• Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to secondary sidebar

New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • Adirondacks & NNY
  • Capital-Saratoga
  • Mohawk Valley
  • Hudson Valley & Catskills
  • NYC & Long Island
  • Western NY
  • History
  • Nature & Environment
  • Arts & Culture
  • Outdoor Recreation
  • Food & Farms
  • Subscribe
  • Support
  • Submit
  • About
  • New Books
  • Events
  • Podcasts

Historic Local Recordings Now Available in Plattsburgh

July 18, 2012 by Editorial Staff 1 Comment

Access to hundreds of audio recordings that reveal the rich histories of Clinton, Essex, and Franklin Counties are now available at SUNY Plattsburgh’s Feinberg Library’s Special Collections.

Recordings include Adirondack Folk Music; Clinton, Essex, and Franklin County oral histories, including those by local residents born prior to the American Civil War; SUNY Plattsburgh concerts; a 1963 recording of Edward “Doc” Redcay on piano and Junior Barber on dobro; and four-time Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Frost reading his works.

The collection of recordings is the result of a collaborative effort by SUNY Plattsburgh Communications Professor Timothy Clukey and Feinberg Library’s Special Collections staff. According to a statement released to the press “copyright restrictions require that researchers visit Special Collections during open hours to listen to any of these recordings.” The recordings are available as mp3 files on a new Audio Station computer kiosk.

A Soundscriber Recorder was used in the mid-20th century by Marjorie Lansing Porter, historian for Clinton and Essex counties. Porter recorded 456 interviews with elderly local residents telling stories and singing traditional Adirondack folk music.

Among the folk music examples, Granma Delorme sang more than one hundred folk songs for Porter, including a Battle of Plattsburgh ballad composed by General Alexander Macomb’s wife. Included also is “Yankee” John Galusha singing “The Three Hunters,” “A Lumbering We Shall Go,” and “Adirondack Eagle.” Francis Delong sings “My Adirondack Home,” and “Peddler Jack.”

Many of the recorded songs deal with mining, lumbering, Adirondack folk tales, and other subjects, as well as traditional Irish and French folk music handed down through generations. The Porter Oral History Interviews cover many topics of historical interest in Clinton and Essex Counties, such as ferry boats, Redford glass, mining, and lumbering.

The Audio Station also includes 96 interviews conducted by William Langlois and Robert McGowan with elder Franklin County residents in the 1970s.

Plans in the works for additions to the Audio Station include:

Rockwell Kent audio recordings (now on reel-to-reel tapes in Special Collections’ Rockwell Kent Collection);

SUNY Plattsburgh Past President Dr. George Angell speaking on antiwar action in 1967—“Protest is Not Enough”;
The 1965 SUNY Plattsburgh Students for a Democratic Society and S.E.A.N.Y.S. teach-in, “The Vietnam Question,” with introduction by Dr. Angell; 
A1964 speech by Senator-Elect Robert Kennedy on the Plattsburgh campus; and a 1964 meeting between Senator-Elect Kennedy and Dr. Angell, discussing various local and county concerns and other topics.
For more information, contact Debra Kimok, Special Collections Librarian (email: debra.kimok@plattsburgh.edu; telephone: 518-564-5206).

During the summer, the Feinberg Special Collections will be open on Mondays and Tuesdays, from 1 pm – 4 pm, and on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, from 10 am – noon and 1 pm – 4 pm. Saturday appointments can be arranged with the Special Collections Librarian.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Adirondacks, Clinton County, Cultural History, Essex County, Franklin County, Literature, Media, Music, Oral History, SUNY Plattsburgh

About Editorial Staff

Stories written under the Editorial Staff byline are drawn from press releases and other notices. Submit your news to New York Almanack here.

Reader Interactions

Trackbacks

  1. Local Historic Audio Recordings at SUNY Plattsburgh | Essex on Lake Champlain says:
    April 9, 2013 at 2:13 PM

    […] Recordings include Adirondack Folk Music and oral histories, including some given by local residents born prior to the American Civil War (New York History). […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Support Our 2022 Fundraising

Subscribe to New York Almanack

Subscribe! Follow the New York Almanack each day via E-mail, RSS, Twitter or Facebook updates.

Recent Comments

  • Sean on A Brief History of the Mohawk River
  • Helise Flickstein on Susan B. Anthony Childhood Home Historic Marker Dedication
  • Art and Fashion Teachers Opportunity: Quilts, Textiles, & Fiber Exhibitions Looking For Entries DEADLINE August 14, 2022 – Keeper of Knowledge on Quilts, Textiles, & Fiber Exhibitions Looking For Entries
  • Margaret on Catskills Resort History: The Beginning of the End
  • Kathleen Hulser on Georgia O’Keefe At Wiawaka On Lake George
  • Alison, descendent of Thurlow Weed on Albany’s Thurlow Weed: Seward, Lincoln’s Election, & The Civil War Years
  • Jimmy Wallach on Catskills Resort History: The Beginning of the End
  • Jimmy Wallach on Catskills Resort History: The Beginning of the End
  • Bob Meyer on ‘The Last Days of John Brown’ in Ticonderoga Friday
  • Sean I. Ahern on ‘The Last Days of John Brown’ in Ticonderoga Friday

Recent New York Books

off the northway
Horse Racing the Chicago Way
The Women's House of Detention
Long Island’s Gold Coast Warriors and the First World War
Public Faces Secret Lives by Wendy Rouse
adirondack cabin
Spaces of Enslavement and Resistance in Dutch New York
ilion cover
Spare Parts

Secondary Sidebar

preservation league
Protect the Adirondacks Hiking Guide