History
By Julia Reischel on Friday, Aug. 8, 2014 - 2:18 pm
Brace yourselves: The Catskills are having their biggest moment since the height of the Borscht Belt resorts in the '50s.
Hudson Valley Magazine has dedicated its entire August issue to the region, declaring that "The Catskills Are Back," and featuring... Read more
By Julia Reischel on Friday, Aug. 1, 2014 - 1:02 am
A ten-foot-tall, 10,000-pound statue of a Hindu rain goddess arrived in Big Indian on Sunday celebrate the reopening of a long-dormant Catskills ashram.
The Poughquag-based Bodhivastu Foundation is planning to open a Buddhist spiritual retreat center at... Read more
By Katherine Speller on Tuesday, Jun. 17, 2014 - 6:07 pm
Although a summer evening stroll through a graveyard sounds like something straight out of “The Addams Family," the Historical Society of the Town of Middletown’s cemetery tours offer an educational twist on an otherwise spooky outing.
Held on Saturday,... Read more
By Katherine Speller on Friday, Jun. 6, 2014 - 3:15 pm
Above: A room at the Arnold House. Photo courtesy of the Arnold House.
For over a century, urbanites have found refuge in the Catskills. But the heyday of the grand Victorian mountain hotels is over, and the era of Borscht Belt resort kitsch is passing... Read more
By John Phillip Tappen on Thursday, May. 29, 2014 - 2:16 pm
Forgotten history is what interests filmmaker Tobe Carey most. His latest film, the documentary Rails to the Catskills, is an attempt to encapsulate the history of the railroad lines that abounded in the Catskills area for much of the late 19th and early... Read more
By Lissa Harris on Tuesday, May. 27, 2014 - 9:51 am
The Catskills region is renowned as the cradle of American dry fly-fishing. It’s the place where, in the 1800s, local anglers first began to alter English flies into shapes and patterns that mimic our own native insects.
Today, the fly-tier’s art thrives... Read more
By Jenna Scherer on Saturday, May. 24, 2014 - 4:44 pm
History has a way of revealing itself by accident. In the 1990s, antique-furniture dealer Robert Swope was browsing a flea market in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood when he stumbled upon a treasure trove—a collection of photographs taken in the ’50s and... Read more
By Lisa Lyons on Saturday, May. 24, 2014 - 10:40 am
Once upon a time, 23 steel fire towers dotted the high peaks of the Catskills. They were staffed by fire tower observers, who scanned the horizon for smoke and filled their downtime with shimmying up the steep steel struts, taming bears and sharing space... Read more
By Lissa Harris on Tuesday, Mar. 25, 2014 - 4:14 pm
Top: Fire engulfs the historic Rexmere Hotel around 11 a.m. on March 25, 2014. Photo by Chris Becker. To see a slideshow of the fire as it destroyed the building in about 20 minutes, see the bottom of this story.
Above: Video of the Rexmere collapsing... Read more
By Julia Reischel on Friday, Mar. 21, 2014 - 2:12 pm
Top: Screenshot of the former Agloe General Store, from a video by YouTube user and John Green fan ObviouslyBenHughes, who visited Agloe in 2010. Above: The full video.
A Catskills town called Agloe is famous this week for the fact that it doesn't exist... Read more
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