September's Top New York History News

• » Dutch Kept Indian Slaves in the Catskills
• » Short-Lived Historian Gossip Says Goodbye
• » Unnatural History of Wall Street
• » NARA Releases Secret Rosenberg Material
• » Peter Eisentadt on Lehman Brothers

Expanded Brooklyn Children’s Museum Reopens

The Brooklyn Children's Museum reopened Saturday after a year-long closure for an expansion and redesign. According to the New York Times:

The museum doubled the size of its city-owned building — with $48 million in city money and $32 million raised by the museum — to 102,000 square feet. As Robin Pogrebin reported in The Times in February, the project struggled through financial hardships. The museum itself lacked a strong physical identity, because most of its space has been underground since a 1977 design by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates created two lower levels. The greatly enlarged museum now hopes to improve its annual visitor total to 400,000 by 2010, from about 250,000 before the museum closed last September for the final stage of the renovation.

A pioneer in education, the Brooklyn Children's Museum was the first museum created expressly for children when it was founded in 1899. Its success has sparked the creation of 300 children's museums around the world. It is the only children's museum in New York City, and one of few in the country, to be accredited by the American Association of Museums. The Museum encourages children to develop an understanding of and respect for themselves, others and the world around them by exploring cultures, the arts, science, and the environment.

The just-completed expansion features eco-friendly design in hopes of attaining LEED certification - it's said to be the first "green" museum in New York City. In keeping with the Museum's commitment to preserve and protect the world's natural resources, it uses environmentally advanced, sustainable, renewable and/or recyclable materials and systems in the building’s design and construction.

Brooklyn Children's Museum is one of the few children's museums in the world with a permanent collection, including nearly 30,000 cultural objects and natural-history specimens. The cultural collection contains both ancient and present-day objects, including musical instruments, sculpture, masks, body adornments, and dolls, as well as everyday household and personal items. The natural-history collection contains rocks, minerals, and fossils, as well as mounted birds, mammals, insects, and skeletons (highlights include the complete skeleton of an Asian elephant, dinosaur footprints, and a whale rib).

For years, much of the collection has been inaccessible to the public simply because of space limitations. Now, an expanded collection study area allows the Museum to display more of the collection and to offer more hands-on activities—so children learn by touching as well as by looking.

Fort Ticonderoga Appeals to Public for Help

Although it is apparently, no longer up, two local newspapers have reported (1, 2), that Fort Ticonderoga is asking the public to keep the fort from shutting down. According to Fred Herbst of Denton Publications:

You have probably seen the headlines. Fort Ticonderoga is in a very difficult financial situation. We don’t want to sell assets. We don’t want to lay off staff. We don’t want to curtail our education programs. We don’t want to close. Without the help of our friends and supporters, however, we may be faced with having to take one or more of these measures.

Fort Ticonderoga's financial troubles began when benefactors Deborah and Forrest Mars Jr. withdrew their support - it's been covered at length here.

The original statement continues:

Fort Ticonderoga needs its army of defenders now more than ever. The new Mars Education Center is 95 percent paid for. We have raised and borrowed more than $22 million, but we still need $700,000 to settle the outstanding bills and an additional $3.5 million to repay the loans and replenish our endowment fund.

Herbst revealed more about the details of Forrest Mars conflict with Executive Director Nick Westbrook.

“The ride is over,” he wrote in an Email to Westbrook that was provided to the Times of Ti.

The Email said Westbrook would not listen to new ideas and had stopped communicating with Mrs. Mars, when she was president of the fort board of trustees.

“We will not be writing any further checks,” Mr. Mars wrote. "Your performance as a manager is lacking. As a historian and archivist, etc., you excel. You have not given proper supervision and leadership to the staff.”

Mr. Mars said he and his wife paid for most of the Mars Education Center.

“As far as the new center, I would think that besides not communicating with your president (Mrs. Mars) regarding the opening of it, the exhibits to be in it, the budget for operating it and a program for the future use, you might have been nice enough and polite enough to communicate with the major donor (Mr. Mars),” the Email reads. “Not a word from you to either of us. We do not even know if you can fund it.”

