NYS Military Museum Wins History Award

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An online project created by the New York State Military Museum and Veterans Research Center and the Saratoga Springs Public Library has won one of two First Prize awards in a contest sponsored by the History Channel.

Honoring Saratoga Veterans, a page available at the library website, features interviews with six Saratoga County residents who served in World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam and Iraq. The videos, recorded as part of the museum’s Veterans Oral History Program, help tell the story of Saratoga residents in America’s wars.

The History Channel prize, awarded in conjunction with the Institute for Museum and Library Services, recognizes libraries which created local programs, exhibits or media projects to tell about the role of their communities in the larger American story.

The contest was created in conjunction with the History Channel series: &#8220America: The Story of Us.&#8221 It was open to libraries around the country and recognized 13 winners, which shared $35,000 in prize money. The Grand Prize Winner-the Lower Macungie Library in Macungie, PA-received a $15,000 prize for an exhibit on the impact of the Apollo 13 flight, on the local community.

The Saratoga Springs Public Library will receive $5,000 in prize money which library director Issac Pulver says will be shared by the museum. The other First Prize Winner was the Erie Community Library of Erie, Colorado, with a project called &#8221 Erie: From Working Coal Town to Suburban Boom Town.&#8221

Ten second prize winning libraries received ten $1,000 prizes.

The New York State Military museum houses over 10,000 artifacts dating from the Revolutionary War to the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that relate to New York State’s military forces, the state’s military history and the contributions of New York’s veterans. The artifacts include uniforms, weapons, artillery pieces, and art. A significant portion of the museum’s collection is from the Civil War.

The museum also owns the largest collection of state battle flags in the country and the largest collection of Civil War flags in the world. Of the over 1700 flags in the collection, more than 60% are from the Civil War.

The library and archive holdings in the Veterans Research Center include a 2000 volume library of military and New York State history, over 6,000 photographs, unit history files, broadsides, scrapbooks, letters and maps.

Revolutionary War Comes Alive In Vermont

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The public is invited to experience the Revolutionary War and the road to American independence as the site of the largest colonial fortification hosts two days of battle re-enactments, demonstrations, and living history activities. The annual “Soldiers Atop the Mount” living history weekend takes place at the Mount Independence State Historic Site in Orwell, Saturday and Sunday, July 24 and 25.

Both days offer opportunities to visit the American and British camps and speak with re-enactors whose units portray some of the actual units that garrisoned Mount Independence.

On Saturday, the camps open at 10:30 a.m. with ongoing demonstrations of camp life, a history scavenger hunt, and children’s activities. At 11:00 a.m. visitors can learn how to drill the American way for children and the young at heart- and at 11:30 there will be a choice of guided tours of the camps or attendance at Mistress Davenport’s School.

Later, at 1:00 p.m. there will be an artillery demonstration followed by a 2:00 p.m. reading of the Declaration of Independence and music by the Seth Warner Mount Independence Fife and Drum Corps.

Finally, the day concludes at 3:00 p.m. with a narrated military tactical demonstration with exciting battle action encircling the audience.

On Sunday, the camps open at 10:00 a.m. and the history scavenger hunt is on. At 11:00 see the artillery demonstration, go on a guided camp tour at 11:30 or attend Mistress Davenport’s School, and experience the narrated military tactical demonstration at 1:30 p.m.

The camp closes at 2:00 p.m. Sunday, but at 2:30 p.m. site interpreter Karl Crannell will give a short talk in the auditorium on Gen. John Stark, hero of the Battle of Bennington.

Constructed in 1776 and 1777 on a rugged peninsula jutting into Lake Champlain, Mount Independence was perfectly positioned to defend the southern lake and New England against British attack from Canada.

On the night of July 5, 1777, the American Army under General Arthur St. Clair withdrew from Mount Independence in Orwell and Fort Ticonderoga across the lake after British General John Burgoyne sailed down, planning to split New England off from the rest of the colonies.

