• 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

Guest Contributor

Contribute an essay to the New York Almanack here.

Owls: Common and Fascinating Forest Residents

January 17, 2021 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

TOS_BarredOwlOn frigid winter evenings, the hooting of a barred owl (Strix varia) serves as a reminder that the darkened forests of the Northeast are still very much alive with activity. Their nocturnal calling emanates from favorite forest haunts, including along lakeshores, swamps, and rivers. But the sound of an owl late at night also conveys a certain eeriness. Or perhaps we are simply conditioned to feel that way. Owls have generated feelings of awe, fascination, and fear for millennia, and their lives and sounds feature heavily in our collective imagination. [Read more…] about Owls: Common and Fascinating Forest Residents

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, Capital-Saratoga, Hudson Valley - Catskills, Mohawk Valley, Nature, New York City, Western NY Tagged With: birding, birds, nature, Wildlife

Veteran’s Honor Roll Is One Town’s Lonely Sentinel

January 15, 2021 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Town of Wilton’s Veteran’s Honor RollIn winter, it stands silently like a lonely sentinel, set back from Ballard Road in the Town of Wilton, Saratoga County. Day and night the traffic whizzes by the Veteran’s Honor Roll, yet its presence is overlooked by most. [Read more…] about Veteran’s Honor Roll Is One Town’s Lonely Sentinel

Filed Under: Capital-Saratoga, History Tagged With: Saratoga, Saratoga County, Saratoga County History Center, Saratoga County History Roundtable, Wilton

Wood Turtles Under Threat

January 9, 2021 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

wood turtle by adelaide tyrolLast June my wife Marie and I encountered a mature wood turtle while walking through a forest near our home. We admired the intricate topography of its shell, inspiration for this species’ scientific name: Glyptemys (“carved turtle”) insculpta (“sculpted”).

The nine-inch adult had brownish-black skin and scarlet-orange patches on its neck and legs. Its lower shell was a rich yellow encircled by black splotches.
[Read more…] about Wood Turtles Under Threat

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, Capital-Saratoga, Hudson Valley - Catskills, Mohawk Valley, Nature, New York City, Western NY Tagged With: nature, turtles, Wildlife

Ballston’s Hawkwood Estate: Teddy Roosevelt, Guy Baker & The Countess

January 8, 2021 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Hawkwood circa 1900Theodore Roosevelt spent a bit of time in Saratoga County, particularly in the years leading up to and including his time as Governor of New York (1899-1900).

TR would often visit a friend, Guy Baker, who lived in Ballston. He hunted on Baker’s Hawkwood estate and sometimes brought members of his family for short visits with the Bakers. [Read more…] about Ballston’s Hawkwood Estate: Teddy Roosevelt, Guy Baker & The Countess

Filed Under: Capital-Saratoga, History Tagged With: Ballston Lake, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Saratoga, Saratoga County, Saratoga County History Center, Saratoga County History Roundtable, Theodore Roosevelt

Life and Legacies of Spencer Trask

January 3, 2021 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Spenser Trask at his Yaddo EstateSpencer Trask awoke on the morning of December 31st, 1909 in the last compartment of the last sleeper car on the Montreal Express as it neared New York City on the D&H Railroad line.

Getting dressed, his thoughts may have turned to the three passions that dominated his 65 years. He did not know then that it would be the final day of his eventful life. [Read more…] about Life and Legacies of Spencer Trask

Filed Under: Arts, Capital-Saratoga, History, New York City Tagged With: art, New York City, Saratoga, Saratoga County, Saratoga Spa State Park, Saratoga Springs, Vice, Yaddo

Bird Migration: Where Are They Now?

January 2, 2021 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

TOS_Bird MigrationMornings are quiet now. Gone is the loud chorus of bird song outside my window that I awoke to in spring and summer. While we brave the cold, snow, and bitter winds of winter by donning extra layers or throwing another log on the fire, most of our summer birds have departed for the warmer temperatures and abundant food of more southern latitudes. [Read more…] about Bird Migration: Where Are They Now?