The Email also said Mr. Mars had paid for one of Westbrook’s sons to attend a private school and had paid for vacations for Westbrook and his wife.

The Fort is under threat to close next year or sell off some it collections; Westbrook will be resigning. The fort closes for the season October 20th.

“The fort is running through its available endowment funds to pay the Mars Education Center bills, and, in the absence of a major infusion of funds, the fort will be essentially broke by the end of 2008,” Paine said in the memo.

UHA / MANY Annual Conference Announcement

Upstate History Alliance and Museum Association of New York are calling for participation in their recently reorganized annual conference. According to their web site, "The UHA/MANY annual conference has a new name and a new format and we need your ideas and leadership to bring it to life! We've decided to leave the "talking head" sessions of past conferences behind and focus on generating a new energy through conversations and networking."

Museums in Conversation: Fresh Perspectives for New York State Museums is being organized in collaboration with the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York Council for the Humanities, and the Archives Partnership Trust. It will be held March 29-30, 2009 at the Doubletree Hotel, Tarrytown, New York.

The calls for session proposals and pre- and post-conference workshops proposals are now available here. The submission deadline is November 1, 2008.

Proposals are being welcomed "from a wide range of disciplines and professions, within and outside the museum community, that focus on how institutions are using interdisciplinary approaches to reach new audiences and build innovative collaborations that strengthen program organizational development."

The conference organizers are seeking undergraduate and graduate student volunteers.

This Week's Top New York History News

• » The Strange History of Sodomy Laws
  
• » Black Confederates Debate Rages On
• » Bittersweet Opening at Columbus Circle
• » Restaurant Month at NYPL
• » NYC's Historic Shops and Restaurants
• » 19th Century Tavern Reveals Ancient Coins
• » Art and Scrolls in New York Museums
• » Yankee Stadium Pieces Stolen
• » Conservancy Protects Philosphers Camp
• » Old Church Site of Watervliet Museum
• » Preservationists Win Over Fort Orange Club?

Adirondack Museum Celebrates Hunting and Fishing

The Adirondack Museum is planning to celebrate National Hunting and Fishing Day tomorrow Saturday, September 27, 2008. The museum is planning "A Sportsman's Paradise," a day-long extravaganza of programs, demonstrations, and music - just for outdoor enthusiasts. Activities are scheduled from 10:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. All are included in the price of general admission.

Demonstrations will include "Casting a Line" with licensed guide and fly-fisherman Patrick Sisti, "Fly Tying" with Geoff Schaake co-owner of the fly-fishing and fly-tying web site www.theanglersnet.com, and "Fish Decoys and Lures" from mother-of-pearl as made by Peter Heid.

Members of the American Mountain Men will return to the museum campus, creating a living history camp that will feature the traditional equipment and gear that would have been typical of a nineteenth century hunting excursion in the Great North Woods. The group will discuss historic hunting and trapping techniques and demonstrate target shooting with Flintlocks as well as knife and tomahawk throwing.

An Author's Corner and Book Signing will be held in the museum's Marion River Carry Pavilion from 10:00 a.m. until 2:00 p.m. Participants will include: Dan Ladd, whose book Deer Hunting in the Adirondacks serves not only as a guide to public lands open to hunting, but also looks at the history and lore surrounding hunting in the Adirondacks; Robert Elinskas, author of A Deer Hunter's History Book - a collection of tales from the Blue Ridge Wilderness Area; and Donald Wharton whose collection of Adirondack outdoor stories about trout fishing, bush pilots, deer hunting and more is entitled Adirondack Forest and Stream: An Outdoorsmen's Reader.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation booth will provide information and answer questions about hunting and fishing in the Adirondacks throughout the day.

Adirondack musician and storyteller Christopher Shaw will delight audiences of all ages with music celebrating the great Adirondack outdoors at 1:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m.

At 2:00 p.m. an illustrated presentation, "Images From Trail Cameras," will be held in the Mark W. Potter Education Center.