Faced with a British force more than twice his size that had occupied high ground from which they could bombard him with impunity, St. Clair abandoned the fortifications without a fight.

Two days later at the Battle of Hubbardton soldiers from Vermont, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire fought in a savage rear guard action to halt Burgoyne’s army.

The fact that these actions preserved the army while stopping the British advance –helping lead to the stunning American victory in October at the Battle of Saratoga – didn’t prevent an outraged Congress from officially censuring St. Clair for the loss of the forts.

He argued that his conduct had been honorable- demanded review by a court martial- and was ultimately exonerated. The British and Germans occupied Mount Independence until November of that year.

Tickets are $6.00 for adults and free for children under 15. This includes admission to the event, the museum, and access to all the trails.

Mount Independence, a National Historic Landmark, is near the end of Mount Independence Road six miles west of the intersection of Vermont Routes 22A and 73 in Orwell and is one of the nation’s best-preserved Revolutionary War sites.

It includes an air conditioned visitor center and museum and nearly six miles of hiking trails, including the award-winning Baldwin Trail, which meets outdoor standards for handicapped accessibility and features new interpretive signs.

Call (802) 948-2000 for more information or visit www.HistoricVermont.org/sites.

Photo: American Revolutionary War Soldiers firing at Mount Independence. Courtesy Vermont Division for Historic Preservation.

Increased Visitation Trend Continues at NYS Parks

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The New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation has announced that Fourth of July holiday weekend attendance numbers were consistent with the strong showing in the early part of the summer season. Attendance over the three-day holiday weekend increased by six percent over last year.

All totaled, nearly 1.9 million people spent a portion of their holiday weekend at a state park or historic site.

Last year, the state park system recorded nearly 56 million visits. The New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation oversees 178 state parks and 35 historic sites. For more information on any of these recreation areas, call 518-474-0456, visit www.nysparks.com.

Free Guided Bicycle Tours at Saratoga Battlefield

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Explore the history and scenery of Saratoga National Historical Park, located on Route 32 and 4 in Stillwater, by joining a Park Ranger for free guided bike tours of the battlefield at 6:00pm to 7:30pm on Wednesday July 21 and Wednesday August 18. Participants will meet at the flagpole at the Visitor Center parking lot. Because the rides are weather dependent, call the park at 664.9821 ext. 224 by 4:30pm to learn the bike ride status.

Touring the battlefield by bicycle combines the relaxation of fresh air, fantastic scenery, and the experience of touching history. These guided bike tours will cover various sections of the Battlefield, giving riders a unique opportunity to learn about the Battle of Saratoga and the history of the park, all while breathing in the ambience of a rural summer evening.

Helmets are required for riders 14 and under, and are recommended for all riders. Please bring water and wear insect repellant.

For more information about the bike rides or other programs at Saratoga National Historical Park—the national park in your own backyard—call the Visitor Center at 518-664-9821 ext. 224 or check the park website at www.nps.gov/sara.

Minnewaska State Park Master Plan Adopted

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The New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation and the Palisades Interstate Park Commission have adopted a master plan for Minnewaska State Park Preserve. State Parks has reinstated the master planning process throughout the park system, and Minnewaska State Park is among the first to complete a new master plan. Park master plans define a long-term, sustainable vision for parks by helping to identify best uses for a specific site, make the most of limited resources, and protect the environment.

The Minnewaska master plan includes natural resource protection measures and more avenues for recreation, including expansion of hiking, biking, equestrian and climbing opportunities, and reuse of the former Phillips House as the preserve office and visitor center. [LINK]

The master plan outlines OPRHP’s vision for potential capital improvements, operational enhancements and natural and cultural resource stewardship within Minnewaska State Park for the next ten to fifteen years. Factors such as the availability of funding, the need to invest in rehabilitation of existing park infrastructure, and other pressing needs in the entire state parks system will influence the sequence and timing of the improvements.

