Rip Van Winkle: The local and mythic roots of Irving’s timeless tale
The story is not just the quintessential autumn Catskills tale, but also echoes many stories of a hero’s journey to another world and back again.
Local History
Hear “America’s Stories” at Mount Gulian Day in Fishkill
Mount Gulian served as Continental Army headquarters of patriot general Fredrich von Steuben from 1782 to ’83. After the American victory at Yorktown, General von Steuben and other American officers created the Society of the Cincinnati at the site, America’s first veterans’ fraternal organization.
Learn about Rifton’s famous covered bridge this Sunday
You don’t have to travel to New England to visit a historic covered bridge. Just four miles north of New Paltz on Route 213 in Rifton is Perrine’s Bridge, the longest standing Burr arch covered bridge in New York State.
Home-movie footage of FDR’s 1940 Kingston visit found, put on DVD
On the afternoon of Nov. 4, 1940, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s motorcade swept into Kingston, after traveling north over the Wurts Street Bridge on Route 9W. It stopped in front of the Gov. Clinton Hotel before the president, on the eve of his re-election, gave a brief speech at Academy Green, across the street. Local businessman William O’Reilly was there and stepped right up out of the crowd to the president’s car to film the scene. “People have said, ‘I can’t think of your father without that black movie camera in front of his face,’” recalled his daughter Patricia Murphy, former president of Friends of Historic Kingston (FHK).
Slide lecture on Borscht Belt history at SUNY-New Paltz
Photographer Marisa Scheinfeld, who grew up in the Catskills, has been haunting what remains of the Borscht Belt – resorts that lie in ruins, are abandoned, converted into something else or in a few cases still operating – capturing large-scale color images of lobbies, pools, dining rooms, guestrooms, showrooms and stages.
Haunted Huguenot Street tours spotlight scary situations for women in local history
Guests will bear witness to the legendary true story of a tormented mother and an unorthodox macabre wedding ceremony, while also learning about sexist witch trials, kidnapped wives, mourning brides and the curse of infertility.
Historic Graveyard Tours in Hyde Park
The Historic Graveyard Tour at St. James Episcopal Church in Hyde Park is now in its seventh season, drawing curious locals and serious history buffs into a live docudrama highlighting chosen “residents” of the 200-year-old cemetery.
New book by local historians tracks slavery in the Hudson Valley
“Ulster County was one of the worst [counties] in the state. There’s only one person so far in this county that I’ve been able to identify as an abolitionist. Even the Quakers didn’t want to let go of their slaves.”
Book, panel examine legacy of naturalist John Burroughs
What we now call natural history or the biosciences were once known as “natural philosophy,” and it was assumed that
New Paltz slavery exhibit small but moving
You have only until September 25 to see a small but moving show on Huguenot Street about slavery in New