A Country Store: Swimming in High Woods in the Summer in Quarry Pools

There were two other wonderful swimming pools in High Woods in those days both owned by artists who had made homes in abandoned quarries.  Tomas Penning's pool was quite large with just a small amount divided off for swimming.  That part was lined with flat bluestone rocks.  Swimming past that, one encountered several inches of muck, so it was best not to put your foot down.  The pool was filled with gold fish grown very large and very wild.  They would come by and nibble your toes if you sat at the water's edge.  When Tom and Elizabeth Penning had a party, everyone brought along their kids, and we had a grand time in the pool and around their beautiful, spectacular house. It is gone now having burned down a decade or so ago. Below is a picture of Tom Penning and Ernie Short standing by the pool having caught some fish.

Harvey and Barbara Fite owned the other wonderful quarry pool.  Harvey had two stepsons, Tad and Jon, one of whom had a birthday in the summer at which time there would be a party.  One year, in the early 50's, Barbara Fite decided to have a party for kids with a theme:  a scavenger hunt.  My sister, Meed (the artist Meed Wetterau Barnett)  and I were invited although we were on the young end of youngsters.  Most were early teens , but we were tweens.  Meed and I were put on the same team.  Looking back, we did not remember much of the scavenger list, but it was quite an adventure. One item was to collect a drawing of a duck from one of a list of local artists. 

This is how Meed remembers it:” I don't remember the other things on the scavenger hunt, but I can add some humor regarding our team's adventure with the cartoon by a Woodstock artist.  Not only did the drawing have to be by one of the artists on the provided list, but also, it had to be of a duck.  Our team was all but certain we could find Fletcher Martin at the Irvington Bar terrace.  He was there, and much amused by our request.  He was probably two sheets to the wind.  He drew us a wonderful picture of a duck that had breasts, and signed it lavishly.  We were delighted and giggled all the way back to headquarters." “It was (later) called Opus 40 because Harvey thought it would take 40 years to complete it.  At the time of the scavenger hunt-birthday party (Tad's or Jon's, don't remember), many of the present paths and terraces of the present Opus 40 were not yet created, and the great piece of bluestone that would become the monolith had not yet been found.  The quarry pool was green and clear, and much deeper than it is now.  At eight years old, I was not yet a strong swimmer and did not dare go into the pool, as it seemed not to have a shallow end. The quarry pool was green and clear, and much deeper than it is now.  At eight years old, I was not yet a strong swimmer and did not dare go into the pool, as it seemed not to have a shallow end.  One thing I remember well is how I admired the daring of the biggest kids as they climbed out onto the high stone winch, which had been left rising over the pool.  When a climber was good and ready, they hung from the end of the winch and let go, falling about fifteen feet into the cold waters of the pool.  I had felt mild frustration at not yet being strong enough to do it myself.  It looked wonderfully fun, and made a great splash."

Meed writes:  "I was probably the littlest kid there--still a child among tweens and teens.  I wasn't ready yet for the social aspects of the day, but the beauty of the place was not lost on me.  It had been one of the ten most perfect weather days of the year.  The sunlight turned the trees a thousand hues of green, and the view of Overlook was blue and purple and dappled with cloud shadows.  The surrounding woods were much closer, shaggier, and wilder than now. There was no thundershower that afternoon to interrupt the goings-on.  I spent most of my time climbing on the rock piles, gazing into the pool, and watching the clouds shadows on Overlook.  I sat in the middle of the little suspension bridge that spanned a deep outcarving in the rock.   A little stream ran below, making the rock smell like heaven.  Much of this formed the basis of future paintings and drawings."

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A Country Store: The way it looked and the way it was in the kitchen

By Diana and Norman Boggs

A good, welcoming host always finds people in his/her kitchen.  No matter where you set up the snacks and drinks, people will always congregate there.  That is the way it was with the kitchen at Henry’s store.  It was attached straight in back of the store.  There was a large, black kerosene stove with six burners and a generous oven.  The cookware was all cast iron, and there were all sizes.  Across from the stove was a red coca cola  cooler with beer on one side and soda on the other. It was about 6-8 feet long, waist height. . I think the whole top assembly must have come off because the inside needed to be periodically washed and drained.  The cooling circulator in the middle acted as a separator of the two halves:  left beer, right soda. It was such fun to open the sliding door and look at the bottles before making a final choice.  There was also a supplementary large refrigerator. 

