Geneology, Fabric, Broadway and Some History Thrown In

Got an new version (2012) of our same Ford Escape and we have immediately started to put as many miles on it as we had the previous one(2008).  Love the blind side mirrors which mean I don't have to wake up hubby to ask if it's ok to change lanes anymore.

Our first stop was in Corning, New York.

We were allowed to take photos here unlike the fabulous Morse Museum with all the Tiffany in Florida.

       

This great piece by Dale Chihuly was in a main lobby area. As you can imagine, the gift shop was fabulous. I only spent $15 on a glass paperweight that was marked down from $25 and when I tore off the paper label there was another under it that read MADE IN CHINA.  Its still very nice.

 Hot glass demo.

 She made a penguin. Very hard to photo.

Great example of cut glass. 

Our second day brought us to Kingston, New York where my mother's side of the family hailed from before they moved to Ohio.

Kingston is a very old city with a lot of Dutch history. My relatives, however, were German Catholic and Protestant Irish.

My memories of Kingston were of staying in this house with my Aunt Gert and Uncle Dep on West Chestnut St.

 The street ends in a cup-de-sac with this view down to the Rondout Creek which flows into the Hudson River.

We stopped here over 20 years ago and did not see this. I thought it had a date on the urn, but cannot see anything in the photo. 

Then and now:

 This was the home of my great grand-parents and later of a great aunt and uncle.

 Just a few houses down is the home of another great aunt. These house hang on a hillside with no houses on the opposite side of the street. Only garage on the upside and I find this one kind of charming.

Best view I got of the Kingston Lighthouse from across the river.

       

River cruises are available in the summer.

This is downtown Kingston which has been nicely renovated with shops and restaurants and a visitors center. Kingston also has an uptown which is less interesting except for the Dutch historical sites I unfortunately didn't get to them.                                                        

      

One place we did get to however was a bit "up the creek" in Eddyville. 

It has been the family since 1955 and grown quite a bit. Since my time in Kingston was as a child before this, I never saw it before. We stayed so late talking...long after closing, I didn't get any good exteriors and almost forgot to take this:

The cousins and Aunt Ginger

And now to Broadway and fabric shopping. A short ride over a bridge and through some beautiful country from Kingston is the Rhinecliff Amtrak station where you can park free for up to 10 days (if you get a spot) . The ride takes you along the Hudson all the way into the NYC. Its cheap and fast and comfortable.                                                                                                                                                          

                               The station is old, charming and has a very helpful staff. 

This is MOOD of Project Runway fame. If you are a fabric fanatic like me head over to my other blog at Thimble Fingers for more. I really don't want to repeat it all here. Shopped all afternoon and hubby carried it all! We had a late lunch, no dinner and headed off to the theater. This was the impetus for this whole trip. When I saw that they were going to make a musical about the life of Carole King I was crossing my fingers it would be good. It is great! And we had great seats. No I did not take this photo from my seat. NO PHOTOGRAPHY ALLOWED. I borrowed this from the internet.

Hoping Jessie Mueller's portrayal earns her the Tony this year.

When we emerged from the theater it was a drenching rain and cabs are nowhere or taken and the subway is daunting, especially at night. So we race walked 12 blocks without umbrellas and grabbed some deli food and ate it on the beds in our typical tiny hotel room. It was located very close to Penn Station which ups the price and lowers the size.

Saturday morning was a visit  to a flea market in a parking garage. Very unlike our local fleas. The vendors were extremely chatty and the stuff was truly different. See THIMBLE FINGERS for more on this.

Had a scheduled noon tour of Rockefeller Center and whizzed by here hoping to come back later, but didn't make it.

This is the iconic symbol of Rockefeller Center.














Except when its the Christmas tree.

This is the spot where they place the Christmas tree each year. The center plaque gets engraved with the date and is given to the donor of the tree.

 Sotheby's, the auction house is housed in one of the buildings. Here is a painting in the window which I like better with the reflections added to it. As to art, there is also this:

                     This is on the CEILING! 

This guy with a sickle flanks one side of a door. His companion with a hammer on the other side wields a hammer. David Rockefeller flipped after he saw it...too late. How many people even give it a glance or turn into communists? 

This is probably what most people associate with Rockefeller Center. Oh, and Saturday Night Live.

Then we went up to "Top of the Rock" which has better views than the Empire State Building. It may not be as high but after getting way up there its pretty hard to tell the difference.    

Tourists take pictures of other tourists. 

                                

                              When I snapped them I put the Empire State Building between them.

Regular shot

Artsy shot

 Above is my favorite photo of the whole trip. It is the carousel in Bryant Park which is a great little park behind the NY Public Library. Many workers like to eat lunch there. We tried the day before but it started to rain. Everyone had moved to the sun and left a lot of empty chairs and tables under the trees.

 We then headed back to the train and Kingston. Below is a sunsetting view of the Hudson River from the train.

We stopped by for a visit with Eleanor and Franklin in Hyde Park which is on the eastern bank of the Hudson about 30 minutes from Kingston. Another beautiful drive that included charming Rhinebeck. No time to stop as we spent all our time at the house and museum and still didn't see everything.

