Donegal Beard Contest Participants Sought

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It’s that time of year again, when men with whiskers shave-down in anticipation of growing their Donegal for this year’s Adirondack Donegal Beard Contest. New beardsmen are welcome to take part in the event, which is free and open to the public.

A Donegal Beard (also called a chin-curtain or Lincoln) is a particular style of Irish hirsute appendage (facial hair) that grows along the jaw line and covers the chin — no soul patch, no mustache. This year marks the contest’s third year.

In order to take part in the contest (and all are welcome) contestants must be clean shaven January 1st and grow a Donegal Beard by St. Patrick’s Day. On the day of the contest, held at Basil and Wicks on Route 28 in North Creek, 4 to 7 pm — all beards must conform to the Donegal standard.

Contestants are judged on length, fullness, style and sophistication.

To see pictures from last year’s contest, and to join the Facebook group, go here.

Photo: 2009 Adirondack Donegal Beard Contestants.

Rockland County: St. Johns in the Wilderness

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In a quiet corner of Rockland County, just a few miles from downtown Haverstraw, NY, stands St. Johns in the Wilderness Episcopal Church. Today it is a reminder that there was once a small but thriving community there, long since grown over.

Located near present day Lake Welch in Harriman State Park, St. John’s was constructed in 1880 through the patronage of Mrs. Margaret Zimmerman, a wealthy New Yorker, as a memorial to her husband John who had died suddenly while they were honeymooning in Palestine. Mrs. Zimmerman (who never remarried) had a retreat estate in Tuxedo Park and enjoyed hiking throughout the area, ultimately buying the land where St. John’s now stands.

In June of 1880, the cornerstone was laid and named for St. John the Evangelist and on November 23rd of the same year, the church was dedicated and officially opened for services. Three years later, Mrs. Zimmerman and Mrs. Carey, director of this church, founded a parish school for orphaned boys from New York City.

That Much Good Might Be Done: St. John’s-in-the-Wilderness, the Legacy of Ada Bessie Carey and Margaret Furniss Zimmerman, is a historical biography of these two 19th century women who devoted much of their lives operating the school and the chapel for the poor families of the Ramapo Mountains. The book details both their efforts and the history of the church.

The author, Odessa Southern Elliott, was caretaker at St. John’s for 30 years. She collected data locally and from around the world. She obtained the memoirs of Dora Ruth West, Mrs. Carey’s adopted daughter- and Sean Furniss, the great-great-great nephew of Mrs. Zimmerman shared his family research with her.

Copies of the book are available at the Harriman Park Visitor’s Center located between exits 16 and 17 on the Palisades Parkway for $15. For more information, call: 845-786-5003.

This Weeks Top New York History News

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Each Friday morning New York History compiles for our readers the previous week’s top stories about New York’s state and local history. You can find all our weekly news round-ups here.

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This Weeks New York History Web Highlights

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Each Friday afternoon New York History compiles for our readers a collection of the week’s top weblinks about New York’s state and local history. You can find all our weekly round-ups here.

Subscribe! More than 550 people get New York History each day via E-Mail, RSS, or Twitter or Facebook updates.

How George Washington Fleeced the Nation

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Sometimes legendary presidents and war heroes are revered for their brilliance and shrewd decision-making – but nobody is perfect! Even people like Churchill and Gandhi had their quirks, and hidden secrets, and laugh-out-loud eccentricities.

How George Washington Fleeced the Nation reveals the previously hidden shortcomings of leading figures from history – the ones your high school teacher or favorite biography conveniently forgot to mention.

Meticulously researched and verified by Phil Mason, who has amassed one of the country’s largest private collections of cuttings and books chronicling the weird and the strange and is also the author of Napoleon’s Hemorrhoids…And Other Small Events that Changed History, this book includes the sometimes hilarious, sometimes shocking details about the lives of history’s icons.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Tories: American Revolution and Civil War

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In 1777, as General John Burgoyne’s army marched south, having taken Fort Ticonderoga, a temporary loyalist enclave was created in Rutland County, Vermont. While many rebel Americans fled before the British Army, a few stayed on. In Rutland Nathan Tuttle, a rebel known locally for hating and taunting loyalists, was one of them.

