Archive » September 2019 » Columns

by John R. Williams

The early morning rides to the various restaurants are now taking place in the dark for many of the Old Men of the Mountain. On Tuesday morning, Sept. 17, on the way to Mrs. K’s Restaurant in Middleburgh, it was just that way, but the darkness was becoming thin as the sun was beginning to come up.

Some of the OFs think this is the best part of the day, while others “yawn and stretch and try to come to life.” The early risers are already at Mrs. K’s getting their cup of ambition.

The darkness of the morning brought out “night” driving — again. The problem happens because of the blue and white lights, especially when the oncoming car does not dim them.

Even on low beam these lights may cause momentary blindness until they go by. The high-rise trucks that bring the headlights to eye level are also a real problem for oncoming drivers.

The OFs think there should be a law that limits the height of headlights off the ground. That way, trucks and these modified vehicles would have headlights down where they belong and not at windshield height. One OF said this is one of those cases where people think only of themselves and not about the people around them.

Autumn watch

The OFs are watching the end of summer, and the fall approaching. Many of the OFs have commented the signs indicate an early start to winter.

The amount of apples on the trees (including the old trees with their little wild apples) is a good indicator of the weather, the OFs say.

The OFs have noticed these trees in our area are loaded with fruit. The leaves on the trees are turning basically brown and falling off. So far there is little color to them.

One OF said it is still early and the color will come when it is supposed to. Another OF said the trees were done early this year in making sugar for the winter and they started getting ready for winter earlier.

One OF commented it might be earlier, but he thinks it is going to be easier because he has not noticed a real bird migration yet. Another OF said it is still early for the birds to pack up and leave also but he has noticed all the robins are gone.

Then one OF said he has robins year-round and not just a few of them, but lots of them. Then this OF said to take a close look at them and the OF bets they are all males.

This OF said the male robin has a black head, and white throat, and the female robin is duller in color. So the other OF said he would check that out.

The OF said that the OF with the year-round robins must have lots of food and protection for them to hang in there through the winter. That OF said he doesn’t know but he has about one-thousand feet of sumac on one side of his property, and it is loaded with a thorn berry bush, and that bush is a pain in the butt. Some thorns on that thing will puncture a tractor tire.

“That’ll do it for the birds,” the other OF said.

Bird lesson for the day from the OMOTM.

Dearth of workers

Some of the OFs talked about some cities having it tough and others rebuilding nicely. The OFs thought it had to do with weather, taxes, and manufacturing plants locating in the southern states, leaving the states close to the Canadian border that used to have heavy manufacturing jobs struggling.

In our area, we seem to be doing well, but up north, not so.

One OF thought it was states with high taxes and tough unions that drive businesses to states with fewer regulations that are receptive to industry. One OF said that today there are more job openings than unemployed workers to fill them. Another OF said he read that, too.

An OF was asked if he wanted to go to work part-time. The fellow who asked this question told the OF that right now he has to take the best of the worst to fill the job.

One OF said he doesn’t think these jobs pay well or have any benefits that will keep a family going. This may be the problem, some thought, and the major reason for the comment is because there are not enough workers to fill the jobs out there.

“Yeah,” one OF mentioned, “statistics can be maneuvered in many ways. If you have lost a job paying $30 an hour with bennies, and have a wife and two kids, working at McDonald’s is not going to cut the mustard.”

The OFs who can still drive at night, and get up early enough to be the early birds at the restaurants, met at their usual early time at Mrs. K’s Restaurant in Middleburgh. However, once all had gathered, those OFs were: Roger Chapman, George Washburn, Wally Guest, Paul Nelson, Robie Osterman, John Rossmann, Bill Lichliter, Roger Shafer, Pete Whitbeck, Bill Bartholomew, Rev. Jay Francis, Dave Williams, Jim Heiser, Joe Rack, Mark Traver, Glenn Patterson, Ken Parks, Chuck Aelesio, Richard Frank, Art Frament, Bob Benac, Otis Lawyer, Jake Lederman, Ted Feurer, Gerry Irwin, Lou Schenck, Marty Herzog, Jack Norray, Herb Bahrmann, Mace Porter, Warren Willsey, Mike Willsey, Rick LaGrange, Elwood Vanderbilt, Allen DeFazio, Fred Crounse, Rick Donnelly, Bob Benninger, Bob Fink, Harold Grippen, Harold Guest, and me.

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September 25, 2019

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by Dennis Sullivan

— From Ladri di bicilcette

Often heralded as a cinematic masterpiece, “The Bicycle Thief,” directed by Vittorio De Sica, opened in the United States in 1949; the original Italian “Ladri di biciclette” opened in Italy the year before. Ladri is plural: thieves. A lot of people in the United States use the singular and, in doing so, miss the point of the film.

The movie portrays the life of a poor unemployed man who gets a job pasting advertising bills on city walls. The only requirement for the job is that he have a bicycle; he does but it’s in hock.

His wife strips the sheets off their bed (her dowry), drags them to the pawn shop, exchanges them for the bike, then sends her man off to bring home the bacon. Marx would call the bike the means of production.

On the first day of the job, things start out well but, when Antonio gets up on a ladder to paste a fancy bill, a man sneaks from behind a car and steals his bike, the means to his family’s dinner.

A good part of the movie is the “victim” (later accompanied by his son) trying to track down the getaway man. Walking around depressed because of ill-luck, he eyes a bike in front of the Stadio Nazionale del PNF, Rome’s famous soccer stadium, unattended.

He quickly tells his son to go home and, once the boy’s out of sight, rushes to the bike and is off riding on somebody else’s supper.

But this time — thus “Ladri” — onlookers see the perpetrator and, mob-like, rush the bike, drag the thief to the ground, and pummel him with justice.

The kid, who missed his train, had come back and witnessed the ignominy being dished out to his father.

