Chapman’s `Hometown Teams’ chronicles Glens Falls as a sports town
Ice sculptures, climate change and book signings information galore
For Maureen Folk, the new curator at the Chapman Museum in Glens Falls, her first exhibition was personal.
Anyone who has lived in Glens Falls for any amount of time can attest to Glens Falls’ reputation as a sports town. Over the years, it has has sported Double A minor league baseball teams, American Hockey League hockey and a half-century of semi-pro football with the Greenjackets.
So a historical review on the history of Glens Falls’ sports is probably long overdue. Of course I’m a former newspaper sports editor.
“Hometown Teams” opens Saturday at the Chapman with a look at the historical roots of baseball, hockey and football in the region. Considering the subject matter, this exhibit might be an opening salvo in an overdue discussion about the city’s sporting past.
The Chapman Museum is hosting an open house from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday with all admission free, although donations are always welcome.
It is also an opportunity to introduce the Chapman to a new fans base - fans.
Folk’s interest in the subject matter took root with her grandfather, Jack Barber, because he played on the Greenjackets’ 1969 championship team. His preserved championship jacket is in one of the prominent displays.
Hank Pelton, the long-time president of the football club and Mr. Everything on the team, has provided championship trophies and other memorabilia.
But the biggest draw might be the hockey.
Ned Harkness started it all in the late 1970s by convincing people in Glens Falls and all over the Capital District they could not live without professional hockey.
Saturday night became hockey night in Glens Falls and the Glens Falls Civic Center was regularly standing room only for big games.
Former player and coach Joe Paterson has lent several hockey sticks to the exhibit and there is material on all the professional hockey teams.
Folk says she is a big baseball fan, but also a supporter of local hockey with the Adirondack Thunder. She described the exhibit as an introduction into how sports evolved in the region from its early town-team baseball throughout the region to the more recent popularity of professional hockey. Some of the baseball artifacts go back to the 1890s. There is also a poster from a Dave LaPoint Day at the Civic Center in 1983.
“We don’t have a huge collection of of sports stuff, but most of the people who are loaning it said they would eventually pass it on to us,” Folk said.
Folk said the biggest frustration was choosing what to cover.
“We were just not able to cover everything,” Folks said.
Especially, when you consider basketball is not part of this exhibit.
That leaves open the opportunity of doing another sports exhibit on the state basketball tournament and the careers of Jimmer Fredette and Joe Girard III in the future.
But for now, the Chapman Museum will be ground zero for a celebration of Glens Falls sports. Make sure you check it out.
The exhibit runs at the Chapman Museum on 348 Glen Street through May 12.
Climate information
Reader Lisa Adamson reached out to me to see if we could provide some public service information about climate change and the efforts to fight rising temperatures locally.
I told her I would be happy to share those efforts with you. Most of the initiatives I did not know about.
Zero Waste Warren County and Queensbury CSC volunteers are providing compost drop off services at the Glens Falls farmers market on Saturdays from 9-noon. Composting helps keep methane (a greenhouse gas emission) out of landfills.
Please join North Country Earth Action 12:15 Fridays in a vigil on the Glens Falls bridge at 12:15 to promote climate action and awareness.
A small climate countdown clock is mounted in the Crandall Library lobby on Glen Street. It measures time left until a tipping point of 1.5-degree Celsius is reached in our atmosphere.
Get involved: CEC/CSC (Clean Energy and Climate Smart Community committees) are meeting the first week of Feb. to discuss the NYS Clean Heating and Cooling Campaign, LED streetlights, composting (and bin sales), climate action plans, trees, the May Interfaith Climate Action Walk, a reuse shed and the April 27 Zero Waste Repair Cafe. www.queensbury.net.
Help hold lights/messaging in Glens Falls to promote climate actions.
To implement the 2019 NYS CLCPA climate law residents can call/contact the Governor and state legislators urging them to pass the full NYHeat Act (S.2016-A/A.4592-A...NY Home Energy Affordable Transition Act which gives the Public Service Commission the authority and direction to align gas utilities with the Climate Act's emission reduction and climate justice mandates.) and the Climate Superfund Act (S.2129-A/A.3351-A which requires companies that have contributed significantly to the buildup of climate-warming greenhouse gases i to bear a share of the costs of needed infrastructure investments ). In person and phone lobbying for important climate, pollution and plastic bills are also possible.
For further information: www.northcountryearthaction.org or text 518 307-7842/
- Lisa Adamson.
Ice sculptures
Back in December I profiled Rich Elmer’s light display at his home on the corner of Dixon and Cottage Hill Road in Queensbury.
