Essex County

Crown Point Pier and Champlain Lighthouse Reopened

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Restoration work on the Crown Point Pier and Champlain Memorial Lighthouse has been completed and both facilities are once again open to the public. Restoration work on the pier included reenforcement of the bulkhead and piers, removal of zebra mussels, refurbishing of the metal trusses and decking, repair of the roof &#8212- including replacement of broken slate shingles, thorough cleaning of exterior and interior surfaces and placement of new signs.

Work on the lighthouse included restoration of the Rodin sculpture, thorough cleaning and repair of outer stonework and thorough cleaning, resealing and painting of the interior. The Rodin sculpture has not been placed back on the lighthouse, but will be prior to the Quadricentennial Celebration in September.

The facilities are located on the shore of Lake Champlain in Essex County on the grounds of DEC Crown Point Public Campground. Other nearby by historic features are the Crown Point Reservation, which includes Fort Crown Point and Fort St. Frederic, the Crown Point Bridge and the Toll Keeper’s House.

The Lake Champlain Quadricentennial celebrates the 400th anniversary of the French explorer Samuel de Champlain’s 1609 sighting of the lake that now bears his name. Champlain is noted as the first European to have recorded his exploration of the lake and the surrounding region.

While celebrations and events will occur throughout the summer, New York’s premier Quadricentennial Celebration will be hosted at the DEC Crown Point Campground and the OPHRP Crown Point Reservation on September 18-20. New York will celebrate the role that Lake Champlain and the Champlain Valley played in the history of our country and the state, and the natural wonders and recreational opportunities of the lake.

The Crown Point steamboat pier was constructed in 1929, serving as a point of embarkation and disembarkation passengers accessing Crown Point from one of the many large steamboats that plied up and down Lake Champlain during that era.

The Champlain Memorial Lighthouse was originally constructed in 1858 and the surrounding land was acquired in 1910 by the New York State Conservation Department &#8211 predecessor to the DEC. In 1912, the States of New York and Vermont and the Province of Quebec worked together to reconstruct the lighthouse as a monument to Samuel de Champlain, in recognition of the 300th anniversary of his explorations.

The Champlain Memorial Lighthouse, the Crown Point Pier and the Toll Keepers House are eligible for listing in the State and National Registers of Historic Places. The entire Crown Point Reservation is also a National Historic Landmark.

Adk Museum Presents The Adirondack Mining Village

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Mining was once a major industry in northern New York State. Small iron mines and forges appeared along Lake Champlain in the late 1700s. In the 1820s, the industry began to grow rapidly, reaching its peak in the mid-to-late 1800s. The story of mining is much more than minerals found and ores extracted. This Monday, July 13, 2009 Dr. Carol Burke will explore human aspects of Adirondack mining in an illustrated program entitled &#8220The Adirondack Mining Village&#8221 at the Adirondack Museum at Blue Mountain Lake, New York.

Part of the museum’s popular Monday Evening Lecture series, the presentation will be held in the Auditorium at 7:30 p.m. There is no charge for museum members. Admission is $5.00 for non-members.

Burke’s presentation reflects an ongoing project that documents accounts of the daily lives or ordinary people who lived and worked in the now abandoned mining villages of Tahawus and nearby Adirondac (known in the 1950s as &#8220The Upper Works&#8221). Dr. Burke will share photographs and recollections of everyday life in these former company towns.

Carol Burke, a Professor at the University of California at Irvine, is a folklorist and journalist whose ethnographic work has produced books that document the lives of Midwestern farm families, female inmates in our nation’s prisons, and most recently, members of the armed services. Six months ago she was embedded with an army unit in northern Iraq.

Dr. Burke spends her summers in the Adirondacks and is currently documenting the everyday life of the once-flourishing mining village of Tahawus. Before joining the faculty at the University of California at Irvine, Professor Burke taught at Vanderbilt University, Johns Hopkins University, and the United States Naval Academy.

The broad story of mining in the Adirondacks is one of fortunes made and lost, of suicide, madness, and ambition, and the opening of one of America’s last frontiers. Mining shaped the physical and cultural landscape of the Adirondack Park for generations. The Adirondack Museum plans to open the completely revitalized exhibit &#8220Mining in the Adirondacks&#8221 in 2012 to share this incredible history.

Photo: Adirondack Village, Near the Upper Works. From Benson J. Lossing’s The Hudson, from the Wilderness to the Sea, 1859.

In and Around Essex, Architecture Focus at History Center

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The Adirondack History Center Museum will host two events in July that look at the landscape and built environment in Essex County. A reception, slide show and gallery tour by photographer Betsy Tisdale featuring the exhibition, In and Around Essex will be held on July 8th, 2009 at 4:00 p.m. The slide show highlights photographs not included in the exhibition and focuses on changes that have taken place in Essex, NY over the last 30 years. Light refreshments will be served including an array of pies contributed by Essex community members for a taste of hometown Essex. Donations accepted. Please call for reservations.