But there’s a deus ex machina: The guy who owns the bike appears. In the midst of the crowd he peers down at a frightened child standing beside a dispirited soul, and tells the crowd: No big, let him go — and the thief, the second thief, is freed.

Here’s where the analysts come in: The father had been the victim of a crime, an act of hostility, when his bike was stolen. But when he finds himself in a similar situation, that is, when he sees an unattended bike the way his was, he responds not with feeling for how the other guy might feel when he sees his bike gone, but with retributive hostility.

The thinking is: Somebody got me, I’ll get somebody; anyone who leaves a bike unattended deserves what he gets — though the paperer does not say the same about himself, that he deserved hostility in the first place.

When the mob came, the people in the mob also dished out a deserts-based justice, acting like hostile vigilantes. They behaved the way the wallpaperer did. The situations differ, of course, but both reflect a transgression of personhood.

The twist in the movie is that the second victim of a bicycle theft does not respond with retributive hostility but commands the crowd: Let the guy go. He responds with hospitality. He not only stops the mob from beating on the perpetrator but treats the offender as he might a guest in his home or a beloved family member.

On one level, we do not know what the guy’s thinking is, such that he would respond to hostility with hospitality. And yet he’s countercultural in the sense that he contradicts the prevailing ethic to take an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, and enjoy diminishing another.

Which is how the current president of the United States behaves. As he said in a November 2012 tweet, “When someone attacks me, I always attack back ... except 100x more. This has nothing to do with a tirade but rather, a way of life!” An admission of a hostile disposition.

Again, we do not know what the second thief’s thinking is about relative worth and how a harm-done should be responded to. Regardless, the father could not fathom what it takes to be hospitable in the face of hostility, to respond to loss with largesse. But that would be another movie.

De Sica’s movie ends with the father, walking home with his son, his tail between his legs. He begins to cry and the son, seeing a man bereft of dignity, takes his hand and offers hospitality — to a criminal, a criminal who happens to be his father. The child has seen beneath the surface separations that keep us apart to where we’re all connected.

I thought of De Sica’s film last week when a story appeared in the news about a bicycle, a bicycle that wasn’t stolen but given, freely given, given by one person to another without knowing the recipient, without assessing whether the recipient deserved it, the only measure being the measure of need, and nothing was asked for in return. Pure hospitality.

The late famous Algerian-born French deconstructionist philosopher, Jacques Derrida, used to say there is no such a thing as a pure act of hospitality, but does not this case of a bicycle freely-given apply?

The recipient of that bike is now a 29-year old Kurdish woman, Mevan Babakar, who was desperate to find the man who gave it to her when she was 5 years old and living as a refugee outside Zwolle, Netherlands.

She went back to that city after all those years to see if she might find, not a getaway but, a giveaway man. She looked in the face of every old man she saw on the street, ready to sing her psalm of gratitude, but no luck.

When she turned to the Web and told her story to the world, in no time the man was ID’ed, but the kind soul said he wanted no light shined on him. He said it was no big deal, all he was doing was honoring personhood.

The 20th-Century Dutch spiritual writer Henry Nouwen looked into this kind of hospitality, asking how people find the strength to offer hospitality in the face of hostility.

In his beloved “Out of Solitude,” Nouwen says hospitable people “instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand.” They do not steal your bike.

He says the hospitable “can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion ... can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement ... can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is [be] a friend who cares.” They do not respond with ire.

I find Nouwen’s words to be a little too abstract but there have been times, when someone stole my bike, that I turned to them for the hospitality they offer.

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September 18, 2019

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by John R. Williams

On a beautiful morning, Tuesday, Sept. 10, the Old Men of the Mountain met at the Middleburgh Diner in Middleburgh.

It is now getting a little dark when some of the OMOTM head out for breakfast, but the OFs do not have to worry. Tuesday morning, the OFs said that there were so many shiny heads at the breakfast that the OFs really don’t need the sun.

As the OFs entered, the inside of the restaurant does seem to get a little brighter. This scribe has to admit he is one that contributes to the illumination of the restaurant.

One OF summed it up nicely (and he too has a shiny head) when he said, “Grass doesn’t grow on a busy street.”

The shiny-head syndrome is a sign of brilliance just like the exterior of the cranium. Maybe that OF is right!

Many of the OFs have gone for a stress test. This test is to check on the condition of the heart. The physical condition that is, because some of the OFs have been called heartless in certain situations — especially by their kids.

Some of the OFs become stressed just to hear that they have to have a stress test. For one thing, this test is painless. So not to worry there.

The other thing, as far as most of the OFs can attest, there are capable people around giving the test, and the OF will be wired up like the back of an old TV set.

The not-so fun part is not the running one must do during the procedure, but the laying flat seemingly forever while the camera takes pictures of the heart after the stress part is done.

The OFs are waiting for the Star Trek type of medicine where they rub a cream on the belly, then wave a wand over it and, whatever the problem is, it is diagnosed immediately, and remedy is applied.

Dorian disaster

Hurricane Dorian was a discussion the OFs had and they talked about the aftermath. The Bahamas, according to the press, were completely flattened, and the pictures seemed to attest to that.

Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas, is only 121 feet above sea level, but most of the islands are only a few feet above sea level. What a mess. 

The OFs also discussed the pictures that show all the relief items sitting on the docks, the perishables rotting in the sun, and other supplies and equipment still sitting there because most of the people have gone. This means there is no one there to unload the supplies anyway, let alone use them.

Miami, Florida is not that far away from some of the Bahama Islands. Bimini is only 50 miles from Miami. That is like a trip from Albany going up the New York State Thruway to St. Johnsville, or down to Saugerties, both a little over an hour away.

To Florida, the Bahamas are like next-door neighbors. Some day they may even build a bridge to the mainland of the Bahamas.

