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Stone secrets: Catskills cairns had deep spiritual significance for Native Americans, says Hudson Valley writer

Stone secrets: Catskills cairns had deep spiritual significance for Native Americans, says Hudson Valley writer

Woodstock’s Glenn Kreisberg’s latest book, Spirits in Stone, published last year by Inner Traditions, reflects his effort to set the record straight of long-lost cultures whose language was at once sophisticated and mysterious, a story whose telling would seem ideally suited to someone who has spent so much of his life exploring and recording the ineffable vestiges of those cultures.

New Paltz rallies against hate in its schools & beyond

New Paltz rallies against hate in its schools & beyond

A gathering of some 50-60 people in front of Elting Library as the “Rise Against Hate” rally began on Saturday, June 8, soon swelled to a crowd of nearly 200 like-minded souls, who came out on a sunny afternoon to stand in solidarity against recent incidents of racism and anti-Semitism in New Paltz schools.

Saugerties’ Jim Starlin: The man behind Thanos

Saugerties’ Jim Starlin: The man behind Thanos

Jim Starlin is one of the most important writers in the history of pop culture, but you likely don’t know his name. As a comics writer at Marvel in the 1970s, Starlin created Thanos, the villain who has supported the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe, the cinematic juggernaut whose intricately-connected franchise movies have dominated international theaters for over a decade now. 

Sowing seeds of community: The New Paltz Rescue Squad

Sowing seeds of community: The New Paltz Rescue Squad

Most encounters with an ambulance are quite pedestrian: the flashing lights and wailing siren signal it’s time to pull the car over and let the members of the rescue squad pass. What’s a momentary pause in the lives of those New Paltz residents might represent a critical moment in the life of someone else, as that ambulance is bringing to their door a crew of professionals with sufficient equipment to do anything that might otherwise happen in a hospital emergency room.

With help, Woodstock man transitions to life outside prison

With help, Woodstock man transitions to life outside prison

“I haven’t experienced freedom in so long, my biggest fear is to have that taken away,” said Woodstocker Ryland Koller, who has been partially released from prison after doing eight years for robbing a heroin dealer in 2011. “I wake up in a cold sweat, thinking some technicality will come up, and I’ll have to go back in. Sleep has been elusive.”

The Anatomy of an Enigma: The Unknown Hervey White

The Anatomy of an Enigma: The Unknown Hervey White

Erroneously named “founder” of Woodstock by Life magazine in 1938, Hervey White [1866-1944] is better described as godfather of a town he personally transformed into America’s most famous Bohemia, earlier even than 1920. But despite this fact, and although admired by artists and farmers alike, Hervey lived and died an enigma. Some knew part, but none knew all his secrets.