Celebrating a Landscape of Culture and Ideas: 1609-2009, is the focus of this season at the History Center which is offering its next event on Sunday, July 12 at 4:00pm. A lecture by Ellen Ryan, Community Outreach Director at Adirondack Architectural Heritage (AARCH), features “What can we learn about people and their environment by looking at architecture?” The presentation corresponds with the exhibition currently on display at the museum: Race, Gender, and Class: Architecture and Society in Essex County. Please call for reservations. $10/non-members, $5/members, $2/students.

The museum is located at 7590 Court Street, Elizabethtown (corner of Hand Avenue and Court Street). For more information please contact the museum at 873-6466 or [email protected].

Adirondack Iron Ore Program in Wilmington

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The Wilmington Historical Society will sponsor the program &#8220Adirondack-Champlain Iron: Creator of Boom Towns & Ghost Towns, 1750s-1970s&#8221 with guest speaker John Moravek, Associate Professor of Geography, SUNY Plattsburgh. The program will be held at the Wilmington Community Center on Springfield Road in Wilmington, Essex County, NY on Friday, July 17, at 7 pm. The public is encouraged to attend. Refreshments will be served. For further information, contact Karen Peters at 946-7586 or Merri Peck at 946- 7627.

About the speaker: John Moravek has been on the faculty at SUNY Plattsburgh since arriving in fall semester of 1969. Now an Associate Professor of Geography, he teaches a variety of courses, including Physical Geography, Historical and Cultural Geography of the United States- as well as the History and Cultural Geography of Russia. He has also offered a popular and intensive two-week workshop (a 3-credit course) on the Historical Geography of the Adirondack Region every July for the past 26 years consecutively which he considers a genuine labor of love as an incorrigible &#8220Adirondackophile&#8221. John is also an official Forty-Sixer, having climbed the first 45 mountains solo. His doctoral dissertation, completed in 1976, investigated a number of facets of the history and geography of the Adirondack-Champlain Iron Industry. He has also presented several papers on the topic at professional meetings, with aspirations of writing a book on the topic at some future date. Currently, his publications include a number of Review Essays/Book Critiques on various topics, primarily related to the Adirondack Region.

Adirondack Museum Offers More Quilt Exhibits

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The Adirondack Museum has launched a new online exhibit, &#8220Common Threads: 150 Year of Adirondack Quilts and Comforters&#8221 that will share quilts and Adirondack quilting history. The online exhibit includes quilts, text, and historic photographs and is a companion piece to a special exhibition, also named &#8220Common Threads&#8221 that will open to the public at the Blue Mountain Lake museum on May 22, 2009.

The exhibit will include more than forty quilts: historic pieces from the Adirondack Museum’s textile collection, as well as contemporary quilts, comforters, and pieced wall hangings on loan from quilters in communities throughout the region. Demonstrations of handwork will accompany the exhibit throughout the summer. According to an Adirondack Museum announcement:

The Adirondack region has supported an active 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: 150 Years of Adirondack Quilts and Comforters&#8221 explores the 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.

&#8220Common Threads&#8221 will include a family-friendly discovery area where kids can explore pattern and design, try simple stitching on child-sized quilt frames, or enjoy illustrated quilt-themed children’s books. The Adirondack Museum has also developed a special &#8220Toddler Tour&#8221 of the quilt exhibit &#8220that will lead the smallest visitors on a fun (and fast) search for color, shapes, and animals among the quilts on display.&#8221

Museum Curator Hallie Bond will offer an illustrated Monday Evening Lecture on July, 27, 2009 entitled &#8220Common Threads &#8211 Adirondack Quilts Tell Their Stories.&#8221 The program will begin at 7:30 p.m. and will be held in the Auditorium.

The Adirondack Fabric and Fiber Arts Festival will be held on September 12, 2009. A celebration of traditional and contemporary fiber arts, the Festival will include demonstrations, a juried artisan’s market, and hands-on activities. In addition, folksinger, song writer Peggy Lynn will offer a special musical presentation, &#8220A Stitch in Time: Songs Celebrating the Art and Heritage of Quilting.&#8221

Lake Placid Sliding Sports Museum Proposed

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At the 1932 & 1980 Lake Placid Winter Olympic Museum Board of Directors’ April meeting, newest member Joe Clain donated $1,000 to kick-off the creation of an International Sliding Sports Museum in Lake Placid. Clain made the donation on behalf of his father Gus Clain and the Linney Family in the hopes that other prominent families in the history of sliding sports will come forward and meet the challenge.

