Schoharie Crossing State Historic Site (opens in a new tab) will host local storyteller, Kate Dudding on Sunday, August 1^st at 6:00pm to perform, “Pandemic Ponderings: Stories of How I’ve Been Coping and Finding Joy.”

Dudding is a storyteller from Saratoga County and has won several Regional and National storytelling awards such as the Northeast Region ORACLE Award from the National Storytelling Network.  She is an award-winning author and storyteller who won the Story Slam at the 2010 National Storytelling Conference in Los Angeles and specializes in telling true stories about people who have made a difference. She has told stories at many venues in the Northeastern USA, including The New-York Historical Society (New York City, NY), The Clearwater Festival (Croton-on-Hudson, NY), First Night Saratoga (Saratoga Springs, NY), and The Norman Rockwell Museum (Stockbridge, MA).

Schoharie Crossing is excited to bring back the annual Not Just for Kids Storytelling series on Sunday evenings in August, starting at 6:00pm.  This storytelling performance each week is open to the public of all ages.  Local tellers, with well-crafted tales will perform during the 29th year of this program at Schoharie Crossing.

The lineup for the rest of the series is: August 8^th, Joe Doolittle; August 15^th, Margaret French. August 22^nd, Jeannine Laverty. August 29^th, Sandy Schuman.

Not Just for Kids Storytelling will be held outside, under a tent near the Visitor Center, 129 Schoharie Street, Fort Hunter, NY 12069. We encourage you to bring a lawn chair or picnic blanket to sit on. The program begins at 6pm and is free to the public due to the generous support of a Saratoga Arts’ Community Arts Grant that has been made possible with funding by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.  Karen’s Produce and Ice Cream is also another wonderful supporter of these programs.

For information please call the Visitor Center at (518) 829-7516, email SchoharieCrossing@parks.ny.gov, or visit our web page: www.parks.ny.gov/historic-sites/schohariecrossing (opens in a new tab) .

The New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation oversees more than 250 individual state parks, historic sites, golf courses, boat launches and recreational trails, which are visited by 71 million people annually.  For more information on any of these recreation areas, call 518-474-0456 or visit www.nysparks.com, connect on Facebook, or follow on Twitter.

Schoharie Crossing State Historic Site (opens in a new tab) is excited to announce their 2021 Virtual “History at Home” Winter Lecture series. The site will offer free online programs from January to March covering a range of interesting history topics.  Links for the programs can be found on Schoharie Crossings NYS Parks webpage, on their Facebook, or by contacting the site.

On Wednesday, January 20^th the site will celebrate the birthday of industrialist and contractor, Otis Eddy.  The program, Otis Eddy’s Aqueduct, will explore Eddy’s life and how he came to be a canal contractor for the Schoharie Creek Aqueduct. Discover his connection to Cornell University and more about the current efforts to preserve the aqueduct remnants at Schoharie Crossing.

January 27^th the site will welcome Schenectady Historian Chris Leonard as he discusses the importance of Schenectady’s home front 75 years after the end of WWII.  Leonard will explore how Schenectady’s industrial capabilities helped the Allies defeat Japan and Germany with war time production and groundbreaking technologies created by the city’s twin economic powerhouses, General Electric and the American Locomotive Company.

On March 4^th, Bill Merchant of the D&H Canal Museum will join Schoharie Crossing for a program about The Black Experience on the D&H Canal.  Merchant will discuss the people that worked and traveled on the Delaware and Hudson Canal during its heyday as it conveyed coal from Pennsylvania to New York’s Hudson River.  An often under-represented segment of canal history, the experiences of black people along this waterway will examined with documents, images, and anecdotes.

The following week on March 11^th, Anne Clothier will provide a lecture on the History of Phrenology. While phrenology often merits only a footnote in modern examinations of social and medical history, it played an important role in how people regarded themselves and others during the formative years of the 1840s.  Influencing topics as varied as courtship, employment, criminal justice, abolition, medicine, and suffrage, phrenology was intertwined throughout the everyday lives of many.  We will also examine the darker sides of the now debunked concepts, exploring how people of color and indigenous populations were further disenfranchised by its teachings.  Clothier is Director of Education at the Saratoga County History Center at Brookside Museum in Ballston Spa.

Hudson Valley Community College professor Matthew Zembo will provide a discussion on February 18th titled, “The 34th Regiment of Foot: A British Regiment in the Northern Frontier of the American War of Independence.” Zembo will discuss how the regiment operated in a vastly different theater of war then those experienced in Europe, how civilians played a role, and what actions the soldiers engaged in during the fight to put down rebellion in New York.

On March 4^th, Schoharie Crossing educator David Brooks will present DeWitt’s Duel.  The life of DeWitt Clinton is an interesting exploration into the politics of early America and New York State. Recognized now as the “Father of the Erie Canal,” NYS governor and former mayor of New York City, Clinton had tended to personal and political rivalries to accomplish legislative goals. Join in to discover some of the intrigue, wrangling, and dirty politics that lead ultimately to DeWitt’s Duel on the plains of Weehawken, New Jersey.

To wrap up the series, Audrey Humphrey from Johnson Hall State Historic Site will present an exploration of Sir William Johnson and his connection to Fort Hunter on March 18^th.  Johnson was one of the largest landowners in New York by the mid-18^th century and his influence in the Mohawk Valley is evident even to this day.  As Superintendent of Indian Affairs, his connection to the Mohawk village of Tionondoroge and congregation at Queen Anne’s Chapel influenced the how the American Revolution played out in New York after his death in 1774.

All the programs will begin at 6:30pm and are offered for free via the online platform, WebEx. The links for these programs go live at 6:20pm. There are no tickets to purchase and no need to pre-register.

For information about this program series, please call the Visitor Center at (518) 829-7516, email SchoharieCrossing@parks.ny.gov, or visit our web page: https://parks.ny.gov/historic-sites/schohariecrossing/details.aspx (opens in a new tab) .

The New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation oversees more than 250 individual state parks, historic sites, golf courses, boat launches and recreational trails, which are visited by 71 million people annually.  For more information on any of these recreation areas, call 518-474-0456 or visit www.nysparks.com, connect on Facebook, or follow on Twitter.