This brought up the resurgence of Irene and its little shower of 13 inches of rain that we in upstate New York felt in 2011. What in the world, the OFs thought, would we do with 2 to 3 feet of rain, if Irene had carried that much liquid?

“My goodness,” one OF exclaimed. “There would have been no Middleburgh, or Schoharie or Central Bridge; it would have been a local disaster of gigantic proportions.”

Energy efficient

Jumping from one topic to another, one OF brought to the OMOTM’s attention that, though we are Old Men of the Mountain, some do keep up with the times. Four of the OFs have electric cars.

Proportionally, that is way above the average population of the country. The next thing you know, the OFs will be driving solar-powered vehicles, basically because they are not in too much of a hurry to get anywhere.

One OF suggested, if you really want to be energy efficient, go back to using horses. They eat grass and grain, supply transportation, and produce methane that can be converted to usable gas to run a gas stove. When its life is over, the horse can still be used for glue, and its hide for leathers (breast collars and driving harnesses) for future horses, and coats and shoes for the riders.

This sounds cruel but true. Again, people going back to the future using horses can’t be in too much of a hurry.

Work ethic

All the OMOTM have had jobs of one sort or another and we have mentioned these many times in previous columns. However, what the OFs did in the past keeps coming up, as this topic probably does in general conversations whether you are an OMOTM or not.

Jobs are a big part of our life; if the OFs have nothing to do, they become bored and go looking for something to do. As the OFs were talking on Tuesday morning, they mentioned that some jobs are a pain in the butt, while others are OK, and some didn’t even know they were working.

Year of goldenrod

As the OFs travel, or are just out and about, they have come to one conclusion: This is the year of goldenrod. That yellow weed is all over; it even seems to be crowding out that invasive plant, the purple loosestrife.

Bees though, seem to love goldenrod, so that might help the declining bee population.

Those attending the breakfast at the Middleburgh Diner in Middleburgh, and not sneezing too much because of the goldenrod were: Bob Benac, Paul Nelson, George Washburn, John Rossmann, Miner Stevens, Robie Osterman, Harold Guest, Wally Guest, Pete Whitbeck, Bill Lichliter, Josh Buck, Dave Williams, Bill Bartholomew, Joe Rack, Mark Traver, Jim Rissacher, Marty Herzog, Ken Parks, Rick LaGrange, Herb Bahrmann, Mace Porter, Jack Norray, Warren Willsey, Russ Pokorny, Ted Feurer, Jake Lederman, Gerry Chartier, Mike Willsey, Elwood Vanderbilt, Harold Grippen, and me.

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September 18, 2019

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by Judy Rothstein

Twenty-five years for a not-for-profit to still be operating is phenomenal. In each of those 25 years, there’s been a gala. They’ve grown, they’ve moved, they’ve honored people who serve the community. They’ve raised money.

The Silver Anniversary Gala takes place Nov. 16 at the Albany Country Club.

Ellen Kaufman is chairing the gala. Greg Floyd, anchor at TV’s Channel 6, will be the master of ceremonies. Jason White, a  Community Caregivers board member, is developing a video to highlight the 25 years. It will include interviews with the two living founders, Joel Edwards and Mary Therriault, as well as archival materials to show CC’s growth over the quarter century.

Honorees are Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple and The Guardian Society Executive Director Ken Harris.

Committee members number 14. These people make the event happen. They’ve been working since February. Here they are: Nicki Armsby, Linda Bourgeois, Eileen Bray, Midge Bulgaro, Donna Cavert, Tricia Gannon, Carol Huber, Richard Jung, Adam Knaust, Petra Malitz, Arnie Rothstein, myself, Nancie Tindale, and Ilona Weisman.

As a not-for-profit, Community Caregivers depends on grants, donations, and fundraisers. All of this is to create a system to match volunteers with people of all ages who need help — non medical — in the communities we serve.

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September 18, 2019

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by Frank L. Palmeri

What if I told you there was a free rock concert you could attend every weekend, featuring deep, thumping bass, driving drum rhythms, attractive lead and backup singers, amplified violins, and even a light show?

That would be pretty great, don’t you think?

Well, you can hear shows like that every weekend if you want at, of all places, church. Yes, they are rocking His house all over the Capital District. You can now — if you choose to — literally “get down” with the Lord.

Recently, I had the opportunity to visit several different area churches and, let me tell you, I was amazed at what some of these so-called “mega-churches” have going on. At one 8:30 a.m. Sunday service, the light show, I kid you not, reminded me of arena rock shows I saw back in the day by bands like ZZ Top and Blue Oyster Cult.

At another church, again very early on a Sunday morning, they actually offered you ear plugs on the way in. It’s a good thing they did, because the music was so loud, the floor was shaking. You could feel the bass throughout your entire body. What a way to help digest your corn flakes.

Let me state right now that I would never, ever go to a church like this on a regular basis. At the Catholic church where I grew up in Brooklyn, they were considered cutting edge because they held Mass in English, not Latin.

As if that weren’t wild enough, every now and then one of the nuns came out dressed in her full habit to play on the acoustic guitar. Believe it or not, that was considered extremely progressive back “Kum ba yah” then.

I never even went to the bathroom in a church — I didn’t believe it was possible — until I met my lovely wife and started going to the Protestant churches. We Catholics trained our bladders to gut it out. That’s just how it was.

So you can see how, for someone raised like I was, hearing a full, amplified rock-and-roll church service is just so jarring to me. At all of these places where they blast it, there are huge video screens where they run PowerPoint presentations with the lyrics to the songs so you can sing along.

I was going to say there are no hymnals in the pews, but then I remembered that there are no pews, just chairs. Some folks seem to really get into it, raising their arms, jumping up and down.

At one service I went to that started at 10:30 a.m., the music, for which you are standing the entire time, didn’t end until 11:05 a.m. Only then did the actual worship service start. Wow. You better be in shape if you want to worship there.

