A Country Store. The Labor Day Parade.

High Woods had been having a church fair since the 1890's, so it was already an established tradition when Henry Wilgus moved to High Woods.  Henry was an Episcopalian as was his wife, May Van Bramer Wilgus, so it is probable they did not attend the Dutch Reformed church nor did they embrace some of its stricter 19th century ideas.  My mother, May Wilgus, and her good friend Virginia Whitely, who was primarily a summer person, attended the Sunday school when they were children.  Church goer or not, everyone loved the Labor Day Fair, and, in the days of Old High Woods, it started with a parade.

The parade was outstanding. Imagine having a parade down a rural road featuring people in costume, an old fire engine and a very handsome cowboy riding a palomino. It  started at the corner of -- giving these roads the names they have now -- Glasco Turnpike and High Woods Road, then went down High Woods Road to Wrolsen Drive, from Wrolsen Drive back to Glasco Turnpike (which would take it to where the Wilgus store was), then back down Glasco Turnpike to Church Road, and then up to the church. That was the High Woods Circle, or the High Woods Block -- the stretch of Glasco Turnpike from Wrolsen Drive/Dutchtown Road down to High Woods Road, then circling back around to the beginning spot on Glasco Turnpike -- which was also the corner (across from the store) that had Henry’s memorial to High Woods veterans of World War II.[i]

Probably, the parade halted at the Wilgus store for a moment before making a grand entrance at the Fairgrounds.  Perhaps, sodas and beers were gathered and quaffed.  The last quarter mile up the hill to church road would be the merriest, and there would be a crowd waiting to welcome the marchers.

In the early 1950s, Bard College upgraded its fire department, and got rid of its old Model A fire engine. Harvey Fite bought it primarily for its pumping power, to pump out his pools for cleaning, but he also painted and polished it, all gleaming brass, and fire engine red paint, and HIGH WOODS NO. 1 printed on the side. Harvey Fite, Bert Wrolsen and others actually helped put out a few local fires.[ii]

Diana Boggs, Green's Grand daughter, Aruba the dog

Tad Richards, Jonathan Richards

Harvey with the fire engine and Bill Johnson on his beautiful palomino became sort of unofficial grand marshals of the Labor Day parade. They would lead the motley procession from Glasco Turnpike around the High Woods circle and back to the church. And trucks full of festive folks joined it along the way.

In the 1930’s, after the repeal of Prohibition, Henry had once entered a truck full of beer in the High Woods Parade.  Along the way, he gave away drinks to the willing.  In those days, there was a split in the community over the idea of drinking beer, so Henry’s beer float was not popular with those who equated beer with the devil.  Jean Wrolsen called it “a confrontation of good and evil.”[iii]

Norman Boggs 
Band welcomes parade

If Labor Day proved to be sunny and mild, the parade was a charming event in a beautiful setting.  Now, all that is left are people’s memories — and these few pictures.  There must be more pictures out there in old scrapbooks, but it is doubtful that they will ever be gathered together in one place.  I have noticed in reading old newspapers from the 20's and 30's and focusing on the High Woods section, that most of the news came from the Church activities.  On occasion, there is a mention of Henry's activities like his attempts to start a kind of bus service to Saugerties, and, of course, he received a good deal of press during his attempt to build a new school in High Woods and get a bus to carry kids to the Saugerties High School.  That is a story for another blog entry.

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[i] Thanks to Tad Richards for his descriptive words and good memory.

[ii] Again, Thanks to Tad for his description of Harvey Fite’s fire engine.

[iii] Wrolsen, Jean.  “High And Healthy.  Henry Wilgus and High Woods” in Toodlum Tales. August, 1979.  Saugerties, N.Y.  1979