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Woodstock Times - Book Review | 11/25/2009 |
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The wild heart of Woodstock
Nixon, Perkins book explores the town at a walk |
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You've got to admire a walking column that generates controversy in the form of angry exchanges in the newspaper pages it has occupied. Just as one can't but love waling columnists who take to the mall when winter's kept them away from the local rambles that center Michael Perkins' and Will Nixon's new collection Walking Woodstock:
Journeys into the Wild Heart of America's Most Famous Small Town, which officially launches with a "Foot Stomp-in' Book Party" 3 p.m.-5 p.m. next Sunday afternoon, December 6, at the Kleinert/James Arts Center.
Many of the pieces included in this 250 page collection of essays from Bushwhack Books, with correspondingly rustic illustrations by the irrepressible Carol Zaloom, originally appeared in these pages. But many will also be new to readers, although the terrain covered is more than familiar.
For those who don't know the authors, the localized joys of the book are centered on the lost roads, overgrown bluestone quarries, specially-protected Woodstock Land Conservancy properties, and more dramatic regional sites covered in the tradition of a host of earlier such times, from John Burroughs through Kenneth Wapners' Catskill Rambles to a seemingly endless flow of trail-specific hiking books.
The large cairns hidden deep in forests that have mystified many a previous hiker get covered, along with some of the region's fire towers, including that peering down on town from Overlook. We are offered a sighting of a Cooper Lake whale, and learn who owns Yankeetown Pond. We get up to Kaaterskill Falls and a host of easier-to-access walks right in town.
It's a perfect gift idea, thusly, for all of us who live or visit here. And want to get to know the wilder Woodstock around us...in a timeless fashion.
But this is also a work of deep literary merit, nestled comfortably in a sometimes-forgotten tree of collaborative and contemplative works that includes both a host of correspondences and memoirs that acknowledge the natural thoughts nature pulls from us, at all times, as well as the even better elements of questioning and ultimate understanding gained in friendly conversation.
Both men have come to this current work via circuitous ramblings, the better to inform their easy-paced but deeply observant walks together.
Nixon first arrived on the Catskills scene in the mid-1990s, retreated to a cabin to rebuild his life as a writer, and not just a journalist. He finally settled into Woodstock, his man-made muse (versus the surrounding Catskills' natural leadership by example) in 2003, and has blessed his home-town-by-choice with the singular enthusiasm only converts have.
Perkins, known of late for his Woodstock Forum series at the town library, as well as his regular flow of poetry and historic pieces published here and elsewhere around town over the years, could be construed as our collective conscience, in many ways. He is gently reminding us all of where Woodstock has been before, and keeps wanting to go, as if always reminded of what has kept him here through the years.
The joy of both men's essays, in addition to the thoughtfulness inherent in each of their individual voices (always fueled by their mindful poet selves), comes from the way they are always acknowledging each other's presence in each piece. Consider these the unveiling of how it is we think while in dialogue...partly engaged and reactive, partly pushing forward, provocative.
The combination is a sweet, rustic alternative to the ADD image rushes of so much of our channel-flipping and driving-dominated thought patterns, and artistic tone, of the day.
The accolades from fellow writers, our local literary canon, attest to the nerve these two have hit in this adventure they've allowed us all to join them on.
Talk about finding innovation and simultaneous comfort in the simpler pleasures we sometimes have to remind ourselves we originally settled here for.
"We walked into the woods, looking for a path around the pond, but found only a road marked private, so we emerged and walked up Pond Road to its cul-de-sac dead end, and walked back to the car feeling somewhat frustrated," Perkins writes in a piece, seeming to sum up the greater within the specific, as all good art does. "Our only remaining strategy was serendipity."
"'This is a hell of a hill,' said Michael, leaning into his walking stick. I concurred," Nixon notes in a piece about California Quarry, as if summing up his own raison d'etre for not only being a Woodstocker, but for a life dedicated to walking and writing. "Here the crumbling pavement ends. The true drama begins."