The day will conclude with "Adirondack Pond Fishing 101" with Patrick Sisti. Sisti specializes in fly-fishing, fishing trips on the Indian River and Adirondack ponds in central Hamilton County as well as hiking camping, canoeing, and nature walks. His presentation will take participants through the steps taken to locate an Adirondack pond, get there, and fish. Handouts will be provided.

"A Sportsman's Paradise" visitors should not miss the exhibits "Woods and Waters: Outdoor Recreation in The Adirondacks," the "Buck Lake Club: An Adirondack Hunting Camp," and "The Great Outdoors" - an interactive space that is perfect for family adventures.

The Adirondack Museum tells the story of the Adirondacks through exhibits, special events, classes for schools, and hands-on activities for visitors of all ages. Open for the season through October 19, 2008. For information call (518) 352-7311, or visit www.adirondackmuseum.org.

49th Annual Schenectady Stockade Walkabout

With a slogan that says "Party Like It's 1662," the Schenectady County Historical Society, the Stockade Association and the Downtown Schenectady Improvement Corporation present the 49th Annual Stockade Walkabout and Waterfront Faire on Saturday.The Walkabout showcases the oldest continuously occupied historic district in the United States, which was designated the first Historic District in New York state in 1962. During the event, from 11 a.m to 5 p.m., you can interact with historical characters from Olde Schenectady, stroll through the neighborhood, tour privately owned 18th- and 19th-century homes, visit historic churches, view the Stockade's only archaeological dig and join an archaeological tour or an architectural tour.

The Walkabout House Tour includes: guided tours of historic homes, churches and public buildings; an archaeological dig at a historic house garden; an architectural tour; an archaeological tour; historic boats along the Mohawk River; carriage rides along the river path and through the streets; children's activities in the park; live music and refreshments throughout the day; an antique car exhibit; guided tours of the old Erie Canal; and Colonial artisan demonstrations and fine crafts.

Tickets for adults purchased in advance are $18, and the day of the event are $25; tickets for children younger than 12 are $7. Park free at Schenectady County Community College and other public lots.

The free Waterfront Faire features arts and crafts vendors; family activities; live entertainment and music; food and refreshments; carriage rides; Schenectady County Faire -- Colonial artisans and demonstrators; and an authentic bateau and turn-of-the-century launch boat.

For more information, visit http://www.stockadewalkabout.com. You can also find information or purchase tickets with credit cards by calling 374-0263. Tickets can also be purchased at the Schenectady County Historical Society, 32 Washington Ave., Schenectady, NY 12305.

Laurence M. Hauptman to Speak at Iroquois Museum

The Iroquois Indian Museum will present “More than Games: Iroquois Indians and Other Native American Athletes at Carlisle Indian School”, a lecture by Dr. Laurence M. Hauptman on Sunday, October 5th at 1PM. The Iroquois Indian Museum is located 35 miles west of Albany, New York, near the intersection of highways 7 and 145. Take exit 22 from Interstate 88 and follow signs. For information and detailed directions call the Museum at (518) 296-8949 or visit our website at www.iroquoismuseum.org.

For Native people, sports are an important part of traditional society. Athletic prowess, sportsmanship, competitiveness, and spirituality are intertwined with various sporting activities. “Ball” games were always extremely popular among Native Americans. Team sports such as lacrosse, Shinny Ball, Double Ball, and Long Ball emphasize the importance of strength of both the body and mind and of leadership and responsibility to others. Baseball became yet another venue for enhancing and demonstrating skill and dexterity.

Dr. Hauptman is a SUNY Distinguished Professor of History at SUNY New Paltz where he has taught for the past 35 years. He is the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 14 books on the Iroquois and other Native Americans. Dr. Hauptman has served as an historical consultant for the Wisconsin Oneidas, the Cayugas, the Mashantucket Pequots, the Senecas, and the Seneca-Cayugas.

Free Admission to Nearly 100 NY Museums Sept.