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, Capital-Saratoga, Hudson Valley - Catskills, Mohawk Valley, Nature, New York City, Western NY Tagged With: Bird Migration, birding, birds, nature, Wildlife

Saratoga County’s Cold War Rocket Test Facility

December 27, 2020 by Guest Contributor 1 Comment

Rocket Test from Observation BunkerOn Christmas morning, December 25th, 1945, the residents of Saratoga County were startled by a loud noise. It was not the clatter of Santa’s reindeer on the roof but instead America’s race to the Moon had begun. [Read more…] about Saratoga County’s Cold War Rocket Test Facility

Filed Under: Capital-Saratoga, History Tagged With: Saratoga, Saratoga County, Saratoga County History Center, Saratoga County History Roundtable

The Life and Death of a Saratoga County Patriot

December 22, 2020 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Daguerreotype believed to be the image of Uriah Gregory near the end of his lifeThe last week of the year 1843 was a difficult time for Ballston farmer Uriah Gregory. On December 29th Uriah lost his beloved wife, Tamer, his partner of more than sixty-five years, with whom he shared a life in the earliest days of the new nation. [Read more…] about The Life and Death of a Saratoga County Patriot

Filed Under: Capital-Saratoga, History Tagged With: Ballston Spa, Battle of Saratoga, Military History, Saratoga, Saratoga County, Saratoga County History Center, Saratoga County History Roundtable

A Tannery Fire Transformed Kaydeross Valley Communities

December 20, 2020 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Bulls Head Tannery Employees in Ballston SpaToday the crossing of Middle Line Road and Geyser Road in Saratoga County contains a few houses and a small parking lot to access the Kayaderosseras Creek. But in the mid-1800s, it was the site of a thriving hamlet of several hundred inhabitants called Milton Center.

Locally renowned Revolutionary War Lt. Colonel James Gordon became an early entrepreneur after the war. He built one of Milton’s earliest gristmills on the creek by 1800 as well as other small mills to the south in the Town of Ballston. [Read more…] about A Tannery Fire Transformed Kaydeross Valley Communities

Filed Under: Capital-Saratoga, History Tagged With: Ballston Spa, Fires, Industrial History, Milton, Saratoga, Saratoga County, Saratoga Springs

Redpolls: Visitors From The Far North

December 20, 2020 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

TOS_RedpollAs winter settles in, people watching their birdfeeders hope to catch a glimpse of something out of the ordinary – perhaps a visitor from the Far North. Nothing satisfies this desire like the bubbly and charismatic common redpoll.

A member of the finch family, this small songbird is similar in size to the American goldfinch. While they breed in the Arctic and northern boreal forests, common redpolls sometimes flock into the northern United States – or beyond – on a winter quest for food. [Read more…] about Redpolls: Visitors From The Far North

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, Capital-Saratoga, Hudson Valley - Catskills, Mohawk Valley, Nature, New York City, Western NY Tagged With: birding, birds, nature, Wildlife

  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to page 3
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 13
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Help Us Reach Our Fundraising Goal For 2020

Subscribe to New York Almanack

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

Recent Comments

  • Noel A. Sherry on Frank Tweedy: A Tenderfoot Becomes An Experienced Surveyor
  • James Grice on Esopus: Wiltwyck School For Boys Lecture
  • Noel Sherry on An Adirondack Surveyor’s Unpublished Work Reflects On A “Wild and Woolly” Career
  • Noel Sherry on Early Adirondack Surveys: The Great Corner & An Ancient Boundary
  • Bob Meyer on An Adirondack Surveyor’s Unpublished Work Reflects On A “Wild and Woolly” Career
  • Bob Bradley on Early Adirondack Surveys: The Great Corner & An Ancient Boundary
  • Bob Bradley on Frank Tweedy: A Tenderfoot Becomes An Experienced Surveyor
  • JanecKushner on Will Lewis: Interview With A Public Radio Pioneer
  • Sam on Colonial Canandaigua In War And Peace
  • Noel Sherry on An Adirondack Surveyor’s Unpublished Work Reflects On A “Wild and Woolly” Career

Recent New York Books

Craft book
Sittin In
sanctuary
Mysterious Stone Sites in the Hudson Valley and Northern New Jersey
Everything Worthy of Observation: The 1826 New York State Travel Journal of Alexander Stewart Scott by Paul G. Schneider Jr.
the inland sea
Schenectady Genesis, Volume II: The Creation of an American City from an Anglo-Dutch Town, ca. 1760-1800
americas first frontier
Francis Two-Gun Crowley's Killings in New York City & Long Island

Secondary Sidebar

New York State Historic Markers