"Foot Stompin' Book Party Celebratin' Walking Woodstock," to fete these two intrepid travelers, and homebodies, will feature not only readings by Perkins and Nixon, but music by Bruce Ackerman, Spider Barbour, Julie Parisi Kirby and Laurie Kirby. It runs 3 p.m.-5 p.m. Sunday, December 6th, at the Kleinert/James Arts Center, 34 Tinker Street in the heart of Woodstock.
See you there... or out walking. ++
Walking Woodstock is now available in local bookstores, as well as online at www.tbmbooks.com
Checking out Hurley
New book takes a look at the town
You want concomitance? Maybe a bit of serendipity? Make that with a Hurley twist?
Friday, Saturday and Sunday, November 27 through 29, the Hurley Heritage Society's Museum Shop will not only be holding a special Holiday Sale from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. each day, but town historian Deana Decker will be on hand to celebrate the publication of her new Hurley, New York: A Brief History from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. with readings, question and answer sessions, book signings, and refreshments.
The new Hurley history, published by The History Press out of South Carolina and Salem, Massachusetts, is a tightly-rendered look at this ancient town's complex roots in old Dutch settlements and later English and then American developments. Much of it is in list form, or short narrative bursts about key events ranging from the pre-Revolutionary Esopus Wars to the town's role during the British attack (and sacking) of nearby Kingston during the War of Independence. Almost surreptitiously, one is able to glimpse that great, nearly invisible sweep of history that renders events such as the creation of the Ashokan Reservoir, and flooding of such small communities as Olive Branch and the old West Hurley, as but blips in the larger scheme of things.
The vital center of the Town of Hurley covered here has stayed where it was founded in the 17th century, at least in Decker's eyes...and marshaled facts. There, in the old village center, we get cemetery records and listings, accounts of the many old stone homes heralded each summer and fall in the historical society's popular fundraising events. Plus images and accounts of the outlying communities' birth and sometimes watery deaths, along with what happens to old buildings when they get moved to the new homes we now know as Ashton, Glenford, and West Hurley.
Much is made of early settlers, as if to create the sturdiness of an historical base for future embellishment.
Or perhaps for previous histories that were more photo-centric, such as Decker's own 2007 Images of America book on the town, which told more recent tales of bluestone quarries, reservoir construction, and the county seats suburbanization of so much of Hurley via photos and captions.
It will be interesting, over time, to see what sort of effect these two specialized publishing concerns' nationwide efforts will have on the ways in which we see our pasts, presents and collective futures.
The History Press, founded five years ago, has published over 500 books geared towards localized histories fitted into a half dozen categories. For the Catskills and Hudson Valley, to date, publications in addition to this first Brief History have included a collection of essays put out by the Woodstock Historical Society last year, Remembering Woodstock, as well as three regional tomes, Hauntings of the Hudson Valley, Murder & Mayhem In The Catskills, and Food, Drink & Celebrations of the Hudson Valley.
Arcadia Publishing, the mother company of the Images of America series (also based in South Carolina), has meanwhile published over 5,000 titles since its founding in 1993, including such local works as Decker's previous book on Hurley, Janine Fallon-Mower's two collections of old Woodstock images, and similar books on Saugerties, Kingston, Marbletown, Esopus, Catskill, Hudson, New Paltz, Highland, Gardiner, Warwarsing, Hyde Park and local hotels and railroads.
None are huge sellers, but by virtue of their being, they seem to be playing a role in shaping our communities self-image. They're lasters.
And great gifts, along with the porcelain versions of the houses described in the new Brief History on sale at the Historical Society's Museum Shop alongside Deckers' signings this coming weekend.
For more information on the books, check out our local bookstores or visit either www.historypress.net or www.arcadiapublishing.com.
For more on the Museum Shop and Decker's upcoming readings, visit www.hurleyheritagesociety.org or call 331-0593. The museum is located at 52 Main Street in Hurley, just west of Route 209.++
Paul Smart
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