, special events, classes for schools, and hands-on activities for visitors of all ages. Open for the season through October 19, 2008. Introducing Rustic Tomorrow &#8212- a new exhibit. For information about all that the museum has to offer, please call (518) 352-7311, or visit www.adirondackmuseum.org