Angus (Gus) Clain was the brakeman for the four-man sled piloted by Robert Linney, which qualified at the 1939 trials in Lake Placid for the 1940 Olympic Winter Games. Because of WWII, the Games were not contested in 1940 or 1944. The family of Gus Clain previously created and donated a very rare exhibit consisting of the sweater and jacket issued to the 1940 Olympic Bobsled team, and which is on permanent display in the Olympic Museum.

The Sliding Sports Museum at Mt. Van Hoevenberg will be an annex to the already existing Olympic Museum – located within the Olympic Center – and as such will come under the same chartering agency, the Board of Regents of the University of the State of New York on behalf of the State Education Department. The future museum will share the same 501(c) 3 not-for-profit status making all donations eligible for a tax deduction.

“The next logical step is to create an advisory board of interested community members who share the same passion for preserving, displaying and educating future generations on the rich history of sliding sports in this area,” said Olympic Museum Director Liz De Fazio in a press release issued this week.

For more information on the proposed International Sliding Museum, or to make a donation, contact De Fazio at (518) 523-1655, ext. 226 or [email protected].

Adirondack Museum To Open For Season May 22nd

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The Adirondack Museum will open for its 52nd season on Friday, May 22, 2009. The Adirondack Museum once again extends an invitation to year-round residents of the Adirondack Park to visit free of charge in May, June, and October. Through this annual gift to close friends and neighbors, the museum welcomes visitors from all corners of the Park. Proof of residency is required.

The Adirondack Museum is open daily from May 22 through October 18, 2009 from 10:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. Friday, September 4 and Friday, September 18 are exceptions to the schedule, as the museum will be closed to prepare for special events. All paid admissions are valid for a second visit within a one-week period.

On Saturday, May 23 the Museum Store will host a book signing from 3:00 p.m. until 5:00 p.m. as part of the opening weekend festivities. Elizabeth Folwell, Creative Director of Adirondack Life will sign copies of her new book Short Carries &#8211 Essays from Adirondack Life. Betsy Folwell joined the staff of Adirondack Life in 1989. Since then she has written scores of articles and essays on the politics, nature, history and culture of the six million acres Adirondack Park. She has won eight writing awards from the International Regional Magazine Association.

The twenty-two exhibits, historic buildings, outstanding collections, lovely gardens, and pristine views that are the Adirondack Museum tell stories of life, work, and play in the Adirondack Park of northern New York State.

&#8220Common Threads: 150 Years of Adirondack Quilts & Comforters&#8221 is one of two exhibits to debut in 2009. The exceptionally beautiful exhibition will include historic quilts from the Adirondack Museum’s textile collection, as well as contemporary quilts, comforters, and pieced wall hangings on loan from quilters in communities throughout the region. The exhibit illustrates a vibrant pieced-textile tradition nurtured by the Adirondack region 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.

The second new exhibit, &#8220A &#8216-Wild, Unsettled Country’: Early Reflections of the Adirondacks&#8221 will include paintings, maps, prints, and photographs that illuminate the untamed Adirondack wilderness discovered by early cartographers, artists, and photographers. The exhibit will showcase more than forty paintings from the museum’s exceptional collection, including works by Thomas Cole, John Frederick Kensett, William Havell, and James David Smillie. Also featured are fifty of the engravings and lithographs of Adirondack landscape paintings that brought these images to a wider audience and provided many Americans with their first glimpse of the &#8220howling wilds&#8221 that were the Adirondack Mountains. A dozen rare and significant maps from the collection of the museum’s research library demonstrate the growth of knowledge about the Adirondacks.

&#8220A &#8216-Wild Unsettled Country’&#8221 will feature photographs sold as tourist souvenirs and to &#8220armchair travelers.&#8221 The first photographic landscape studies made in the Adirondacks by William James Stillman in 1859 have never been exhibited before. Photos by Seneca Ray Stoddard will also be included. The exhibit will include special labels and text just for kids in addition to the traditional presentation. The Adirondack Museum encourages parents and children to explore and discover together.

The Adirondack Museum’s 2009 Photobelt exhibition will feature rarely-seen images from the extensive postcard collection. &#8220Wish Your Were Here&#8221 will showcase Adirondack views of hotels, campsites, tally-ho rides, scenery, boat trips, restaurants, and roadside attractions &#8211 sent home to friends and relatives from 1900 to 1960. Postcards have always been treasured souvenirs and the perfect way to say, &#8220Wish you were here!&#8221

Five newly acquired boats will be displayed in the exhibition &#8220Boats and Boating in the Adirondacks.&#8221 These include a very rare 1918 Moxley launch, a Hickman Sea Sled (forerunner of the Boston Whaler), a Grumman canoe, a Theodore Hanmer guideboat, a Grant Raider, and a 1910 William Vassar guideboat.