The Roosevelt Family Home

The Stable which reminds me of the summer home at Campobello

Franklin had his first haircut at age 5.

Gravesite

Museum and Presidential Library designed by FDR in the style of the Hudson River Valley

FDR's Ford Phaeton with hand controls

Nothing ever changes!

The trip was planned around genealogy and graveyards but I will save that for a whole other post. This is long enough.

A Short Trip in Miles, A Long Way in Time

This posting to my travel blog is of an entirely different sort. The trip we took on Thursday May 8th coincided with my husband’s birthday and produced a fascinating wealth of history about his family.  I have been actively working on the genealogy of both sides of our family since last fall and his side has some really fascinating stuff. I mentioned in a post about our Florida trip in February that his grandfather on his father’s side was an stage actor and in early Edison films*

You can check it out about halfway through the posting HERE 

Thursday we searched his mother’s side of the family. She was an Adams and her father was the son of the man who ran the Adams Bag Company in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. 

My father-in-law would occasionally joke that “he married one of the bags” but in our pursuit of our own happiness we failed to get into the particulars of the family history until now when retirement and perhaps the imminence of our own demise is causing us to wonder about roots.

              Today and yesterday

This photo courtesy of The Chagrin Falls Historical Society shows a cool reflection but the downside is that the water is waaaay to high due to flooding!

Our first stop was at the old mill which is now in the National Historic Register (see article) and is being transformed into new restaurant, retail and office space. See article here

The bridge that offers the best vantage point is closed to traffic but you can still drive right up to it. This mill passed through several more ownerships and actually was operating in some capacity until 2004.

The bag man's descendant on the bridge

Chagrin Falls is one of those charming little places that have maintained the older homes and the kind of retail that bring out day trippers and tourists.  There was a busload of “red hat ladies” strolling the shops and perusing the falls on the greatest spring day in memory. 

We ventured into the Visitor Center on Main Street which is housed in the Township Hall where we encountered a long time resident who was quick to inquire what we needed and when we mentioned our family was associated with the Adams Bag Co. she immediately brought forth the 287 page Chagrin Falls: An Ohio Village History. A quick 

turn to the index revealed 18 pages for Adams Bag and Alfred Adams and Fitch Adams and the Greek Revival style home Alfred lived in.

We told her that our next stop was the Chagrin Falls Historical Society, but that we knew they would only be open from 2pm to 4 pm but she assured us that they would already be there and not to hesitate but agreed that it might be nice to have lunch first. By the way, no fast food places have been granted access to the town but there are plenty of places to eat. Our choice, turned out to be only so-so soooo I will not mention it since it might have been an off day!

We were welcomed heartily at the Historical Society by at least a half dozen members who seemed delighted to have people seeking there services.  When we told them that 

Dan’s family were the Adams Bag people the first remark was that we must know about “the drowning in the mill pond”.  No. Who? What? Never.  Not only did we not know that in 1891 Fitch Mygatt Adams drowned while inspecting possible damage from excessive rains and was swept over the spillway and his body was recovered four hours later.

BUT, we didn’t know that this Fitch Mygatt Adams was the older brother of my husband’s grandfather Alfred H. Adams.  We knew that his great grandfather, Alfred Adams along with his brother Fitch Adams and and Mr. Jewett of Cincinnati   formed a company that purchased the property and made paper using manila rope fiber. My genealogical searches had become confusing because Alfred had a son named Fitch and Fitch had a son named Alfred.  Now I know why some of the birth and death dates didn’t always make sense. Things for our descendants may be a lot easier now that everyone wants there kids to have “special” names. 

Note: We have found that the family traces back to William Bradford of the Plymouth Plantation and the Mayflower!!

Fitch Mygatt Adams (left) with his father Alfred Adams

Alfred H., younger brother of Fitch M. seemed
to have little connection to the company and had
 moved to Abilene Kansas and Los Angeles, CA
 before dying at 33, the same age at which his brother
drowned.

I had hoped to find out where the family had lived and that quest was more than fulfilled when we were told exactly where the house is and what had recently happened to it.

Alfred (great-granddad) lived there for 13 years after purchasing it from the original owner Charles Sears, another paper mill owner, who built it in 1844 . There had been at least nine mills of various types along the Chagrin River here. Then the Sihler family purchased it in 1927 and it served as Windsor Hospital for mainly psychiatric and post operative care.

 Just recently the home has been saved from demolition and lovingly and expertly renovated into a fabulous family home.

Read the NEWS ARTICLE here

We drove up to the house which is at the highest point in town and snapped this picture.

After returning home, I was itching to see what else I might find online now that I had more search terms to try out like the "Sears Adams house"  and I discovered the blog written by the new owners documenting the whole renovation.
Read it HERE

I literally cried when I found this.  I contacted the blogger/house owner and we have been invited to let her know when we are in the area  take a private tour. My eyes are filling up as I type.

Next we are heading off to Pennsylvania and New York in hopes of returning with more history.  Watch this space!