Since then, Rich has been hard at work with his latest project ice sculptures. He has been working on the Asian lantern display for some time. The thaw and heavy rain last week almost got the best of him, but the recent snow and colder temperatures have brought it all back to life.
If you are on Dixon Road, make sure you slow down so you can take in the lighted display.
More lights
Keep an eye out for the North Country Lights group on your way home from work Friday night.
The group will once again be posting a message for our local congresswoman: “Shame on Stefanik” in light form in a prominent local location.
Considering Stefanik’s recent pronouncement that she did not believe E. Jean Carroll’s sexual assault allegations - although a jury that heard the evidence did - and her reference to those prosecuted for their actions on Jan. 6 were “hostages,” it seems an appropriate message.
Book signing
I’ll be out and about signing books over the next couple of days.
I’ll be taking in the SUNY Adirondack event about the future of local home health care this afternoon from 1 to 3 p.m.
The event is sponsored by American Association of University Women and will be held at Adirondack Hall. I will be signing books afterward.
The keynote speaker will be Robert Martiniano.
On Saturday, I will be at the Chapman Museum’s open house (10 a.m. to 4 p.m.) and the opening of its new exhibit “Hometown Teams.” I will be signing books from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
One item I noticed in the Chapman gift shop recently was the DVD on the Jimmer Fredette game at the Cool Insurance Arena when the Glens Falls star was a senior at Brigham Young and on his way to national player of the year honors.
It was one of the great nights in Glens Falls sports history. If you are local sports fans, this DVD is a must for your collection.
Next event
My next event is set for Thursday, Feb. 8 at the Glens Falls Senior Center at 1 p.m.
As of right now, that is the last event scheduled for February, but that could change.
I will be talking about the value of commentary and analysis in our daily media diet and some of the stories in my latest book “The Last American Editor, Vol. 2.”
Reading all this makes me realize…Glens Falls is a happening little city!
As an unrepentant sports fan who spends too much time watching ESPN, I was fascinated to read about the team sports exhibit at the Chapman. It is a creative idea, probably long overdue. I was also interested in your comment that this should be the “opening salvo”in a broader discussion of sports in the area. Realizing that the need for visuals-artifacts limits what an exhibit can do, let me suggest the possibility of expanding the sports covered and focusing not only on Jimmer but other home grown - and national - athletic stars who performed here.
Just a few suggestions along those lines for a possible future follow up:
-Basketball.
-Decades ago, older family members told me they had seen baseball great Lou Gehrig play basketball (in the 30s?) off-season for a barnstorming team that I believe they said was at the K of C gym. That probably would be tough to verify.
-in the late 50s, I saw Hall of Famer Bob Petit and his St. Louis Hawks play an exhibition game vs. Bill Russell’s Boston Celtics at the Glens Falls High Gymnasium, not long after their battle for the NBA Championship. (Famed Celtics coach Red Auerbach generously spent time before the game with budding GFHS star Dick Derby, who later played at Yale.)
-For decades, long before the State high school championships, Glens Falls hosted a well-known high school invitational, with teams from up and down the East Coast.
-Hall of Famer Elvin Hayes, I recall, played an exhibition with - I believe - the Houston Rockets at the Arena.
-Golf.
-Donald Ross, the world famous (in golf) golf designer, in 1914, designed the Glens Falls Country Club, and according to North Country historian Maury Thompson, reviewed the course at least one more time -in 1938. Ross designed 400 courses overall. GFCC is now rated by golf magazines as among the top 100 courses in the US.
-In the 1930s, the Glens Falls Country Club hosted a national tournament that attracted the likes of Ben Hogan (who as a young man, slept in his car in the club parking lot before one round), Sam Snead, Walter Hagen, Byron Nelson and Gene Sarazen.
-The indomitable Tom Haggerty, a pro at the GF club for 50 years before retiring a few years ago, at retirement was second in the nation in longevity among pros, according to the PGA.. He, his brother and his father were pros at Albany regional courses for a combined 100 plus years.
-Sixty years ago, the New York State Amateur Golf Tournament was at the Round Pond Links and the finals featured Don Allen, the six time state champ who was later voted the greatest NY state golfer of the century, and Bill Tryon, a three time state champion and former Princeton footballer. It was a titanic match that went into extra holes, and won by Tryon.
-Around the same time, four time US Women’s Open champion Betsy Rawls (who won 55 tournaments overall in a Hall of Fame career) played then reigning state amateur champion Gail Purdy (later Brophy) in an exhibition at the club. Sight unseen, Rawls went around the course in an under par round that included a dramatic eagle and a birdie. (Btw, Purdy was a nationally known skater as well as outstanding golfer.)
-dave Nathan
Bethesda, MD