This Saturday, September 27, 2008, nearly 100 museums in New York State will participate in Smithsonian magazine's fourth annual Museum Day. Museum Day is an opportunity for museums and cultural institutions nationwide to open their doors free of charge. A celebration of culture, learning and the dissemination of knowledge, Smithsonian's Museum Day reflects the spirit of the magazine, and emulates
the free-admission policy of the Smithsonian Institution's Washington, D.C.
- based museums.

Last year, nearly 100,000 people attended Museum Day. All fifty states plus Puerto Rico were represented by 651 participating museums. Established New York institutions like the New York State Museum, the Adirondack Museum, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, Museum of the City of New York, National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame, and more, will all take part this year. A complete list of New York museums that are participating is located here.

Museum visitors must present Smithsonian magazine's Museum Day Admission Card to
gain free entry to participating institutions. The Museum Day Admission
Card is available for free download at Smithsonian.com.

Call for Papers: Consortium on Revolutionary Era, 1750-1850

Although it's going to be held in Savannah, GA (February 19-21, 2009), New York History readers may find this call for papers interesting:

The Consortium on the Revolutionary Era, 1750-1805 is an organization which provides a venue for the presentation of original research on not only the revolutionary history of Europe in this era, but also the Atlantic World and beyond. They are welcoming proposals from the allied disciplines and comparative studies; in short, they offer a platform for research into the revolutionary era broadly defined.

The 2009 conference will be held February 19-21 at the Savannah DeSoto Hilton.

The program committee prefers proposals for complete sessions (three
papers, plus chair and a commentator). However, they will accept proposals for incomplete sessions, and individual paper proposals. Session proposals should include name of presenter, title of paper, and brief abstract (no more than one page) for each paper; and brief CVs (no more than 2 pages) for each participant. The deadline for proposals is October 15, 2008. They are looking for traditional presentations of new research, as well as roundtable discussions. Proposals from doctoral students are welcome.

Keynote Address: Alan Forrest
York University
Alan Forrest is Professor of Modern History and Director of the Centre
for Eighteenth Century Studies, York University.

Banquet Speaker: David Armitage, Harvard University David Armitage is
Professor of History at Harvard University.

Send proposals to:
Professor Charles P. Crouch
Department of History
P.O. Box 8054
Georgia Southern University
Statesboro, GA 30460-8054
chascro@georgiasouthern.edu

Fort Drum WWII Barracks to be Demolished

The Watertown Daily Times is reporting that 87 World War Two era barracks at Fort Drum are going to be torn down in the next month:

Those buildings, built in 1941, are being torn down to make way for more construction to accommodate units of the 10th Mountain Division. South post will become the new home for the 91st Military Police Battalion, 7th Engineer Battalion and 63rd Explosive Ordnance Device Battalion — which is currently deployed to Baghdad, Iraq.

We want to tear them all down eventually," said James W. Corriveau, the public works director for Fort Drum. "We are building new facilities on that space and falling in on the old infrastructure."

The demolition of old motor pools along Gasoline Alley has been ongoing this summer.

Here's a gem from someone with a [ahem] sense of history:

"The nostalgic value of this World War II world isn't too much," Mr. Corriveau said. "The Army has lots of stuff from that time period — these buildings weren't supposed to last forever."

Here is a little history from the Fort Drum website:

With the outbreak of World War Two, the area now known as Pine Camp was selected for a major expansion and an additional 75,000 acres of land was purchased. With that purchase, 525 local families were displaced. Five entire villages were eliminated, while others were reduced from one-third to one-half their size.

By Labor Day 1941, 100 tracts of land were taken over. Three thousand buildings, including 24 schools, 6 churches and a post office were abandoned. Contractors then went to work, and in a period of 10 months at a cost of $20 million, an entire city was built to house the divisions scheduled to train here.

Eight hundred buildings were constructed; 240 barracks, 84 mess halls, 86 storehouses, 58 warehouses, 27 officers' quarters, 22 headquarters buildings, and 99 recreational buildings as well as guardhouses and a hospital. Construction workers paid the price, as the winter of 1941-42 was one of the coldest in North Country history.

