Hathorn Spring # 3 Springwatercolor

Continuing on my springwater color series, I braved the winter cold, (it's not so bad this year) and painted the southernmost spring  in the Saratoga Springs chain of springs. 
Hathorn # 3 should be called # 2, for it was bottled and sold, and was/is known for it's medicinal properties, due to it's cathartic effects. I like how the dictionary (not a physical dictionary, those have gone way of the buffalo) online # 2 describes it purging or cleansing, especially by causing evacuation of the bowels. 

 It's taste is distinct, it's really salty, and has a peppery finish, due to being one of the most mineralized springs, in the chain of springs around Saratoga (Springs). It's so carbonated, the bottles would explode if kept at high temperatures. Many o' tourists got back home to Jersey or where ever, to only find they just delivered a trunk full of luggage, speckled with broken glass and salt water.

Early 1900's postcard

 The water erupts in ever changing intervals that produces an all or nothing, uh, does it work? wait for it.....wait for it...wait for it...... splash!!!....showering splash!!!!!!!! gurgle....splash!!!!
 With the sound and power of a Thruway rest stop's bathroom toilet's flush, it's a mini Lumberjack Splash for the hand. The fountain (that has been relatively the same since the early 1900's) is shallow, so people with big jugs leave with bummer looks on their constipated faces.
 I do suggest trying it, it tastes great! If you don't wanna have to run to the nearest john, (located next to the State Seal spring) just try a dixie cup size, you'll be fine, heheheheh.

 an old postcard 1940's

That sign says that this water was served at the Hall of Springs, 7am to 9pm, and I betcha the Hall of Springs bathroom took no prisoners 7am to 9pm too! 
Person in the photo below contemplates using that green trash can......any port in a storm!

 1960's

Today

 Got my water ready...

Finished Product!

Check out my other springwater colors, on this lovely blog! Thanks!!!!!

Winter's Walk in the Spa State Park

I really wanted to get over there and see the springs at sub zero temps, but, it was too cold for me to even get in the van to warm it up. So, yesterday, when the freeeeze broke, I headed on over, take a look with me!

                          The run off tufa dome from the Orenda Spring, looking lovely!

Geyser Spouter

Hayes Spring

              State Seal (not one person getting water today!) 
                             

Polaris Spring, encased in ice!

    Oh Deer!

Hitchin' a ride

 Coesa Spring still a bubblin'!

Yep, that's me!

Skidmore College football team 1946

Since it's Super Bowl Sunday, I have a football story, of local historical implications. Following WWII, in 1944, the GI Bill afforded vets a college education, cramming co-ed colleges with extra students. The government asked if any all women's schools could help lessen the burden, and soon after, Skidmore College, then an all girls school, accepted it's first (temporary) male students.

 These guys fresh from war, wanted a full college education, including well rounded athletics, with many sports, namely football. At the Surrey, on North Broadway, (at the time, not Skidmore property) there was the Brown Prep School for Boys, which would serve as formidable opponents.

 The game garnered 1,500 spectators and was covered by many newspapers, though, I can't find a single photo. The game ended in a tie score. Here's a bunch of news articles detailing the game.....

From San Jose College 

Vassar never excepted the challenge.

Suicide at City Hall Jan. 29 1902

 One of the many stories this town's history holds, is a morbid tale of local politicians and their politics, that ended in suicide at City Hall.

From Nellie Bly's "The Wickedest Summer Resort"

Caleb Mitchell, who went by Cale, was a man of many trades. In 1880, he patented a liquor serving table. 

photo from US Patent Archive

Cale along with his brother, ran the Glen Mitchell Hotel, just north of North Broadway. I have photos of the ruins of that hotel, ruins that I remember from my old stomping grounds growing up on Rt. 9 near Loughberry Lake, and the ruins are still there, and I will post soon. 
 *(Side Note) The Glen Mitchell Hotel later became St. Clement's College, and a shrine was built in 1898, of "The Lady Of Lourds." The Lady is a statue depiction of one of the Marian apparitions, a story, from the mid 1800's where Mary appeared in a cave and basically provided a spring that had healing waters flowing from it. This statue is now on Lake Ave. in front of St. Clements. 
postcard 1934                                                          

 Cale was elected village president (mayor), in 1894. At the time, he was also the proprietor of Mitchell's Tavern, located opposite Division st. on Broadway. Like most other storefronts on Broadway, it featured a gambling room in the back. These gambling rooms catered to local residents, unlike Canfield's Casino, whom only catered to high stakes bettors from out of state.

