Download or read book The Catskills written by Stephen M. Silverman and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2015-10-27 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Catskills (“Cat Creek” in Dutch), America’s original frontier, northwest of New York City, with its seven hundred thousand acres of forest land preserve and its five counties—Delaware, Greene, Sullivan, Ulster, Schoharie; America’s first great vacationland; the subject of the nineteenth-century Hudson River School paintings that captured the almost godlike majesty of the mountains and landscapes, the skies, waterfalls, pastures, cliffs . . . refuge and home to poets and gangsters, tycoons and politicians, preachers and outlaws, musicians and spiritualists, outcasts and rebels . . . Stephen Silverman and Raphael Silver tell of the turning points that made the Catskills so vital to the development of America: Henry Hudson’s first spotting the distant blue mountains in 1609; the New York State constitutional convention, resulting in New York’s own Declaration of Independence from Great Britain and its own constitution, causing the ire of the invading British army . . . the Catskills as a popular attraction in the 1800s, with the construction of the Catskill Mountain House and its rugged imitators that offered WASP guests “one-hundred percent restricted” accommodations (“Hebrews will knock vainly for admission”), a policy that remained until the Catskills became the curative for tubercular patients, sending real-estate prices plummeting and the WASP enclave on to richer pastures . . . Here are the gangsters (Jack “Legs” Diamond and Dutch Schultz, among them) who sought refuge in the Catskill Mountains, and the resorts that after World War II catered to upwardly mobile Jewish families, giving rise to hundreds of hotels inspired by Grossinger’s, the original “Disneyland with knishes”—the Concord, Brown’s Hotel, Kutsher’s Hotel, and others—in what became known as the Borscht Belt and Sour Cream Alps, with their headliners from movies and radio (Phil Silvers, Eddie Cantor, Milton Berle, et al.), and others who learned their trade there, among them Moss Hart (who got his start organizing summer theatricals), Sid Caesar, Lenny Bruce, Mel Brooks, Woody Allen, and Joan Rivers. Here is a nineteenth-century America turning away from England for its literary and artistic inspiration, finding it instead in Washington Irving’s “Rip Van Winkle” and his childhood recollections (set in the Catskills) . . . in James Fenimore Cooper’s adventure-romances, which provided a pastoral history, describing the shift from a colonial to a nationalist mentality . . . and in the canvases of Thomas Cole, Asher B. Durand, Frederick Church, and others that caught the grandeur of the wilderness and that gave texture, color, and form to Irving’s and Cooper’s imaginings. Here are the entrepreneurs and financiers who saw the Catskills as a way to strike it rich, plundering the resources that had been likened to “creation,” the Catskills’ tanneries that supplied the boots and saddles for Union troops in the Civil War . . . and the bluestone quarries whose excavated rock became the curbs and streets of the fast-growing Eastern Seaboard. Here are the Catskills brought fully to life in all of their intensity, beauty, vastness, and lunacy.

Download or read book Catskill Mountains written by Ulster & Delaware Railroad and published by . This book was released on 1894 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Making Mountains written by David Stradling and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2009-11-23 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over two hundred years, the Catskill Mountains have been repeatedly and dramatically transformed by New York City. In Making Mountains, David Stradling shows the transformation of the Catskills landscape as a collaborative process, one in which local and urban hands, capital, and ideas have come together to reshape the mountains and the communities therein. This collaboration has had environmental, economic, and cultural consequences. Early on, the Catskills were an important source of natural resources. Later, when New York City needed to expand its water supply, engineers helped direct the city toward the Catskills, claiming that the mountains offered the purest and most cost-effective waters. By the 1960s, New York had created the great reservoir and aqueduct system in the mountains that now supplies the city with 90 percent of its water. The Catskills also served as a critical space in which the nation's ideas about nature evolved. Stradling describes the great influence writers and artists had upon urban residents - especially the painters of the Hudson River School, whose ideal landscapes created expectations about how rural America should appear. By the mid-1800s, urban residents had turned the Catskills into an important vacation ground, and by the late 1800s, the Catskills had become one of the premiere resort regions in the nation. In the mid-twentieth century, the older Catskill resort region was in steep decline, but the Jewish "Borscht Belt" in the southern Catskills was thriving. The automobile revitalized mountain tourism and residence, and increased the threat of suburbanization of the historic landscape. Throughout each of these significant incarnations, urban and rural residents worked in a rough collaboration, though not without conflict, to reshape the mountains and American ideas about rural landscapes and nature.

Download or read book Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow written by Washington Irving and published by Orient Blackswan. This book was released on 1963 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A man who sleeps for twenty years in the Catskill Mountains wakes to a much-changed world.

Download or read book The Catskill Mountains and the Region Around written by Charles Rockwell and published by . This book was released on 1869 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Catskill Mountains written by Ulster & Delaware Railroad Co. Pass. Dept and published by . This book was released on 1904 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Hudson Valley and Catskill Mountains written by Joanne Michaels and published by Harmony. This book was released on 1988 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first complete guidebook to the burgeoning area of the Hudson Valley and Catskill Mountains includes information on the best inns, bed and breakfasts, restaurants, country auctions, antique shops, historic sites, museums, state parks, fishing, hiking, country fairs, and more. 11 maps.