The three divisions to train at Pine Camp were General George S. Patton's 4th Armored Division (Gen. Creighton Abrams was a battalion commander here at the time), the 45th Infantry Division and the 5th Armored Division.

The post also served as a prisoner of war camp. Of those prisoners who died here, one Italian and six Germans are still buried in the Sheepfold Cemetery near Remington Pond

A "Call for Quilts" from the Adirondack Museum

From Blue Mountain Lake in the Adirondacks comes this "Call for Quilts," forwarded here for your information:

Blue Mountain Lake, N.Y. Do you have an exceptional quilt, comforter, or pieced wall hanging made after 1970 that was used in, inspired by, or depicts the Adirondack region?

The Adirondack Museum at Blue Mountain Lake, New York is seeking six to ten contemporary quilts to borrow for a new exhibit, "Common Threads: 150 Years of Adirondack Quilts and Comforters," scheduled to open in May 2009.

The Adirondack region has nurtured a vibrant pieced-textile tradition for over a century and a half. From bedcovers, plain or fancy, meant to keep families warm through long Adirondack winters, to stunning art quilts of the twenty-first century, the quilts and comforters of the North Country mirror national trends and also tell a unique story of life in the mountains.

"Common Threads" will combine the scholarly approaches of social history, art history, and material culture studies to explore themes of women's work, domestic life, social networks in a rural area, generational continuity among women, and women's artistic response to life in the Adirondacks.

Curator Hallie Bond will develop the new exhibit that will include quilts from the museum's textile collection that are rarely on display. Bond has identified the historic pieces, but now needs help in collecting modern examples of pieced work to bring the exhibition up to the present time.

A panel of three quilters and quilting scholars - Lee Kogan, Edith Mitchell, and Shirley Ware - will select pieces for the exhibit. For additional information please contact Hallie Bond at the Adirondack Museum, Box 99, Blue Mountain Lake, N.Y. 12812 or (518) 352-7311, ext. 105.

Those interested in the project will receive a complete description of the exhibition, details about the themes that contemporary quilts should illustrate, and an entry form. Submissions will be by photograph and must be received by the Adirondack Museum no later than October 1, 2008.

The Adirondack Museum tells the story of the Adirondacks through exhibits, special events, classes for schools, and hands-on activities for visitors of all ages. Open for the season through October 19, 2008. Introducing Rustic Tomorrow -- a new exhibit. For information about all that the museum has to offer, please call (518) 352-7311, or visit www.adirondackmuseum.org

NYS Archives Research Residency Program

The Archives Partnership Trust and the New York State Archives announce the availability of awards to support research using state government records held by the Archives. The Larry J. Hackman Research Residency program is intended to encourage product-related research in such areas as history, law, public policy, geography, and culture by covering research-related expenses such as travel, lodging, meals, and copying of records. Award amounts have ranged from $100 to $4,500.

Academic and public historians, graduate students, independent researchers and writers, and primary and secondary school teachers are encouraged to apply. Projects involving alternative uses of the State Archives, such as background research for multimedia projects, exhibits, documentary films, and historical novels, are eligible. The topic or area of study must draw, at least in part, on the holdings of the New York State Archives.

Information on the 2009 Larry J. Hackman Research Residency Program and application forms are available online at www.nysarchivestrust.org For further information contact the Archives Partnership Trust, Cultural Education Center, Suite 9C49, Albany, New York 12230; (518) 473 7091. Applications must be postmarked by January 15, 2009.

Fort Ticonderoga Executive Director to Step Down

North Country Public Radio is reporting this afternoon that Fort Ticonderoga's longtime executive director Nick Westbrook will step down (Post Star says next year). According to the report board president Peter Paine says Westbrook will remain "affiliated with the historic site in a scholarly and advisory capacity" and described the move as "part of a planned transition."

Ongoing controversy over the loss of the Fort's most important benefactor has been covered at length on the New York History Blog before.

This weekend the New York Times covered the story:

This summer, the national historic landmark — called Fort Ti for short — began its 100th season as an attraction open to the public with two causes for celebration: the unveiling of a splashy new education center, and an increase in visitors, reversing a long decline.