Tuttle’s decision to stay behind was not a very good one at a time and place when the American Revolution was a full-scale Civil War. As Burgoyne’s army passed through Rutland, Tuttle disappeared. Ten years later it was revealed by a local Tory that Tuttle had been bayoneted, his body weighted with stones and thrown into a creek. Nathan Tuttle was an American, and so were his murderers, likely men associated with the notorious Loyalist and close confidant of John Burgoyne, Philip Skene of Whitehall.

Under the grand story of the fight for American independence are finer threads, stories of people who are often assigned a mere footnote in the Revolutionary narrative. Offering a fresh look at the lives of those who sided with Britain during the American Revolution, TORIES: Fighting for the King in America’s First Civil War, by Thomas Allen, weaves a provocative and unsettling picture of a bloody and savage civil war that divided America and sent more than 80,000 Tory Americans — Loyalists, as they called themselves — fleeing to Canada, the United Kingdom and other parts of the world.

For Loyalists, America was home- yet, when they sought to preserve allegiance to the Crown and protect their homes from the rebels, many Loyalists found themselves in a civil war raging in the midst of a Revolution. Hatred between Tories and Patriots divided families, friends, and communities. This war was vicious and personal, forcing many Loyalists to flee America. Those who chose to stay quickly realized that if they had any chance of survival, the British had to win.

Incorporating firsthand documents from archives in the United Kingdom and Canada, TORIES gives voice to little heard and Americans. TORIES also explores little known facts about Loyalists, such as: New York City and Philadelphia were Tory strongholds throughout the Revolution- at times, Georgia and the Carolinas had more trained and armed Tories than British Redcoats- Lord Dunmore, a Virginia royal governor, offered freedom to any slave that joined the British fight, creating thousands of black Loyalists- Scottish Highlanders, though onetime foes of the British, fought for the Crown in exchange for land grants- and William Franklin, son of Benjamin Franklin, led a brutal Tory guerrilla force that terrorized New Jersey.

While historical accounts portray the Revolution as a conflict between the Patriots and the British, there is another narrative: the bloody fighting between Americans, a civil war whose savagery shocked even battle-hardened Redcoats and Hessians. From mudslinging and rhetorical sparring to water-boarding, house-burning, and lynching, here is the rarely chronicled war-within-the-war that adds a new dimension to the history of the American Revolution. TORIES introduces readers to the forgotten Americans who chose the British side—and paid dearly for their choice.

THOMAS B. ALLEN is the author of numerous history books, including George Washington, Spymaster and Remember Valley Forge. A contributor to Smithsonian Magazine, National Geographic, Military History Quarterly, Military History Magazine, Naval History, Naval Institute Proceedings, and other publications, he lives in Bethesda Maryland with his wife, artist Scottie Allen.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Ferdinand Pecora’s Investigation of the Great Crash

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In the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008, the image of Wall Street’s most influential powerbrokers being called before Congress to give an accounting of their actions will not soon be forgotten. One name was repeatedly invoked during this time, a reminder of when the government first had to step in to protect the American people from Wall Street’s excessive greed: Ferdinand Pecora.

In the winter of 1933, Ferdinand Pecora took the reins of the bumbling Senate investigation of the 1929 crash. He was an unlikely hero: Sicilian-born, stout, with little experience in the Wall Street realm, he nevertheless created the sensational headlines needed to galvanize public opinion for reform. The hearings, under his leadership, spurred Congress to take unprecedented steps to rein in the free-wheeling banking industry, and led directly to the New Deal’s landmark economic reforms.

Now, Michael Perino’s The Hellhound Of Wall Street: How Ferdinand Pecora’s Investigation of the Great Crash Forever Changed American Finance, tells the story of Pecora’s pursuit of the “banksters” of Wall Street. The story a resonates so powerfully even today that Nancy Pelosi, Frank Rich, and Ron Chernow, among others, have publically referred to his legacy.

The Pecora commission brought an end to Washington’s traditionally hands-off approach to the stock market and led directly to the creation of the SEC and other landmark financial reforms that still govern our markets today.

In Hellhound Of Wall Street, Congressional hearings become high-stakes courtroom drama, with an inspiring tale of an unlikely hero’s triumph over powerful interests. Michael Perino provides a minute-by-minute account of the ten dramatic days when Pecora turned the hearings around, cross-examining the officers of National City Bank (today’s Citigroup), particularly its chairman, Charles Mitchell, one of the best known bankers of his day.