Highlights of the plan include:

• Developing a climbing management plan to indicate additional areas suitable for rock climbing-

• Creating a looped single track mountain bike trail system and enhancing the existing woods roads for hiking and horseback riding-

• Implementing ridgewide efforts focused on fire management, deer impacts on biodiversity and invasive species control- and

• Reusing the former Phillips House as the preserve office and visitor center and improving parking lot designs.

Adirondack History: Have You Seen That Vigilante Man?

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The Wilmington Historical Society will be hosting a program with historian and author Amy Godine entitled &#8220Have You Seen That Vigilante Man?&#8221 to be held on Friday, July 30th at 7 pm at the Wilmington Community Center on Springfield Road in Wilmington.

Night riders, white cappers and vigilante strikes- the darker side of American mob justice was not confined to the Deep South or the Far West. Adirondack history is ablaze with flashes of &#8220frontier justice,&#8221 from farmers giving chase to horse thieves to &#8220townie&#8221 raids on striking immigrant miners to the anti-Catholic rallies of the KKK. Amy Godine’s anecdotal history of Adirondack vigilantism plumbs a regional legacy with deep, enduring roots, and considers what about the North Country made it fertile and forgiving ground for outlaw activity.

Readers of Adirondack Life magazine are acquainted with Amy Godine’s work on social and ethnic history in the Adirondack region. Whether delving into the stories of Spanish road workers, Polish miners, black homesteaders, Jewish peddlers or Chinese immigrants, Godine celebrates the &#8220under-stories&#8221 of so-called &#8220non-elites,&#8221 groups whose contributions to Adirondack history are conventionally ignored. Exhibitions she has curated on vanished Adirondack ethnic enclaves have appeared at the Chapman Historical Museum, the Saratoga History Museum, the Adirondack Museum and the New York State Museum. The recently published 3rd edition of The Adirondack Reader, the anthology Rooted in Rock, and The Adirondack Book, feature her essays- with Elizabeth Folwell, she co-authored Adirondack Odysseys. A former Yaddo, MacDowell, and Hackman Research Fellow, she is also an inaugural Fellow of the New York Academy of History.

The “Have You Seen That Vigilante Man?” program on July 30th is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be served. For further information, contact Karen Peters at (518) 524-1023 or Merri Peck at (518) 946- 7627.

Photo: Members of Ku Klux Klan march in Washington DC in 1925.

Troy: Chances to Tour Limited Access Sites

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Hidden history will be revealed as the Rensselaer County Historical Society offers unique opportunities to tour limited-access sites around Troy. From a riverfront warehouse painstakingly renovated into an elegant loft apartment to the attic of the 1786 Melville House, the Rensselaer County Historical Society’s Hidden History programs offer the public opportunities to tour historic buildings and sites not normally open to the general public.

Participants may register for individual programs ($12 members/$15 not-yet-members) or for the whole 4-program series ($45 members/$50 not-yet-members). All tours last an hour and meet at the location specified. Call 518-272-7232, x12 to register or register online at http://www.rchsonline.org/registration.html.

HIDDEN HISTORY: 169 River Street Renovation
Date: Tuesday, July 27, 2010- 4:30-5:30 pm

Place: 169 River Street, Troy

169 River Street was once home to the Wustefeld Candy Company. Now, this renovated warehouse building on Troy’s riverfront is a great example of the adaptive re-use of historic structures. Explore this former warehouse building and learn about how it was transformed into a modern loft apartment &#8211 with some wonderful traces of its industrial past remaining.

HIDDEN HISTORY: Herman Melville House
Date: Tuesday, August 24, 2010- 4:30-5:30 pm

Place: Corner 1st Ave and 114th Street, Lansingburgh
The 1786 Melville House was home to Herman Melville while he wrote his first two novels and is now home to the Lansingburgh Historical Society. Join us for a tour of this historic building, including its “Attic Museum” which highlights Lansingburgh’s unique contributions to the area economy.