But instead of celebrating, its caretakers issued an S.O.S., warning that the fort, one of the state’s most important historic sites, was struggling for survival, largely because of a breach between the fort’s greatest benefactor — an heir of the Mars candy fortune — and its executive director.

The problem is money: The fort had a shortfall of $2.5 million for the education center. The president of the board that governs the fort, which is owned by a nonprofit organization, said in an internal memo this summer that the site would be “essentially broke” by the end of the year. The memo proposed a half-dozen solutions, including the sale of artwork from the group’s collection.

Teddy Roosevelt and The Adirondack Forest Preserve

This post has been cross-posted to Adirondack Almanack, the blog of Adirondack culture, history, and politics.

In the heart of the Adirondacks is the Town of Newcomb, population about 500. The town was developed as a lumbering and mining community - today tourism and forest and wood products are the dominate way locals make a living. As a result the Essex County town is one of the Adirondacks' poorer communities ($32,639 median income in 2000).

The folks in Newcomb (and also in North Creek in Warren County) often promote their communities' connection to Theodore Roosevelt's ascendancy to the presidency. Teddy's nighttime trip from a camp in Newcomb to the rail station at North Creek as William McKinley lay dying from a bullet delivered by Leon Czolgosz's .32 caliber Iver-Johnson handgun is usually considered Roosevelt's great tie to the Adirondack region. There is a annual celebration of Roosevelt this weekend, but more of that later.

Roosevelt was the first American president to find the long-term conservation of our natural resources and important goal. According to the great wiki "Roosevelt set aside more land for national parks and nature preserves than all of his predecessors combined, 194 million acres":

Roosevelt created the first National Bird Preserve, (the beginning of the Wildlife Refuge system)... recognized the imminent extinction of the American Bison... urged Congress to establish the United States Forest Service (1905), to manage government forest lands, and he appointed Gifford Pinchot to head the service... In all, by 1909, the Roosevelt administration had created an unprecedented 42 million acres (170,000 km²) of national forests, 53 national wildlife refuges and 18 areas of "special interest", including the Grand Canyon.

A longstanding question from Roosevelt's time still creates raging debates in Newcomb - should the state keep buying land in Newcomb (and elsewhere) to add to the Forest Preserve while it continues to ban logging?

Here is a short history of the movement to log the Adirondack Forest Preserve prior to 1900:

1798 - New York State sells 4 million acres of the Macomb Patent for eight pence an acre. Political and corporate interests would control much of the Adirondacks for the next century. In 1855 for example, the state sold three entire townships to a railroad company for five cents an acre, even though the price had been set by law at 75 cents an acre.

In 1885, the Forest Preserve Act was passed establishing the New York State Forest Commission and declaring that "The lands now or hereafter constituting the forest preserve shall be forever kept as wild forest lands. They shall not sold, nor shall they be leased or taken by any corporation, public or private."

With the establishment of the Forest Preserve came calls to log it. In 1890, the Commission argued that new Forest Preserve lands should be purchased with money from the sales of timber (softwoods over 12 inches in diameter). In 1892, the state legislature established the Adirondack Park within the Forest Preserve and stated it would be "forever reserved, maintained and cared for as a ground open for the free use of all the people for their health or pleasure, and as forest lands necessary to the preservation of the headwaters of the chief rivers and a future timber supply."

The following year later the State Legislature approved the logging of Tamarack and Spruce 12 inches and up and any size Poplar. The New York Evening Post reported that fifteen bills were rushed to the New York Legislature "nearly all of which are directly to the advantage of the timber and land sharks." The following year, the American Forestry Association, the New York State Forestry Association, the Adirondack Park Association, and the Genesee Forestry Association, held a "Forest Congress" in Albany which opposed the lumbering plan.