At another one of these services, the main pastor wasn’t even there. They had him up on the big screen from somewhere in the midwest.

He was good, and there were local associate pastors there as well, but somehow it left me a little bit cold. It’s kind of like when you go see the Metropolitan Opera “Live in HD” in the theater. The good news is that you are seeing the best opera company in the world without having to drive to Manhattan and pay tons to park and buy tickets.

But after a beautiful aria, when everyone who’s there live is cheering their heads off, everyone in the theater just sits quietly. I mean, how do you applaud for a screen?

It’s the same thing with this church. The message may be good, but if you’re not there in person, it somehow loses its lustre, at least for me.

You could argue that these kinds of high-energy services draw in young people, and indeed there were plenty of youth at all the services of this type that I attended. But I would counter that a good organist, like my wife, Charlotte, can also create an energy when she plays some of the classic hymns while accompanying her excellent choir.

We all have different tastes in music, I get that, but at least when I hear the dulcet tones of a lovely organ, with or without a well-honed choir, I don’t have to feel like I’m in a mosh pit to enjoy it.

Believe me, a good organist can take you away to places you never even knew existed, and when she hits a low note, you can really feel it throbbing through your body, but in a good way — like it becomes a part of you.

After all, the organ, “the king of instruments,” be it the venerable pipe or the modern electronic, is really a part of the building. Nothing can match a well-tuned organ for sheer variety and power.

I guess you can say it all comes down to what kind of church experience you want, or don’t want. I mean, you don’t have to go to church at all; heck, you don’t even have to get out of bed if you don’t want to

But assuming you feel that a church service is something good for you, for whatever reason — worship, community, obligation, or a genuine need to learn more about God — then it’s up to you to decide what kind of service you want to attend. If you want to feel like you’re at a rave at 2 a.m., bathed in sound you can feel throughout your body, along with a concert-like light show, you can get that in many places around here.

Or if you prefer the more traditional organ and choir service, I know for a fact that there are world-class organists in the Capital District who are amazing to listen to as well. Your decision, but let me leave you with this:

One bright beautiful Saturday morning a long time ago, I had to go to a funeral in Mechanicville. I’d been through there plenty of times but never “in there,” and this was before GPS so I had only a vague idea of where the church was.

Finally, I found the street and there was a huge stone church on the corner, so I parked and went in. As I opened the thick, heavy doors hung on large, black wrought-iron hinges, it was like stepping back in time to another world.

Outside were cafés, stores, and traffic lights — the typical hustle and bustle of a busy Saturday morning in downtown anywhere. Inside, I had to adjust my eyes, as candles burned gently in the back of the dimly lit yet ornate sanctuary.

There were about a dozen people there, spread out in the pews. As I sat down in the back, I noticed that the robed priest had his head down and was praying, or more accurately, chanting, if you can believe that.

The people who were there were kneeling, some intensely, with hands folded and heads bent, praying like their lives depended on it. At that moment, you cannot tell me that God was not there, in that place, for those people.

In all my life, the only other time I’ve felt “His” presence at hand that closely was at the birth of my children. That is how spiritually moving this praying was, in that holy place, amidst all the gold, wood, and marble (you know how Catholic churches are). It was like being back in the 14th Century, when church truly was the center of all life.

Eventually, I realized I was at the wrong place, so I left and, sure enough, three blocks up the road was the funeral. Still, I’ve never forgotten that prayer service early on a Saturday morning in Mechanicville. That was something special for sure.

What makes this country great is that you have the right to attend a thumping rock-concert-style service, or a traditional organ-and-choir service, or a simple Saturday-morning prayer service, or no service at all.

Many fine men and women died to give us this freedom. Never forget that. And don’t forget to bring ear plugs if you’re going to a church you’ve never been to before.

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by Mary Ellen Johnson

One of the most valuable Depression-era make-work programs of the New Deal was the Historic American Buildings Survey, or HABS, which recorded buildings across America, ranging from impressive urban structures to small buildings reflecting historical or regional significance.

The survey served the dual purpose of creating employment for architects, draftsmen, and photographers who would use their expertise recording antique buildings that in many cases by the 1930s were rapidly deteriorating or vanishing completely.

This mammoth project documented with photographs and drawings approximately 40,000 of the nation’s historic structures including six in the town of Guilderland.

After architect Charles E. Peterson proposed that a survey be done of American’s antique buildings in 1933, the National Parks Service established HABS in cooperation with the American Institute of Architects and the Library of Congress.

The Historic Sites Act, passed by Congress in 1935, formalized the Historic American Buildings Survey with a provision stating that the federal government would “secure, collate and preserve drawings, plans, photographs and other data of historic and archeological sites, buildings and objects.”

Professionals involved in carrying out the survey were guided by field directions established in Washington, D.C. For large or very important buildings, a combination of photographs and drawings with additional historical data was recorded while for simpler structures the HABS “short format” sufficed with one or more photographs.

Guilderland’s sites were photographed, but elsewhere both in the city and county of Albany, drawings as well as photographs were made such as those recording the Watervliet Shaker site.

Photographer Nelson E. Baldwin visited Guilderland on two occasions in 1937 to take both interior and exterior pictures of the buildings chosen to be recorded.

Fortunately so far that winter there had been very little snow in January when Baldwin visited the Freeman House in Guilderland Center, the Severson house in Altamont, the Case Tavern on Route 20 near the hamlet of Guilderland, and the “old Indian fort” now usually known by the name of the current owners as the Yezzi house on Foundry Road.

A few months later, in May, Baldwin returned, this time to Altamont to photograph the old Severson Inn, now the site of Stewart’s and the Crounse homestead on the Altamont-Voorheesville Road.