Mitchell strode into the hearing room in obvious disdain for the proceedings, but he left utterly disgraced. Pecora’s rigorous questioning revealed that City Bank was guilty of shocking financial abuses, from selling worthless bonds to manipulating its stock price. Most offensive of all, and all too familiar sounding today, was the excessive compensation and bonuses awarded to its executives for peddling shoddy securities to the American public.

A gripping courtroom drama with remarkable contemporary relevance, Hellhound Of Wall Street brings to life a crucial turning point in American financial history and reminds us again of the delicate and crucial relationship between Wall Street and government.

Michael Perino is the Dean George W. Matheson Professor of Law at St. John’s University School of Law. A former Wall Street litigator, Perino has authored numerous articles on securities regulation, securities fraud, and class action litigation. He has testified in both the United States Senate and the House of Representatives and is frequently quoted in the media on securities and corporate matters. He has appeared on NPR’s “All Things Considered”, “Morning Edition”, and “Marketplace”, and on “Bill Moyers’ Journal” on PBS, and on CNBC.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Syracuses Clark Music Company, Melville Clark

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In Pulling Strings: The Legacy of Melville A. Clark, musician Linda Pembroke Kaiser explores the extraordinary career of Melville A. Clark (1883–1953), a musician, inventor, entrepreneur, community leader, and collector whose colorful story is largely unknown. The story is told by Kaiser, a musician who performs on the harp, piano, and guitar. She has published articles in the International Folk Harp Journal and has published and recorded an album of harp music, Lullabies for Earth Children.

Beginning with an account of Clark’s musical family, Kaiser chronicles the founding in 1859 of the Clark Music Company, of which Melville Clark became president in 1919. Originally just a tinkers shed, the business ultimately moved into a six-story building in the center of Syracuse. The Clark Music Company celebrates its 150th anniversary in 2010. Clark also combined his talents as a gifted musician and astute entrepreneur to start the first Syracuse Symphony Orchestra.

Kaiser recounts the development of the Clark Irish Harp, the first portable harp manufactured in the United States, that could easily play accidentals. There were other Clark inventions, such as the first nylon strings for instruments. In addition, Clark designed balloons that the British used in 1918 to drop more than 1,250,000 pamphlets over Germany.

Clark’s story unfolds in detail: a musical encounter with President Wilson, entertaining President F. D. Roosevelt, a visit to Buckingham Palace to present Princess Elizabeth with a music box, and the journey of a Clark Irish harp to Antarctica with Admiral Byrd.

Pulling Strings uncovers the life of a musical genius and also sheds light on a forgotten chapter in Syracuse history.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

A Progressive History of Union Square, NYC

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Even in the supersized world of New York City, Union Square stands out for its astonishing legacy. Yet most of that rich history was lost in the square’s descent from a city showplace to an area approached only at personal peril.

Union Square’s 300-year story is finally told by author/photographer James Isaiah Gabbe in The Universe of Union Square, a coffee-table book and companion DVD (Visions & Voices) that marks the first time the history of the square has been captured from a progressive cultural perspective.

The book relates the people, places and events that shaped so much of America’s progressive tradition while the DVD brings the chronicle up to the moment through 60 lively interviews with city officials, business owners, artists, activists, clergy and others whose lives are intertwined with this remarkable place. More information about the book and a full list of interviewees can be found online.

Gabbe, a former journalist and historian is a longtime resident of Union Square and was for many years the president of the Union Square Partnership &#8211 the nation’s first business improvement district.

As president of the Union Square Partnership Gabbe thought he knew the area’s history well enough to create a nicely illustrated brochure, but wherever he turned, Gabbe heard stories that led him through a warren of intrigue and Dickensian characters.

Three years, hundreds of interviews and site visits later, The Universe of Union Square spans 265 pages of fascinating vignettes and nearly 1000 archival images and contemporary photographs. Visions & Voices, the companion DVD, brings the chronicle up to the moment through 60 lively conversations with city officials, community activists, business leaders, academics, clergy, artists and others whose lives are intertwined with this remarkable place.