HIDDEN HISTORY: Lighting Research Center/Gurley Building
Date: Tuesday, September 28, 2010- 4:30-5:30 pm

Place: 21 Union Street, Troy
This National Historic Landmark building was built in 1862 and opened just 8 months after the original building on the site burned to the ground in the Great Fire of Troy. Rensselaer’s innovative Lighting Research Center occupies floors of the building that were once home to production lines for Gurley’s world famous surveying equipment.

HIDDEN HISTORY: Rensselaer Model Railroad Society
Date: Tuesday, October 26, 2010- 4:30-5:30 pm

Place: Davison Hall, RPI.

Hidden deep within the RPI campus and not normally open to the public, the Rensselaer Model Railroad Society has created a 33 feet wide by 123 feet long historically accurate railroad layout of 1950s Troy. RMRS has generously opened their doors for us to see this unique re-creation. For more information, please visit http://railroad.union.rpi.edu. Please note – the layout is not handicapped accessible and for safety reasons, is only open to ages 12 and up.

Currier & Ives at Senate House Historic Site

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The prints of Currier & Ives—one of the most successful purveyors of lithographic prints in the 19th Century—are diverse, full of fascinating historical information and compelling imagery, perhaps despite their perennial appeal on calendars and cards. A new exhibit at Senate House State Historic Site, in Kingston, NY, offers us forty of their prints focusing on the ideals, values and innovations of the 19th Century. The exhibit is free and open to the public. For more information on hours, location and other details, please call (845) 338-2786.

While it’s better known for its buildings and collections representing colonial and Revolutionary history, Senate House State Historic Site, located in uptown Kingston, also has impressive collections of objects, documents and art of the 19th Century, including over 200 Currier & Ives prints, given to the site by the late Rutgers Ives Hurry, a Saugerties resident whose passion was collecting images of the Hudson Valley made by the firm.

The Senate House exhibition focuses on three themes: the ideal of the 19th-century home, images of New York City, and Hudson River steamboats (both the luxury and potential dangers they represented). The exhibit is entitled “Cheap and Popular Pictures,” a term touted by Nathaniel Currier and James Merritt Ives, who shrewdly observed and marketed their images&#8211made by many different artists of the day—to the opinions, interests and ideals of America’s growing middle class.

Currier & Ives: “Cheap and Popular Pictures” can be viewed during open hours at Senate House State Historic Site: Wednesday through Saturday, 10 am to 5 pm, and 1 – 5 pm on Sundays. The exhibition runs through October 31, and is available by appointment and for school groups after that date. Senate House is located at 296 Fair Street, Kingston NY, 12401. For more information: (845) 338-2786.

Collection Storage Tours at Adirondack Museum

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Visitors can now get a glimpse of more than 7,000 historic artifacts not currently on exhibit at the Adirondack Museum in a state-of-the-art facility in the hamlet of Blue Mountain Lake by touring the Collections Storage and Study Center each Monday in July and August from 2:00 p.m. until 3:00 p.m.

The tours are free for museum members- $10 for non-members. Visitors can sign up for a tour on Mondays at the Membership Desk in the Visitor Center. Each tour is limited to thirty people.

The Collections Storage and Study Center holds an amazing array of objects from the Adirondack past. Collections consist of: boats, including power boats, canoes, kayaks, guideboats, and unusual boats- traditional and rustic furniture- hand tools and machinery- large vehicles, including horse-drawn carriages and sleighs, snowmobiles, fire trucks, and a Jitterbug- maple sugaring equipment- ice harvesting tools- as well as agricultural artifacts.

Adirondack Museum Conservator and Collections Manager Doreen Alessi will lead the tours. Alessi cares for more than 100,000 two and three-dimensional artifacts in the collection of the Adirondack Museum. She is a Professional Associate of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (AIC).

Photo: Collections Storage and Study Center, Adirondack Museum.