It was disappointing to find no coverage in The Altamont Enterprise of the survey or of Baldwin’s activities at that time. A brief article in July 1937 did note that the Old Friends Meeting House at Quaker Street near Duanesburg, which had been included in the Schenectady County survey, had received a certificate from Harold Ickes, the Secretary of the Interior, declaring that the building possessed “exceptional historic or architectural interest … being worthy of careful preservation.”

In 1937, all of the Guilderland buildings were private homes and it is not known if their owners received similar certificates. An advisory committee of the Historic American Buildings Survey had chosen the 700 buildings to be photographed in 16 counties of New York State and it seems very probable that Guilderland Town Historian Arthur Gregg was involved in the choices in Guilderland.

This magnificent collection of photographs and drawings is kept in the Library of Congress and is easily accessible by computer because it has been digitized. The photographs are copyright- and reproduction-free with acknowledgement to the Library of Congress.

The following are photographs taken by Nelson E. Baldwin on his visits to Guilderland in 1937 and are shown on the Library of Congress website. There are additional photographs that are not included here.

Crounse House

Frederick and Elizabeth Crounse were among the very first settlers in Guilderland, arriving at their farm in the shadow of the Helderbergs in the mid-1750s. The house that Baldwin photographed in 1937 was built circa 1803, probably adding to or replacing an earlier, simpler structure. Note that historic interior features were recorded as well as with this photograph of a key, lock, and hinge in the Crounse house. The house is on Route 156, the Altamont-Voorheesville Road, marked in front by a New York State historic marker.

Case Tavern

It was claimed that the Case Tavern was built in 1799 by Russell Case shortly before the Great Western Turnpike opened. It remained a popular tavern until turnpike traffic declined with the development of railroads. After this, it became the Case family homestead, sheltering eight generations until it was sold out of the family in 1946. The building burned in 1950 and today is the site of the former M & M Motel. The Western Turnpike Golf Course is on land that had been the Case farm adjoining the tavern. The rear views of these historic houses were also photographed.

Severson Tavern

A residence when this photo was taken in 1937, the building was originally George (Jurrian) Severson’s (Severtse’s) tavern on the Old Schoharie Road, a rest stop for weary travelers who were about to climb the escarpment on their way to the Schoharie Valley. Dating to the 1790s, the tavern was open for business at least by 1795 when Severson received a liquor license. At his death in 1813, it was the scene of an auction when his two enslaved females were sold there for $191. The tavern business dried up for his descendants in the late 1840s when the improved Schoharie Plank Road changed the route through what later became Altamont and travelers no longer passed by the tavern door. Sadly, Altamont’s most historic building was demolished in 1956 to make way for an Esso Gas Station, which in turn was razed to be replaced by the Stewart’s Shop on the site today.

Severson House

The Seversons were one of the oldest families in Guilderland, settling here in the mid-1700s. According to the 1767 Bleecker Map of the Manor of Rensselaerwyck, the Severson family was already in this location on what is now Brandle Road in Altamont. By the time of the American Revolution, at least one section of this house had been constructed by George/Jurrian Severson; it was one of the first houses erected in the area of Altamont. Note that in both interior and exterior photographs either an assistant is holding a measuring rod against the building or it is simply propped against and interior feature. In 1937, the original fireplace still retained the crane needed to hold kettles for cooking.

Freeman House

Built circa 1734, the Freeman House is considered the oldest frame house in Guilderland. It probably had been enlarged since the original section was built in the 1730s. Today called the Freeman House, it was shown as being owned by a Robert Freeman on the 1767 Bleecker map of the Manor of Rensselaerwyck. In the years after the American Revolution, it became the home of Barent Mynderse, one of our town’s leading Revolutionary War Patriots. Edward Crounse was the owner of the house and large farm that went with it in 1937. In the front view of the house, the hump of the roof of the back addition, is in actuality a part of the huge barn that stood nearby. At that time, the house was covered with synthetic brick siding, now removed, restoring the house to its original siding. It still retains its Dutch door, but the front stoop has been removed. A state historic marker is in front of the house on Route 146 in Guilderland Center.

The Old Indian Fort

According to the late town historian Arthur Gregg, the house is designated on a 1690 map as an Indian fort. While it is difficult to make out the detail, there are two narrow slits, one on either side of the chimney near the peak of the roof, that were bricked up in 1937. Perhaps at one time, when they were open, they were meant to allow the inhabitants to fire down on attackers. The house stands back from Foundry Road in a lane and isn’t visible from the road. It is considered the oldest house in the town of Guilderland and, from the late 1700s until about 1960, it descended in the Tayler-Cooper-Nott family. In the 1940s, a member of the Nott family did extensive renovations, which completely changed the look of the house from the photograph.

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by John R. Williams

The breakfast this Tuesday, September (it is already September, the kids are back in school and, to the Old Men of the Mountain ,it seems like they just got out) 3rd, was at Pop’s Place in Preston Hollow. Pop’s place is, for many of the OMOTM, the furthest restaurant they go to.

Some dedicated OFs travel about one hour and 15 minutes to get to Pop’s Place. Also, this time around, the short way for many of the OFs is over the mountain through Rensselaerville. For the last month or so, the bridge over the Myosotis creek is closed for repairs.

To continue onto any routes to get down off the mountain to Route 145, you have to go over that bridge, except for the circuitous roundabout detour the state has set up. Now it is not so short, especially when the OFs had no idea where they were. Some OFs knew the bridge was out and they started earlier and took the long way around.

Bad taste at Thacher park

Not particularly a discussion from Tuesday, but one of a few weeks past, that has been brought to light again, is Thacher Park. To many of the OFs, the park has been part of their local history and a while back they installed a playground of sorts at the southern end of the park.

Many of the OFs feel Thacher Park with its Indian history and Indian Ladder Trail is a historical park and not a playground. The signs at the end of the park with their garish colors and circus-like appeal take away from the dignity of the park. One OF commented it is bad enough that thing is there but to advertise its location in such a way, to him, is in real bad taste.