Northern NY Discusses Interviewing and Oral History

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The Clinton-Essex Counties Roundtable will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. on Saturday, May 9, 2009 at the Northern New York American Canadian Genealogy Society, Keeseville Civic Center, 1802 Main St., Keeseville. The topic will be “Community Scholars Training: Interviewing & Oral History” and will be presented by Traditional Arts in Upstate New York (TAUNY) Executive Director Jill Breit.

Breit will share examples of successful oral history projects and demonstrate the many ways interviews can be used for different outcomes. She will focus on how to organize an oral history project, the basics of an oral history interview, the importance of field notes and follow-up interviews, recorders and other equipment for collecting oral history.

There will also be a tour of NNY American Canadian Genealogy Society Library and the Anderson Falls Heritage Society. Lunch will be provided at a cost of $5.00, payable at the roundtable.

The roundtable is provided free of charge to the public on behalf of the Northern New York Library Network, Potsdam, and Documentary Heritage Program. To register for this event contact the NNYLN at 315-265-1119, or sign up on-line at www.nnyln.org and click on “Classes.”

Champlain Valley Architecture Tours

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As part of the Lake Champlain Quadricentennial celebration, Adirondack Architectural Heritage is presenting a new tour series, Architecture of the Champlain Valley. The series features half-day walking tours of eight towns along the lake, led by experienced and professional guides. Tours will be at 9:30 am and 1:00 pm on Saturdays in May and June unless otherwise noted.

May 2- Willsboro: One of the oldest settlements in Essex County, Willsboro has a rich history connected to agriculture, paper industry, stone quarrying, shipbuilding, and tourism.

May 9- Keeseville: Keeseville is a town with a long history as an industrial community that manufactured products from wood and iron ore using the power of the Ausable River.

May 16- Essex: Essex prospered during much of the 19th century as a shipping and ship building port, and today, as a National Historic Register District, contains many wonderful examples of various styles of architecture.

May 23- Elizabethtown: As the county seat, Elizabethtown boasts a large historic government complex, and a number of buildings that reflect the town’s social, political and economic importance.

May 30- Port Henry: Port Henry and the surrounding town of Moriah have the longest industrial history of any community in the Champlain Valley, beginning with iron mining and manufacturing in the late 1700s.

June 6- Ticonderoga: Historically associated with military events, Ticonderoga developed as an industrial town connected to paper manufacturing, and today offers more than three dozen buildings listed on the National Register.

June 20- Wadhams (10:00)/Westport (1:00): The hamlet of Wadhams lies just north of Westport on the Boquet River, and was once known for its industrial pursuits which supported the outlying farms. Though industry and agriculture played a role in the development of Westport, it has gained most of its identity as a summer resort town.

June 27- Ironville: In the town of Crown Point, the settlement of Ironville is the site of the Penfield Homestead Museum and was once the center of a thriving iron industry.

Attendance is free of charge, but advance registration is required. Reservations may be made by calling AARCH at 834-9328.

Adirondack Architectural Heritage (AARCH) is the private, non-profit, historic preservation organization for the Adirondack Park region. This is one of over fifty events in our annual series highlighting the region’s vast architectural legacy. For more information on membership and our complete program schedule contact AARCH at (518) 834-9328 or visit our website at www.aarch.org.

ORDA Creating New Sliding Sports Museum

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The New York State Olympic Regional Development Authority (ORDA) is looking to create the North American Sliding Sports Museum at Lake Placid’s historic Olympic Sports Complex. At this time, ORDA would like to call on all former bobsledders, lugers and skeleton athletes or family members of deceased athletes to come to Lake Placid during competition weekends in February. ORDA is calling on all former track workers or family members of deceased track workers who have kept their story and history alive. The Olympic Sports Complex is in the preliminary planning stage of creating a North America Sliding Sports Museum and ORDA would like to record the history, memories, stories and experiences of everyone affiliated with the Lake Placid tracks.

The goal of the North America Sliding Sports Museum is to tell the stories of athletes, to educate the public and inspire future athletes of these fast paced sports. Along with oral histories, ORDA is also accepting artifacts, programs, all images, uniforms, posters, club logos, club trophies, and more. By donating these items to the Olympic Museum, not only is the public memorializing special experiences but also contributing to a unique piece of history and everyone will be given a deed of gift to use at tax time.

The dates will be February 6-8, 20-22 and Feb. 26- March 1. Each person who donates or records an oral history will receive free admission to the world championships.
For more information on how to donate historical memorabilia, or to schedule an interview, please contact ORDA Corporate Development Assistant Alison Casey at (518) 523-1655 ext. 343 or email her at [email protected].