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Free Puppet Show set Saturday behind the Old Forge Hardware

Local summer resident and puppeteer Ken Carman will present a free musical storytelling program on Saturday, August13 at 1 p.m. around the fireplace behind the Old Forge Hardware.

Carman has been entertaining in the Old Forge area for the last six years. Each one of his shows carries a special message.

In this year’s show, Planet of the Rude Dudes, Carman and his puppets will take the audience on a rocketship ride where they end up crashing on a planet of very rude creatures. 

Carman, with the help of the puppets and participants, will teach the inhabitants of the planet to use kind and polite words. 

The stars of the show are puppets Kische and Lorraine, and a new character, King of the Rudes on the Rude Planet.

Following the performance the puppets will meet with the audience.

The free program is sponsored by Souvenir Village, A Sweet Car Named Desire, and the Old Forge Hardware.

 

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"Adirondack Civilian Conservation Corps Camps: History, Memories and Legacy of the CCC" by Marty Podskoch

New book tells story of Adirondack Civilian Conservation Corps

"Adirondack Civilian Conservation Corps Camps: History, Memories and Legacy of the CCC" by Marty PodskochA CCC regiment at Lake Placid

Author to appear at Old Forge Hardware for booksigning on Friday, August 26, from 2 to 4pm

Author Marty Podskoch’s latest book, Adirondack Civilian Conservation Corps Camps: History, Memories and Legacy of the CCC, which chronicles the public works program created by President Franklin Roosevelt and his New Deal, will be released on August 15.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) operated from 1933 to 1942 and targeted single men ages 18 to 25 years, and veterans in relief of families who had difficulty finding jobs during the Great Depression.

The program provided unskilled manual labor to environmental conservation and to development of natural resources in rural lands.

The US Army supervised the camps which had 200 men each.

Some of the earliest camps were set up in 26 Adirondack towns including Speculator, Newcomb, Paul Smiths,Tupper Lake, and Lake Placid.

A CCC regiment at Lake Placid

In the Adirondacks, enrollees built trails, roads, campsites and dams, stocked fish, built and maintained fire towers, Continue reading

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Herr-Story by Charles Herr: A look at local days gone by

Interview: Old Forge Hardware’s founder Moses Cohen

On May 10, 1922, the Old Forge Hardware store built by Moses Cohen burned to the ground. Today, that year is engraved under the Cohen name on the façade of the present store.

After three days, the fire was still burning coal, construction materials and other debris and would smolder for days to come.

But Moses Cohen continued to operate, securing office room in the Givens Block and permission from Old Forge Village to put in shelves and stock up the Fire Hall (today’s Nathan’s Bakery) as fast as trucks could deliver the goods.

In 1923, his rebuilt store sold everything from “paints, bath tubs and up to the best in parlor suites.”

A year after the fire, the Utica Daily Press interviewed Mr. Cohen in an article titled “Moses Cohen’s Story of Struggle to Top” as the current store was being completed.

Though the copy is barely legible and hampered my transcription, I thought this early story about his beginnings in Old Forge a worthy note to the town’s early history and how one man overcame ethnic prejudice with sound business practices.

Except for my parenthetical historical notes, the information is directly from the article.

The reporter told of Mr. Cohen’s life before Old Forge. Continue reading

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