Serious hobbies

Not many, but some of the OFs have restored World War II Army vehicles. Why not?

The OFs have collections of hundreds of old possessions; why not army trucks? They talked of a rendezvous of sorts with a few of the collectors of these types of vehicles at the Greenville Drive-in theater.

By the time this column is in the paper the event will be over, but to the OFs it was interesting because the drive-in will be showing old World War II movies to go along with old army trucks.

The other event for these World War II vehicles is a planned ride being organized by one of the OMOTM. They will actually form a convoy as they travel the prescribed route similar to a motorcycle ride.

This ride will not be like a gymkhana done with sports cars where the ending is a mystery and the riders are given check points and items to gather that will lead them to the end. Generally, the gymkhana also has a prescribed time to complete.

These hobbies are completely harmless and lots of fun, and as long as the OFs still have their licenses and can drive, they can be in any of these clubs. Everybody to their own hobbies and some are more than hobbies — they are historical in nature.

Those who are involved in hobbies of this sort study and research the historical time in which they are interested. To talk to these OFs on whatever the subject interests them is like going to school, and the OFs have more information that is correct than any school book.

This is true if the OF is a Revolutionary War reenactor or Civil War enthusiast or  is interested in World War II or World War I. Now, as one OF commented, it will soon be whatever skirmish our young people will be involved in.

Origins of small towns

All over our great country, there are hundreds of small towns. The Old Men of the Mountain are all from small towns; there is not a big-city dweller among any of us.

Most of the small towns have a history as to why they are where they are but, as the OFs drive through them to get to each of the different restaurant, the questions are asked: Why is Gallupville where it is? Why is Quaker Street where it is? Why is South Berne where it is? Why is Knox where it is? Why is Duanesburg where it is? etc, etc.

Most of these small towns have their own historical societies and if the interest is really there, the OFs have tons of time on their hands. It would be neat to visit all of these places and see why they are there.

Each OF from a specific location knows the history of his small town; the OF from Berne may know his, but might not know the reason for South Berne. That reasoning is what came about with the OFs, especially Tuesday morning. One OFs family was from the area and told of what it was like 50 to 60 years ago.

But why Preston Hollow is really there we can now go to  Google which tells us that Preston Hollow was owned from 1629 by the Dutch patroons Van Rensselaer and it was part of the huge Manor of Rensselaerwyck.

The area was so inaccessible that it was not settled until the late 1700s. Shortly after the Revolutionary War, Stephen Van Rensselaer III advertised “free” tracts of land of 160 acres to anyone who would develop the land.

After seven years, farmers had to pay an annual rent of four fat fowls, 18 bushels of wheat, and a day’s service. The rents were perpetual and binding on subsequent purchasers of the land and the patroon reserved mineral and water rights.

These “incomplete sales” led to the Anti-Rent Rebellion from 1839 to 1889, which influenced the wording of the Federal Homestead Act of 1862 and opened up the west to settlement.

Preston Hollow was free land, people! School is now in recess.

Hurricane watch

Many of the OFs have friends or relatives in harm’s way with hurricanes that come up the coast. It is no different with Dorian as it gets ready to affect the East Coast in one way or another.

Some of the OMOTM even have homes in the area of the country where hurricanes visit on occasion. These OFs are watching the TV with keen interest to keep up with the track of the storm and the degree of intensity, whether it is grade 2 or 3 or whatever.

Some of the OFs say we have are blizzards but they think hurricanes are worse. The OFs can build for snow loads but really high winds and unusually high water must be tough to build for.

The OFs who made it to Pop’s Place in Preston Hollow, eventually, after a scenic ride through the mountains, were: Harold Guest, Wally Guest, Robie Osterman, George Washburn, Bill Lichliter, Roger Chapman, Paul Nelson, Pete Whitbeck, Jake Lederman, Art Frament, Bob Benac, Rich Donnelly, Ray Kennedy, Joe Rack, Mark Traver, Jack Norray, Lou Schenck, Herb Bahrmann, Mace Porter, Mike Willsey, Russ Pokorny, Warren Willsey, Gerry Chartier, Elwood Vanderbilt, Rich Vanderbilt, Harold Grippen, and me.

Location:

Post date: 
September 11, 2019

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by Jesse S. Sommer

Three months ago, as late June recessed into full-blown summer, a grainy video shared by WNYT News Channel 13’s Facebook account alighted on my newsfeed. My gut recognized “the Big Gym” of the Voorheesville Elementary School before I did, so I was already smiling in the millisecond it took to click “play” on the cell phone footage recorded by an attendee of the district’s fifth-grade graduation.

The video depicts a familiar scene: Children arrayed in a semi-circle, shoulder-to-shoulder, on three ascending levels of risers before a mass audience of gleeful parents seated in row after row of portably stackable chairs atop the hard gymnasium floor, with an overflow crowd spilling into the cheap seats of the Big Gym’s second-floor twin balconies.

And standing at the center of the action — as she has so many times before — is Dr. Mary Teresa Morgan, a beloved local institution in her own right after 30 years of teaching, poised to deliver her final performance as the retiring head of the Voorheesville Music Department.

The suspenseful silence is suddenly punctured by the inaugural notes of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” — released a year before I was born but as relevant today as it was in 1981. And now Dr. Morgan is overexaggerating the rhythmic thrust of her arms. And now she’s playfully donning sunglasses. And now she’s tossing an action cue to the parents in the audience, who rise obediently pursuant to some previously rehearsed stage direction. And now everyone is laughing, together.

Either in person or in the pages of The Enterprise — where Rebecca Tillou’s October 2018 letter to the editor movingly recounted the ovarian cancer Dr. Morgan vanquished a decade ago — thousands of us have become intimately familiar with Dr. Morgan’s heroics, “radiant curly hair,” and sparkling blue eyes.