When the circulator circulated its last, the cooler was simply kept full of a mixture of chopped ice and water.  The water was normally so cold that if you plunged a bottle of beer in too fast, it would explode.  The soda bottles seemed to be sturdier.  Henry would make periodic trips to Kingston or Saugerties to get 50 lb blocks of ice.  He kept the ice in an older coke cooler outside the kitchen door.  He had all the tools to move the blocks:  a long handled cutter to cut the blocks (looked like a relic from the old chopping ice out on the pond era), a tongs to carry them or their parts and any number of ice picks to finish the disassembly.

   Cabinets ran along the wall, and they were filled with eight ounce glasses, some were the classic beer glasses with the bulge on the top, others were just straight.  There was also an assortment of pitchers and Miss Rhinegold metal trays. They were gleaming and ready for the Saturday night dances when jolly groups would order up several for the table.  The sink was a double sink, and Henry was very specific about washing glasses. There could be no milk products washed with the beer glasses as they could leave a residue and the poured beer would not have a head.

You had to be careful of dangling flypaper that could catch you by the hair if you were not careful.  It worked pretty well to keep the fly population down.

The blue/gray cabinets were built low.  They were SPOOL CABINETS.... serious antiques...wish I had'em.

This is a picture of Bill Wilgus in the kitchen.

William (Bill) Wilgus and Ernie Short

There was another cash register in the kitchen for the convenient purchase of beverages to be consumed on the premises. Of course, there were various sign up sheets for the annual fishing contest, and other notices if they were important to the community, and funny pictures of who “skunked” whom in the ongoing card games.

Henry always cooked Sunday dinner for the family and he would invite anybody who happened to be hanging around in the kitchen to join us.  The variety of meals is discussed in another blog entry, but chicken was the most usual choice.  Boiled or canned veggies were included, and there was always a plate of white Bond bread and butter never margarine.

It was not unknown for him to suddenly have a party that included a clambake with lobster and plenty of corn.  He was, after all, a Jersey boy and had grown up near the ocean.

Jackson C. Frank: a memory of Jack by Marianne Collins and Diana Boggs

A note of explanation from Diana Boggs:  When I was a student at Alfred University, I used to get away to Buffalo to visit my brother Norman who was working for our old friend, Jerry Raven at the Limelight Café.  That is where I met Marianne Welch (who was later married to my brother, Norman for a while) and Jackson C. Frank who was part of their group The Grosvenors.  Marianne and I were nineteen, Norman was twenty-two and Jack was twenty.  I used to hang around with them running the tape recorder and being their most appreciative audience.  We brought Jack to Woodstock, a place he later considered his home. Marianne and I offer the following memory of Jack.

We are grateful to those who recognized Jack Frank’s prodigious talent and have honored him at the Buffalo Music Hall Of Fame. And, to Jim Abbott, author of Jackson C. Frank: The Clear Hard Light Of Genius, whose years of dedicated friendship and caring for Jack, not an easy task, resulted In a thoughtful and sensitive book that will also help to keep the body of work that Jack accomplished alive and available. Jack and his work deserve to be remembered and afforded their place in that extremely creative time of the singer songwriter in England and America in the 1960’s.

It was Jerry Raven who welcomed Jack into his first regular performing gig at Jerry’s iconic coffeehouse, The Limelight, on Edward Street in Buffalo. For several years, Jack performed with Norm Boggs, who was Jerry’s good friend from his Woodstock days and a grad student at U.B. Another grad student, bass player, Ev Neinhaus and Marianne Welch, stepping out from her role as The Limelight’s cook and into female vocalist, soon joined them.

The group was well received and performed around the Northeast and Canada. But. It wasn’t hard to see that once he got his stage “sea legs”, Jack was able to stretch more and grow into himself as a solo. His voice was mesmerizing and his playing style, possibly because of his physical limitations, gave him a unique sound that brought people back again and again.

