New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

Great Depression

Albany County’s West Mountain: Some History

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Lewis Sherman HouseWest Mountain refers to the highlands in the southwest quadrant of the Town of Berne, NY, and is the highest point in Albany County at 2,160 ft.

A map of Van Rensselaer Patroonship leases made in 1787 does not shows anyone living on West Mountian, but white settlers probably started clearing land there within a few years of that date.  A few years later there were enough folks to organize the Baptist Church of Christ, just north of the Rensselaerville-Berne town line. A schoolhouse was built next door, jointly operated by both towns. [Read more…] about Albany County’s West Mountain: Some History

Memoir Recounts The Remarkable Life of Sophie Kussmaul

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through sophies eyesThrough Sophie’s Eyes (Cahaba, 2008) is a remarkable memoir by Sophie Kussmaul (1875-1968), granddaughter of Princess Regina Henry, first cousin to Frederick III, Emperor of Germany, and niece of Dr. Adolf Kussmaul, a noted Heidelberg physician.

Edited by Sinclair Seevers, the memoir spans her first six decades, two thirds of Kussmaul’s long life.  It’s a vivid account of her shy childhood in the 1870s through the years of the Great Depression. [Read more…] about Memoir Recounts The Remarkable Life of Sophie Kussmaul

A Visit To The Deansboro, Oneida Co, CCC Camp

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Deansboro CCC Camp flag pole and three buildingsDuring the Great Depression of the 1930s the federal government started numerous programs to provide jobs. One, based on an earlier New York State program established by then Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC).

The CCC employed about 3.5 million young men nationwide, with about 210,00 of them at 116 camps across New York State. The camps, for men only, were supervised by the U.S. Army and the Soil Conservation Commission. [Read more…] about A Visit To The Deansboro, Oneida Co, CCC Camp

Cutting The Scotia Runway: An Adirondack Conservationist During The War

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Paul Schaefer shouldering an axeIn the 1990s I would visit Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks (AfPA) vice president and archivist Paul Schaefer (1908-1996) at his home in Niskayuna to learn as much as I could from him about wilderness preservation.

After he died, Paul was named one of the 100 top conservationists in the United States by Audubon magazine. I was the executive director of the AfPA and learned a great deal from Paul during the last decade of his life. [Read more…] about Cutting The Scotia Runway: An Adirondack Conservationist During The War

Adirondack CCC Camps History Talk Set for Oneonta

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adirondack civilian conservation corps campsThe Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) began on March 31, 1933 under President Roosevelt’s “New Deal” to relieve the poverty and unemployment of the Depression.

Workers built trails, roads, campsites, & dams, stocked fish, built & maintained fire tower observer’s cabins & telephone lines, fought fires, & planted millions of trees. The CCC disbanded in 1942 due to the need for men in WWII. [Read more…] about Adirondack CCC Camps History Talk Set for Oneonta

Exhibit: Reginald Marsh, US Custom House Murals

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Passing Skyline, 1937The Museum of the City of New York will present “From Ship to Shore: Reginald Marsh & The U.S. Custom House Murals,” a glimpse at rarely seen works from the celebrated American painter known for bringing city scenes to life from the beaches of Coney Island to the burlesque stage, and the United States Custom House. [Read more…] about Exhibit: Reginald Marsh, US Custom House Murals

New-York Historical Opens Art as Activism Exhibit

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Roosevelt and Lehman Campaign PosterLong before digital technology made instant worldwide communication possible, political protests and calls for action reached the public through posters. Posted on walls and bulletin boards, slapped up on store windows and church doors, these works often featured bright colors and modernist art-inspired graphics, and were quickly mass-produced to inform communities, stir up audiences, and call attention to injustice.

This summer, the New-York Historical Society is presenting 72 posters dating from the early 1930s through the 1970s in Art as Activism: Graphic Art from the Merrill C. Berman Collection, on through September 13, 2015. [Read more…] about New-York Historical Opens Art as Activism Exhibit

New Book Traces America in the 1930s

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america-thirtiesAs the newest addition to the America in the Twentieth Century series, America in the Thirties (Syracuse Univ. Press, 2015) explores the complexity of America in what is considered its darkest era of the century.

The decade stood in stark contrast to the carefree, happy-go-lucky days of the Roaring Twenties when prosperity appeared endless. The Stock Market Crash in October 1929 and the economic collapse it unleashed threatened the very foundations of America’s economic, political, and social institutions. The ecological disaster produced by the Dust Bowl ravaging the Great Plains only added to the suffering and misery. [Read more…] about New Book Traces America in the 1930s

NYS Museum Exhibit: Franklin Roosevelt’s First New Deal

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NYSM-bustsFDR_EleanorAn exhibition on President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the “First New Deal” in New York has opened at the New York State Museum. On display through May 4, “New York and the First New Deal” will feature bronze bust sculptures of Roosevelt and his wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, as well as other images and artifacts from Roosevelt’s economic revitalization efforts in New York.

The bronze busts are by sculptor Caroline Palmer of Montgomery, New York. Palmer originally created a set of Roosevelt busts for the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in Hyde Park, NY. She created another set which is currently on loan to the State Museum. [Read more…] about NYS Museum Exhibit: Franklin Roosevelt’s First New Deal

Books: A Memoir of Ticonderoga in Great Depression

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Stubing Rist coverUp on a Hill and Thereabouts: An Adirondack Childhood (SUNY Press, 2013) by Gloria Stubing Rist is a memoir of growing up in Chilson near Ticonderoga, during the Great Depression. In the 1930s, life for kids tucked away in the quiet woodlands of the Adirondacks was rich with nature and filled with human characters.

This memoir contains the recollections of one woman who spent her childhood on the hillsides and in the woods near Ticonderoga. Rist served as Newcomb Central School’s school nurse for five years. Her father-in-law was Ernest Rist, a Newcomb politician in the 1920s through the 1950s. Following his death, New York State honored him by naming a previously unnamed peak after him, Rist Mountain in the southeast corner of the Marcy quadrangle. [Read more…] about Books: A Memoir of Ticonderoga in Great Depression