Gabbe’s exploration extends to an eight-block radius beyond the confines of the park, touching nine adjacent neighborhoods that together form Union Square’s “Universe.”

“Who knew that such a small area of land would become a cauldron in which an unprecedented diversity of people would shape America’s restless, progressive soul,” Gabbe said. “By turns violent and peaceful, with triumph and dismay, Union Square was witness and party to the growth of a nation.”

The Universe of Union Square explores the area’s people, architecture, institutions and happenings through eight thematic chapters – highlights include:

* Peter Stuyvesant’s Harvest: From the Lenape Nation and European Walloons to “blue bloods” and immigrants, a look at the area’s changing populations, including the criminal fringe, from prosperity through hard times between World War I and the 1980s. Includes notable architectural landmarks, the Greenmarket and acts of violence.

* Democracy’s Stage: The “universe’s” history – and legacy – as New York’s center of free public expression. From Civil War protests and Lincoln proclaiming “right makes might” to serving as headquarters for the nascent labor movement and political activists of all persuasions – through to providing the world a haven to mourn and heal after 9/11.

* Creative Cauldron: Celebrating the impresarios, actors, writers, artists and musicians who have made their mark here. Covers the area’s role as the original “heart” of Broadway and the Yiddish theater- the earliest center for American opera- the birthplace of American vaudeville and the modern nightclub- and home to many famed arts clubs and enterprises that founded the film industry.

* Inventive Ventures: This is where gutsy entrepreneurs built the peerless Ladies’ Mile, a collection of urban shopping emporiums that set the stage for modern department stores but have never been equaled. And where scores of other fascinating enterprises were fostered, including world-famous Strand Book Store, Blatt Billiards and the landmarked Bowlmor bowling alley.

* Fibers of the Future: Past and present, individuals and organizations exemplifying compassionate and visionary citizenship, from the selflessness of baker Charles Fleischmann, who fed anyone willing to wait in line for bread, to Tammany Hall, which began as a noble civic and political service to immigrants but ended in infamy. This was also home to Peter Cooper, Helen Keller, Teddy and Eleanor Roosevelt, Ida Tarbell, Margaret Sanger and Bill Wilson – all of whom changed society in momentous ways.

The Universe of Union Square also covers the area’s 60 institutions from preschools to universities, libraries to museums – many like NYU, New School, Cooper Union, Stuyvesant and Washington Irving High Schools – created to serve the working class, immigrants and women, who had no access to education. And Gabbe recounts tales of Emma Goldman, Andy Warhol and the Mad Bomber among scores of other famous and infamous characters as it documents the area’s modern resurrection from decades of urban decay.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Buffalos Central Park: Photography, Architecture

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Proud Buffalonians and Erie County local history and architecture buffs will find a new book, Central Park, Buffalo, New York: A Neighborhood of History and Tradition, a unique glimpse at one of the first planned neighborhoods in Western New York.

The 214-page, full color, photo-based thoroughly documented coffee-table book takes readers on a tour of the Central Park’s graceful homes, historic churches and tree-lined streets. The book is available at the Buffalo & Erie County Historical Society’s Museum Shop. The price is $39.95, and all proceeds go directly to the Museum.

Central Park was planned and developed by Lewis J. Bennett, a successful entrepreneur who moved to Buffalo from the Hudson Valley. Bennett planned and named the streets, as well as many other amenities which enticed people to build homes in Central Park. As the book reveals the neighborhood’s history and streets, the reader is introduced to past residents, including business pioneers Bob Rich, John J. Boland, Adam E. Cornelius and Edward Barcolo- literary critic Leslie Fiedler- painter Robert Blair, and his brother, Charles Blair, a dashing war hero and aviator who married Hollywood legend Maureen O’Hara.

The book project was originally inspired by Rev. Samuel McCune, an amateur historian, who looked out of his Morris Avenue home and wondered who the street was named after. Rev. McCune embarked on several years of research, compiling information and historic pictures which are used in the volume.

It features photography by the late Dr. Peter Hare and other local photographers. James R. Arnone, a local attorney, wrote the text and took many of the photographs as well. The book also features recollections by the late Bob Venneman (1912-1998) of his experience living his entire life in Central Park, and especially during the relative early days of its development.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.