And here, as always, the production is quintessential Dr. Morgan. (I @#$%&*ing love Dr. Morgan.)  Executing pitch-perfect satirical silliness over the responsive giggles of the fifth-graders and Journey’s unselfconscious blare, Dr. Morgan’s choreography is as much a signature of her charm now as it was more than 25 years ago when I was blessed to sit cross-legged in her music class.

Eventually, the audience floods forth into the space in front of the risers, and two generations’ worth of dance routines merge into one. In this moment, from the balcony above, the amateur videographer catches that elusive and infinitesimally short stage of life just before children realize, correctly, that they’re supposed to be humiliated by their parents.

Even more notable, though, is the video’s living proof that there yet exist people who can peaceably assemble in the service of enlivening their children’s graduation, even though they may harbor drastically different political perspectives. For what most caught my eye was a flutter at the top left of the screen.

Sitting in the balcony rafters is a man futilely combatting the stifling heat by waving a makeshift fan (maybe the ceremony’s program?) back and forth in front of his face. I literally laughed aloud when I saw it, feeling a rush of solidarity with that poor stranger’s recognizable misery. If ever there were a symbol of what it means to be a New Scot, this was it.

I salute you, Makeshift Fan-Waving Guy; your powerful example couldn’t have come at a better time. It’s been awhile since I’ve felt so connected to someone.  

****

I’m not doing well, folks; I grow more and more distressed at how mean everyone’s being to each other.  And it’s not just me; even retired Four-Star General and former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis bemoans the tenor of our time.  Writing in The Wall Street Journal on Aug. 28, Secretary Mattis noted that:

“[O]ur own commons seems to be breaking apart ... We are dividing into hostile tribes cheering against each other, fueled by emotion and a mutual disdain that jeopardizes our future, instead of rediscovering our common ground and finding solutions. All Americans need to recognize that our democracy is an experiment — and one that can be reversed. We all know that we’re better than our current politics. Tribalism must not be allowed to destroy our experiment.”

“[W]e need to get our own country’s act together first,” he writes, “especially if we are to help others.”   He’s right: The challenges we face as a species are insurmountable unless we confront them as Americans.

Our social media is spying on us. Our food is poisoning us. The bees are dying, the ice caps are melting, the seas are rising, the Amazon is on fire, and the hurricanes are all Category 5s, now.

Next year, my nephew will conduct his first live-shooter training drills as he begins his elementary education. Our unprecedented national debt is fueled by even more unprecedented deficits.

Anti-Semitism has returned — like clockwork — and our social norms are being tested and frayed by a national discourse that renders us more polarized than ever.

It’s getting easier and easier to lose myself in the din of so much social discord and indictment right when I so desperately need to feel like I’m part of something larger than myself.

Because what are we fighting for if not for each other? What was the point of this outrageous American experiment if *non* e pluribus unum?  If from many exotic backgrounds and many opposing perspectives and many differing experiences we can’t come together to declare ourselves an indivisible whole committed to the welfare of even the most ill-informed and obnoxious uncle spouting off at Thanksgiving?

I rise to declare that I don’t think you’re racist if you want to build the Wall, and I don’t think you’re a fascist if you want to ban my guns. I don’t think you’re a bigot if gender-neutral public restrooms make you uncomfortable, and I don’t think you’re a murderer if you support a woman’s right to choose.

I don’t perceive your concern about immigration policy to imply that you want children to die in cages, and I don’t believe your support for the public option means you’re actively fomenting a Bolshevik revolution.  Rather, I presume that your beliefs are held in good-faith, and formed by some personal experience about which I’ve yet to learn. And I’ll listen to you — even if I’m not thrilled by what I hear.

Your stance on global warming, on Israel, on the #MeToo movement, on tax policy, on the societal value of television drivel like “Ghost Hunters” may fundamentally differ from mine, but — if it does — that merely means we’re perfectly positioned to engage one another in lively discussion while waving makeshift fans together amid the sweltering heat of the Big Gym as our children file onto the risers.

We are all New Scots, and it doesn’t matter whether we reside on opposite sides of Voorheesville’s tracks or tune in to different cable news networks.

A collection of individuals whose opinions differ is “a community.” A collection of individuals whose opinions don’t differ is “a cult.” That’s the lesson of Makeshift Fan-Waving Guy.

More than once, I was a graduating student on those risers: first as a kindergartener proudly armed with colorful kazoo, and later as a pre-adolescent embarking on the rigorous rite of passage to high school.

And more than once did I then serve my time in that audience, enduring the stifling heat as I watched younger sisters follow in my footsteps. There’s perhaps only a handful of the Big Gym’s square inches that I didn’t once inhabit.

Seeing such hallowed ground filled with families and old friends instantly injected into my chaotic world a moment of peace that I haven’t experienced in a long time.

For we are Voorheesvillagers, all of us. And I would do anything for you, Makeshift Fan-Waving Guy, to include extending you my deepest respect for a differing opinion that I’ll do my best to understand.

And although the classmate who sat beside me as we sang along to the latest Disney musicals during early morning chorus rehearsals may have grown up to possess an opposing worldview, our shared experience of the magic emanating from Dr. Morgan’s incomparable upright piano binds us forever.

Dr. Morgan brought us together; she was one of the true pillars of our community. Let’s seize the opportunity of her retirement to fill her shoes and emulate her lifetime of public service, to ourselves become pillars of the largest communities of which we can conceive.

Dr. Morgan was neither movement leader nor fiery partisan advocate. She was, instead, a shepherd tending to a flock that spanned and united multiple generations. This era demands more shepherds — those who tend to our many opposing viewpoints, but who nonetheless move us together as one.