Download or read book The Catskill Mountains written by and published by . This book was released on 1909 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Catskill Mountain House written by Roland Van Zandt and published by Black Dome Press. This book was released on 1966 with total page 458 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Borscht Belt written by and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Borscht Belt, which features essays by Stefan Kanfer and Jenna Weissman Joselit, presents Marisa Scheinfeld's photographs of abandoned sites where resorts, hotels, and bungalow colonies once boomed in the Catskill Mountain region of upstate New York.

Download or read book Catskill Mountains the Most Picturesque Mountain Region on the Globe written by Ulster & Delaware Railroad and published by . This book was released on 1896 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Catskill Delta written by Donald L. Woodrow and published by Geological Society of America. This book was released on 1985 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Enjoying the Catskills written by Arthur C. Mack and published by . This book was released on 1972 with total page 112 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The beauty and charm of this useful book is that it helps you discover the true dimensions of the real Catskill Mountains. Enjoying the Catskills is the only book about the region that reveals such a diversity of enchantments and attractions awaiting your enjoyment. Each page unlocks a storehouse of riches. Here is a wealth of information for everyone, whether you are a visitor or a resident of the area. The book is more than a guide. Intermingled with legend and glimpses of history and famous characters are vital facts on a wide range of subjects, all conveniently arranged for easy reading and reference. These include geology, wildlife, hiking, camping, fishing, hunting, motoring, wilderness areas, canoeing, ski touring, and many others.

Download or read book Skiing in the Catskill Region written by George V. Quinn and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2013 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Arriving by train to Phoenicia, New York, in the mid-1930s, downhill skiers first discovered the snowy trails of Simpson Ski Slope. Soon after, many Borscht Belt hotels were offering skiing and skating as ways to fill rooms during cold winter months when crowds thinned. In the high central Catskills, where abundant snowfall was a big draw, many abandoned rooming houses were commandeered to serve as base lodges for fledgling ski areas. In addition to farming and logging, skiing became an important industry to the area. People found steady employment in dozens of new areas sprouting all over the mountains. Downhill skiing is just part of the region's history. Ski jumping, racing, ski clubs, fashion, and colorful personalities were all part of the experience.

Download or read book Acidic Deposition and Aquatic Ecosystems written by Donald F. Charles and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 742 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Acidic deposition and its effect on aquatic ecosystems have become major scientific and public policy issues in the United States since the early 1970s, and many diverse studies have been completed. This book is the first comprehensive, integrated synthesis of available information on current and potential effects of acidic precipitation on lakes and streams in geographic regions with a high number of low-alkalinity surface water from the Adirondacks and the Southern Blue Ridge to the Upper Midwest to the Rocky Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, and the Cascades. Written by leading authors, the book examines the current status of water chemistry and characterizes the processes controlling water chemistry on a regional basis by using and comparing high-quality data sets. Methods for the assessment of long-term changes in water chemistry and their effects in fish and other biota are also presented. The book amply illustrates the substantial diversity among geographical regions with respect to the nature of surface waters and the complexity of their response to acidic deposition. This volume will be of great interest to researchers in limnology, aquatic ecology, environmental chemistry, hydrology, and atmospheric sciences. It will also serve as an important reference for environmental managers and policy makers.

Download or read book Hiking the Catskills written by Randi Minetor and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-08-01 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hiking the Catskills provides everything hikers need to plan day hikes in the Catskill region of New York State: a five-county area west of the Hudson River that includes parts of Delaware, Greene, Otsego, Sullivan and Ulster counties. This guide selects 40 hikes from the best among the Catskills’ famous peaks above 3,500 feet, as well as more moderate trails to backcountry waterfalls, easier trails to some of the area’s most spectacular viewpoints, and rail trails that provide access to fragrant woodlands and unusual geological wonders. This book provides a separate, full-color, detailed map for each hike—making it different from books by the Appalachian and Adirondack Mountain Clubs—and waypoint-by-waypoint directions to guide readers along trails with confidence. Color photos and descriptions of the history, natural wonders, and special features of each hike help readers choose the best hikes for their personal interests and skill levels. In a region largely abandoned by tourists and just now seeing renewed interest from visitors, Hiking the Catskills provides the guidance readers need to plan exciting trips into the mountains. This book leads them to the ridges, notches, and cloves that inspired a uniquely American landscape painting style, the vistas that drew thousands of vacationers here throughout the twentieth century, and the peaks that challenge the most rugged explorers. It’s time to rediscover the Catskills, one of New York’s most fascinating natural areas.

Download or read book Best Hikes with Children in the Catskills and Hudson River Valley written by Cynthia Copeland Lewis and published by The Mountaineers Books. This book was released on 2002 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: * Guidebook to short, easy hikes and trails your children will be comfortable on* Includes ideas for keeping the kids engaged and having funNew York's Catskills have long been an outdoor playground for families escaping from the city. Here's a guidebook that shows you hikes that the whole family can do. Best Hikes with Children in the Catskills and Hudson River Valley, 2nd Ed. includes games that will keep the kids engaged and enjoying the trails. From Catskills State Park, Bear-Mountain-Harriman State Park, Hudson Highlands, Shawangunk Mountains, Southern Taconics, the Long Path, and the Appalachian Trail, there's something for everyone in this all-inclusive guidebook.Hikes detailed include shorter two- and four-mile hikes to six-plus miles and overnighters. Practical information on hiking with children - setting a realistic pace, playing games, and encouraging personal and environmental responsibility - make this a guidebook to recommend.