Close friends knew of Jack’s miraculous, however, only partial recovery from the severe burns he received in the historic Cleveland Hill school fire.  It is probable that Jack should not have survived, never walked, never been able to live on his own. The limp, the bent arms, the scars he carried, and his constant pain, were, frankly horrific.

But, despite all of it, Jack was regarded by his friends as one of the funniest, wryly humorous people ever.  It was a gift that he could not avoid, even if he had wanted to. It made him completely engaging and adorable while at the same time being the biggest pain in the ass one ever met!

His music had an informal sound to it that he could only achieve by meticulous practice. The themes he addressed in his lyrics melded deeply personal and universal concepts and feelings and his love of language shone throughout all of his writing. It was no small accident that Jack had an enormous repertoire of traditional English and American folk songs. Those who heard his first performances of that music can hear it reprised in very subtle ways in some of his own writing.

The fire, the settlement from the fire, and his subsequent travel to England and Europe, are the triggers that set his creative juices free but – they also held the seeds of the physical, emotional, and psychological problems that, ultimately, he could not overcome.

By the time he returned home and settled in Woodstock, money gone, marriage beyond shaky, and his first child, a son, tragically taken just hours after birth, Jack began a downward trajectory from which he never fully emerged.

Marianne Welch Collins notes the following:  The Boggs family and I did what we could to soften the hard places that Jack landed, but ultimately we knew it was not going to be enough. For many years, we became the home that” when you go there, they have to take you in.” He was always welcome, but we always knew that when Jack came to us, he wasn’t doing well.

Now, Jack’s artistic output and his contributions to the music of his time are being acknowledged. He overcame so much to be able to accomplish anything. He was a beautiful, brave, tenacious, gifted and inspiring individual and all of us who had the opportunity to experience him – from Paul Simon and Art Garfunkle, his European traveling companions, to Sandy Denny, his lover and quite possibly his soul mate, to John Kay, his friend before Steppenwolf fame, and all the rest of us, he is truly unforgettable. Thank you for helping to keep his memory alive. And, thanks again to Jim Abbott for his dedication to Jack and his legacy.

8-4-2015

Fifties: Return to Alfred University for the reunion: Sweet Benign Mother, May I?

Sweet Benign Mother, May I?

Our Alfred Alma Mater refers to the school as our “sweet benign mother”, and we all love that term and sing it in great voice.  My fiftieth reunion did not disappoint me.  My friends were still friends, and conversation was, for the most part, not about medical conditions and deaths.  There was some talk about joint replacement, but that might have been my fault since my doctor suggested I test the water for my knee replacement by asking how many old friends had them and how they fared.  Serious conversation found most happy with replacements and quite encouraging.

One high point was a brief recitation from the handbook of 1965, the rule and laws that governed us at the time. Hilarious.  It got me thinking, though, about my grandmother who lived through the horse and buggy years to the Sputnik and Apollo times.  The Boggs family had one of the first automobiles in Woodstock.  No driving licenses were required at the time, and when, one day,  she decided to drive, she just got in the auto and went to the store. Upon arriving, she simply asked someone to turn the car around for her, she did not know how to do that, and then went on home.No permission was required.  She was always a terrible driver never recognizing those new flashing turn signals.On the other hand, she told me her mother would send her in for another petticoat if she could see even a shadow of a leg, so lots of permission was required.

At Alfred, we lived through the horse and buggy days of social regulations.  Women were protected by a series of policy statements requiring permission from “sweet benign mother” before leaving for an overnight or dressing in an odd manner.  My Spanish teacher required women to wear skits to class.  Her desk was actually set on a raised platform at the head of the classroom.  We laughed, but complied for the most part keeping skirts tucked in our purses and slipping them on over our slacks on the way to class.

The beauty of western New York, the unusual ceramic tiles of the buildings around Alfred, and the clear air reminded me why I still love Alfred. My class is full of interesting people from the spectrum of chosen occupations, doctors, lawyers, teachers, writers, farmers, and one forager, artists and engineers. I was the only librarian that I noticed, but one old friend has two sisters that are librarians and were Alfred grads.

I am still thinking about my theme of asking permission.  Regulation is still a struggle.  In my library career, I met with many stupid rules designed to keep collections in order, and with many people who wished to limit access to information or keep things "the way they always have been".  As I age, I try to fight the call of nostalgia, but I also am under the impression that an historical perspective might be important:  you know, the old saying about if you don't remember history, you are inclined to repeat it.