Just prior to the turn of the century saw the Temperance Movement (religious and anti-alcohol) in the US gaining more and more traction. Also, at the time, a journalist named Elizabeth Cochran, pen name Nellie Bly, became a top journalist, after faking insanity to get an inside look on life in the asylums. She soon after garnered worldwide attention by traveling around the world in a record setting 72 days. 
Now at her peak in her career, she came to Saratoga, and saw man, woman, and child, participating in gambling and drinking, it was enough fodder to make her next article. 
 Mind you, this was a time when the Saratoga Racetrack was owned by a guy named "Dutch Fred" Walbaum, who made his money from a gambling/brothel house on the Bowery in NYC, and a racetrack in New Jersey. The NJ track was known for drugged horses, jockeys with battery stingers, and winter racing.

photo from Daily Racing Form

Saratoga was full bore, then, Nellie Bly released a bombshell hit piece called "Our Wickedest Summer Resort." In the article, she interviews Cale Mitchell, and, pertaining to Saratoga history, this interview is one some old West sounding stuff for sure. Anyway, this article put Saratoga Springs under the microscope. http://www.nellieblyonline.com/images/uploads/1894-08-19_Our_Wickedest_Summer_Resort.pdf

 NY Senator Edgar Brackett, from Wilton, who lived in Saratoga, shared City Hall with Cale Mitchell. But, that's about all they shared, for Brackett, now under fire from the press and public, again went after Caleb. Brackett had held office a few years before the gambler turned mayor. Brackett, prior to Cale Mitchell's election, tried to get Mitchell and gambling out of Saratoga. 

Now, Brackett, was determined as Senator, to clean up his town. Graft and vice, ballot stuffing and whatnot at the Democratic club Tammany Hall (another topic I write about soon) in NYC was recently highly publicized, and with that frame of mind, he passed a bill, making the town board of trustees the only ones eligible to vote for the mayor. Cale fought back, and lost. 

Senator Brackett, made it illegal to own a gambling establishment in Saratoga, except for Richard Canfield, and the Saratoga Club, for they catered to high society out of towners. Cale's Broadway spot was shut down, he opened a pool hall next to the racetrack, only to be shut down again. Caleb fought in court to disrupt the gambling and power monopoly Brackett had established with Canfield. 

Caleb Mitchell now without a store front/gambling establishment, no longer mayor, was at an all time low. On January 29th, 1902, Caleb Mitchell, got a gun, went to City Hall, and barged Sen. Edgar Brackett's office. Brackett was not there, Brackett was on a train to Albany, to present his anti-gambling bill. Caleb Mitchell then turned the gun on himself, and shot himself in the head, in the doorway of Brackett's office. He was the 5th in his family to take his own life. 

from the SF Call Jan.30 1902

NY Times article below

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9A0DE7DA1F3CEF33A25753C3A9679C946397D6CF

I'll save it for another story post on Richard Canfield, but, this suicide, along with other events, made things harder for Canfield to operate his casino monopoly in Saratoga. 

One Foggy Christmas Eve Eve at the Spa State Park

The weather outside is delightful, may not be holiday season weather, but, I'll take it. The fog rolled in over night and hung around all morning, which made for some good photos, check it out!

                                        SPAC's lawn is looking quite amazing!!!

                         
                                                            Geyser Creek is flowing fierce!

         
                                                      Beech Constrictor

                                                       RB2 quitely sits and waits........

                    ALL PHOTOS BY GEORGE DEMERS

                                        Thanks for taking time to read my blog!

One big family

 Judge Henry Walton moved to Saratoga Springs in 1790, buying up large parcels of land, two years after he studied law under Aaron Burr, vice president to Thomas Jefferson. Aaron Burr is most famous for his duel with Alexander Hamilton, the man on your ten dollar bill, who Burr shot over politics and slander in 1804. 

 In 1833 Burr married Madam Jumel, who soon after divorced him in 1836, spitefully using Hamilton's son as her lawyer.

Jumel's personal cook was Anne Northup, wife of Solomon Northup, a black man kidnapped and sold as a slave in 1841. He was taken  at Mongomery Hall, bar front later to be a part of the Grand Union Hotel. Both Anne and Solomon worked at the hotel.

 Judge Walton sold the property now known as Skidmore College to A.T. Stewart, who willed it to the attorney who produced the will (?) Judge Henry Hilton in 1879.

Judge Henry Hilton established it as ''Woodlawn Estates'' adorned with statues and winding trolley paths. 

Judge Henry Hilton at the time, through the will deal, also managed/owned the Grand Union Hotel, and was part of a national controversy in 1877, after not allowing Jews to stay at the 1,000 room hotel, which, at the time, is was the largest in the world.

 So, basically, a judge sold property now known as Skidmore College, to a bigot judge, who also owned a hotel that used to employ a couple, where the wife, also worked for a wife, of a guy who taught law to the judge who sold property now known as Skidmore College.

Notice, the stone fence is the only thing left from the old property!