It’s a privilege to have myself once embodied the anonymous man waving a makeshift fan back-and-forth at a Voorheesville chorus recital, in solidarity with the people who made suffering the heat so worth it. And it’s a greater privilege to have served as one of the many students who over the years perched atop those risers to contribute a youthful soprano to the choruses Dr. Morgan led, where from many high-pitched voices emerged a single song.

One in particular was Dr. Morgan’s favorite. As such, and with apologies to the original authorship, I’ve adapted it to close out this column:

Dr. Morgan, Voorheesville’s still calling
from years ago, by alumni far and wide. 
The summer’s gone, and all the flowers are dying …
’tis you (’tis you) must go and we must bide.

But come ye back when summer’s in the meadow,
or when the village is hushed and white with snow.
’Tis we’ll be here in sunshine or in shadow —
Dr. Morgan, Voorheesville still loves you so.

****
Editor’s note: 
Captain Jesse Sommer is a paratrooper in the United States Army’s 7th Special Forces Group (Airborne). He is a lifelong resident of Albany County.

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Post date: 
September 10, 2019

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by John R. Williams

The Old Men of the Mountain traveled to Gracie’s Restaurant in Voorheesville on Tuesday, Aug. 27. This is the old Voorheesville Diner, which was taken to the ground and rebuilt.

Though the restaurant is now completely different, the trains are not. Four trains went past while the OMOTM were there and these trains were rolling by at a pretty quick pace. With watching something that large, the OFs tried to estimate their speed and they came up with about 50 miles per hour or faster.

An intellectual mood

From last week, we continued the OFs discussion on the paranormal. We discussed animals and their sense of what is going on around us before we humans know it. The OFs discussed the homing instinct of many animals and birds and how those that are newly born (especially birds) fly away thousands of miles in the fall, and in the spring, manage to find their way back to the same nest. How do they do that?

Before the advent of the 20th Century, science did not acknowledge the vitality of trees and plants. The OFs discussed some of Cleve Backster’s work on plants, and brine shrimp.

Then there was Jagadish Chandra Bose, an Indian plant physiologist and physicist, and his study on plants. One study backed up his other study on plants having life, and sending out electrical impulses (at least one being able to be recorded) that they are going to die before they do. Interesting information like that.

Like an apple knows it is going to picked before it is; also that it is going to fall off the tree on its own accord before it falls. The OFs were in an intellectual mood this Tuesday.

The OFs also mentioned the information in these books is very surprising. One was that mothers of some animals (if not all, but that is only a guess) know if something happens to their offspring and indicate this knowledge by twitching.

Cleve Backster used brine shrimp to prove this and then graduated his research to include rabbits. The Russians used dogs. The scribe thinks the internet or the library is in order on this one.

Train trips

The OFs watched the trains go by and talked of some of their train trips. One OF mentioned taking a train excursion to Alaska and back and said that was quite an experience.

The OF said that the trip to Alaska was smooth and neat; however, they had to pull over every time a freight train went by. Apparently, the freight trains have the right of way. Also, he said, when they were in the plains part of Canada one day there was nothing to see but sunflowers — the whole day. That was kinda boring.

The OF noted that the return trip was completely different. He related that the train swayed back and forth, and clickety-clacked the whole way. The OF said a little better than half-way he told his wife he wanted to get off and fly the rest of the way home. The OF claimed the reason the trip is so long is the passenger train does spend a lot of time sitting on the side tracks waiting for the freight trains to go by in both countries.

Abundant apples

The OFs who have land, and old apple trees, are commenting on how many apples they have on them this year, and these apples are mostly worm-free. The OFs used to think these apples were useless except for feeding deer during the winter.

Now they are finding out they make really good cider — especially hard cider. Like anything else, the fad is catching on so that there is even a cider press on the market that can be used on these smaller sweet apples.

Some of the OFs have checked their old trees and say they are loaded and they may try making cider because of the quantity of apples they see. They will use their old presses to do it.

One OF said that, in the fall, there is nothing like warm cider doughnuts, and hot mulled cider, with pumpkin pie and whipped cream.

“Almost a meal,” another OF said.

A third OF said, “It isn’t fall yet, let’s enjoy the summer; it is short enough as it is. It seems like I just got the boat out, let alone used it.”

Spider scare

A different OF changed the subject completely as the conversation on apples started to peter out; he brought up the subject of spiders. The OF told about sitting down in his living room peacefully watching Rural TV when a blood-curdling scream came from the upstairs bathroom.

The OF said he jumped out of the chair as fast as he could.

“At my age,” he said, “that is not too fast because I have to push myself up and out by the arms of the chair.”

To which another OF added that he has to sit in chairs with arms, too, because he can’t get out of chairs with no arms or chairs that are too soft.

Anyway, the OF hollered upstairs, “What’s going on?”

And the wife screamed back breathlessly, “S P I D E R!”

The OF said, when he got upstairs, his wife told him that, when she went to wash her face and brought the washcloth up, a huge black spider, about the size of a quarter, fell out of the washcloth onto the top of the vanity.

She said she quickly grabbed a shampoo bottle and whacked the spider; however, she missed him and got only half of this interloper. When she took the bottle away there was half a spider running across the vanity, and the other half squashed flat with one leg moving.

“It took awhile for her to calm down,” the OF said.

It is noted that every time this story is told the spider gets bigger and soon it will be the size of a silver dollar.

Those OFs who decided breakfast out was better than making their own, or shaking the wife out of bed to make it for them, and decided to go to Gracie’s Kitchen in Voorheesville instead, were: Miner Stevens, Roger Chapman, Harold Guest, Wally Guest, Pete Whitbeck, Warren Willsey, Russ Pokorny, Mike Willsey, Gerry Chartier, Lou Schenck, Herb Bahrmann, Mace Porter, and me.

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Post date: 
September 4, 2019

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