A Country Store: A High Woods Summer Swimming At The Patch.

The Patch was a popular swimming destination.  It was a deep place in the stream.  To get there you had to descend a steep path through the woods. It had been a favorite place for High Woods kids for decades.  My mother, May Wilgus is shown below.  The year is circa 1928 as she looks about 12 and she is wearing a 20’s style bathing suit, probably wool knit.  The other photo shows one of her friends, probably her cousin, Shirley, pointing to the swimming hole from the cliff above.  There is a shaft of sunlight, and the sandy beach is on the right.

 It looks the same as it looked in the 1950’s when it was an almost daily destination for our little family, mother, May, brother, Norman, sister, Meed, little brother, Mark, and me, Diana, plus our close friends Kit and Gunny Evers. 

Our car would arrive and all the kids would dash for the path leaving my mother to carry towels, picnic baskets and other necessities.  Often, there would be a father present such as Alf or Alan, and they would lug the heavy burdens as we kids ran down the path.

Along the way, there was a fossil place, an outcropping filled with fossils, and we would stop to see if there were any new ones.  We took them home and made little collections of them here and there in our yard in Woodstock.  With a little direction, I suppose it might have been a profound learning experience, but instead it remained a curiosity.

There was a sandy clearing at the end of the path, and, of course, a beautiful pool.  There were shallow spots along the edges, but the middle ran to a depth of over six feet.  A prominent shale cliff hung out over the water that allowed cannon balls, and dives.  The water was cool and clear.

We went there pretty much every day during the summer.  First, there would be a stop at the Wilgus store for provisions:  large slices of bologna, while bread, peanut butter and jelly.  Beer for the adults, lemonade for kids.  (My mother did not approve of soda).

There were occasional encounters with wildlife.  We were carefully warned about copperheads, so an occasional encounter with a hog nosed snake caused extreme anxiety as they make a huge display when frightened.  Water snakes would swim through unmolested on occasion.  A sandy spot near the little waterfall seemed like a nice spot to sit, but is loaded with leaches.  We called them bloodsuckers.  There were water striders, dragonflies and horseflies.  My brother, Norman, would search for Dobsons on the rocks near the edge of the stream.  They look like little lobsters, and wiggled around when touched. 

I enjoyed catching little pinheads in a cup.  Trout and bass were plentiful in the stream.  Crows were our favorite bird, and we would run around caw cawing whenever we heard them. 

A picnic fire would mean hot dogs, and everyone would rush off to find a good roasting stick.  Dessert would be marshmallows set on fire, burned to a crisp on the outside but soft and gooey and delicious inside.  The rocks around the fire could suddenly explode from the heat on the moist layers inside.  We were lucky to have no burning incidents, but it could be a very startling experience. 

The ride home in my mothers Jeepster (see picture below)  was itchy and sandy.  There was no need to bathe at home since we had been in the water all day, and, in the summer, it was not at all unusual for our well to go dry.

Fifties: Going back to Alfred

The fifties are sneaking up on me.  I mean those fifty-year anniversaries.  I am starting to notice them and even contemplate the meaning behind some of those half a lifetime events.  Not, of course, half a lifetime to me.  That passed some time ago.  These are events that happened when I was in my late teens and early twenties my personal golden (rhymes with olden) years.  That must be why those anniversaries are called golden. 

It started even before I decided to attend my fifty-year reunion at Alfred University.  A couple of years ago I remembered that it had been fifty plus years since what I like to call “The Great incident on the Village Green”. I was going to write a whole blog about it, a beautiful July day when the police attacked a group of young people peacefully singing songs and playing guitars on the Woodstock Village Green. I was there along with Geoff Brown, a friend from my college years.   It’s true.  It happened.  You can look it up if you feel like rattling through the archives in the Woodstock Library.   I have always assumed the police were worried that the civil rights movement might be sneaking into Woodstock along with those other beatnik types.   The town had a special report about the whole thing, and I was going to look it up and read it, but it sapped my energy just thinking about it.   Joan Baez showed up to sing outside the police department where they were holding the songsters. I’m sorry.  These days Woodstock exhausts me.