The move to log the Forest Preserve created a backlash from conservationists and that, along with a report form the State Comptroller outlining immense fraud, bribery, and illegal cutting, led to inclusion of a formal ban in the New York Constitution in 1894. "The lands of the state, now owned or hereafter acquired, constituting the forest preserve as now fixed by law, shall be forever kept as wild forest lands. They shall not be leased, sold or exchanged, or be taken by any corporation, public or private, nor shall the timber thereon be sold, removed or destroyed." The American Forestry Association also opposed this plan.

In 1898, New York Governor Frank Black, pushed for a 40,000 acre experimental forestry station to be run by Cornell Forest School, which was established by the same law. Cornell University started the forestry program but closed its doors in 1903, it was headed by Bernhard Eduard Fernow.

In 1898 Teddy Roosevelt was elected Governor. Roosevelt believed that someday, forestry could be applied to the state's Forest Preserve - he said so in his 1900 annual message: "We need to have our system of forestry gradually developed and conducted along scientific principles. When this has been done it will be possible to allow marketable lumber to be cut everywhere without damage to the forests."

Roosevelt brought in Gifford Pinchot and the United States Division of Forestry who devised a plan to lumber Township 40 in the Totten and Crossfield Purchase. About 25 men were hired under forester Ralph Hosmer and local lumberer Eugene Bruce to survey the woods and lay out a plan to log the Forest Preserve. With the failure of the plan's adoption came the virtual end to serious attempts to log the Adirondacks en masse.

The annual Newcomb Roosevelt celebration is this weekend (Sept. 5, 6, and 7)

Newcomb Visitor Interpretive Center Opening Celebration (Friday night, Sept. 5, at 6:30 p.m., and featuring Adirondack Folksinger-Songwriter Peggy Lynn)

Craft Fair (Saturday, Sept. 6, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. and Sunday, Sept. 7, 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. at the Newcomb Central School)

Quilt Show (Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 6-7, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m. at the Newcomb Visitor Interpretive Center).

All Weekend Long: Wagon Rides to Camp Santanoni, Free Pony Rides, Wool Spinning, a Classic Car Exhibit, Historic Guided Tours of Newcomb and Village of Adirondac, the Ty Yandon 5K Memorial Foot Race, and the TR Naturalist Challenge.

Fireworks on Saturday evening, Sept. 6, at the Overlook (Musical Entertainment beforehand)

For more information, contact the Newcomb Chamber of Commerce at (518) 582-3211.

Call for Proposals: Underground Railroad History Conference

The Planning Committee of the Eighth Underground Railroad (UGR) History Conference is soliciting brief proposals for presentations, panels, and workshops that address the theme "The Underground Railroad, Its Legacies, and Our Communities." Proposals should be made for a 60-minute workshop session, for a poster session or exhibition, or for a cultural/artistic activity.

According to the announcement, conference organizers "ask that all proposals allow for significant audience interaction. And, while we urge that proposals focus on the conference theme, we also invite proposals on other important topics concerning Underground Railroad history. See the full call for proposals pdf here.

The Eighth Annual UGR History Conference will be held at College Park, Union College, Schenectady, NY, on February 27-28, 2009. It is sponsored by the Underground Railroad History Project of the Capital Region, Inc.

For more information, consult the web site at http://www.ugrworkshop.com/

Proposals should be submitted to the planning committee by September 30, 2008 by mail at URHPCR, PO Box 10851, Albany NY 12201 or via e-mail at urhpcr [AT] localnet [DOT] com

AASLH Annual Meeting in Rochester September 9-12, 2008

The American Association for State and Local History Annual Meeting in Rochester beginning September 9th is geared toward "history professionals, historical sites, historical societies, history museums, military museums, libraries, presidential sites, students, suppliers, and more."

According to their website:

This is your chance to share your passion, ideas, and knowledge with over 800 of your peers in the field of state and local history. You’ll have an opportunity to learn from over 80 sessions and 17 pre-meeting workshops that directly relate to the latest issues and trends that you face. And, you’ll also have an opportunity to have fun while you explore Rochester’s amazing history through the evening events and tours.

Although apparently they're keeping the costs of the conference pretty quiet (good luck finding it on the website), you can apparently register here.