Me back then

If the year ends with a zero or five, it means Alfred University will be

calling me home for a reunion. This year it is my 50th. I am planning to

attend along with several of my old friends who had wonderful nicknames way

back then like BeBe, Tickie, Martie, CJ, Scottie, and, of course me, DJ.  I Love

the trip across New York State. I'm going through the Finger Lakes area to

that place "nestled away mid the Empire State hills".  Alfred was the perfect place for me in the fall of 1961. Alfred was dry because the county had never repealed Prohibition. At that time, the school had eight men to every woman attending because they had a large engineering school and very few women entering engineering. There were very strict curfews for women, but none for men. Fraternities and Sororities ruled the campus social life. The Twist was the dance and beer the preferred drink, so we could

twist the night away until curfew. There was no fear of meeting last night's date in the breakfast line as dining halls were separate for men and women. It was such an innocent time, a bubble,  with big surprises in the near future. I was such a terrible student, regularly appearing in a coat covering my pajamas, smoking cigarettes and looking through my notes for some hint of what was happening.

When I return to Alfred University for our half century reunion, I will be sure to walk past C.D. Smith's house. He was one of those wonderful professor teachers, part of the great Alfred faculty my genius friend, author and professor, Dave Ball still appreciates .[i]C.D.  lived across from Sigma, my house for junior and senior years and had a black cat I called "Cellar Door" who would scamper across the rooftops and in my window. I admit to feeding him because he was great company. "C.D" was a pretty good sport about it. His powers of observation were impressive. From the sidelines, as I managed props or costumes, I watched him work with actors, never a bully and always interesting and engaging as the group moved towards opening night.

I have been back to visit Alfred University several times since 1965. I have seen the campus changes, and I don't mind them at all.  There are many improvements.   Because this is the 50th reunion, I am thinking about ideas I actually brought forward with me as I went on in my daily life. Fellow student, Jim Morgan (later: James Franklin Morgan, teacher, lyricist and author) ruled the Theater Barn where all sets were constantly under construction. He taught me how to use a staple gun. We worked to the music of The Beatles, Motown and jazz, and we used whatever we had on hand covering and repainting old furniture for whatever play was in production. For some reason we had bolts of red velveteen, so it made many appearances on stage. His designs were ingenious works of art at least in my memory. Important life lesson learned: grab your staple gun, use what you have and move forward. You left us too soon, Jimmy. I miss you.

Terrible, world-altering events happened on the national scene during my years at Alfred.  Marilyn Monroe died, The Cuban Missile Crisis (I actually called home to see what my parents thought about the whole thing), JFK was assassinated.  Everyone remembers the day JFK died.  Students were gathered around in stunned silence.  I walked out of Alumni Hall, and someone was saying, “they shot the President”, and I really thought it must be a joke, a psych department experiment. The Beatles arrived to save us from the gloom, and the world went forward, or around or in various directions.  Little did I know that soon I would step from Alfred into the world of the free speech movement on the Berkeley campus.

Looking back at our food selection a half century ago reminded me that I had never tasted a bagel before living at Sigma Chi Nu.  Our president, Martha Lewin said we should have them available, and voila, our cook, Mrs. Baker obtained Lenders frozen bagels, and we had them as a major food group from that time forward.  Steak and cake was served every Friday in the dorm cafeteria.  Other food favorites:  knife-sliced English muffins and second cups of coffee at the campus center, and BLT’s made at midnight in the kitchen under the director of Scottie who understood how to cook crispy bacon.  Others who tried often set the broiler on fire.

There will be more observations when I return.  See you in a couple of weeks. 

Selfie

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[i] David Ball wrote: I agree about CD Smith. I also really liked the other theater guy, Ronald Brown. And we had an amazing English literature faculty. E.B. Finch, David Ohara, Mel Bernstein.... Ohara succeeded, astonisngly, in making me like neoclassical literature. Most people have only a teacher or two in their pantheon of major influences. We had many. Alfred was an enclave of top level professors who didn't want to play the idiotic publish-or-perish academic game, so instead came to Alfred where they could focus on their subjects and subjects. No grad assistants in sight. So surviving the medieval social framework was worth it.

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