NY State Assembly Recognizes Local Historian for Her Work

By TERESA WINCHESTER
GILBERTSVILLE

Leigh Eckmair, long-time historian for the Town of Butternuts and the Village of Gilbertsville, as well as archivist for the Gilbertsville Free Library, received a legislative citation from the New York State Assembly on August 17. The recognition was made as a surprise to Eckmair by Assemblyman Joseph Angelino at Gilbertsville’s Centennial Park, immediately following the fire department’s sesquicentennial parade.

The citation stated that it is “a custom of this Legislative Body to take note of and publicly acknowledge individuals who have distinguished themselves through their exemplary careers, accomplishments, and purposeful lives of service to their community.”

Eckmair was specifically acknowledged for her involvement in a research project which ultimately quashed an Army Corps of Engineers plan to install a series of dams in the Butternut Valley. According to the citation, these dams would have created a 7-mile-long lake, thus “flooding the entire village and most of the Butternut Valley and over 4,000 years of Native American civilization.” Congress deauthorized the monies appropriated for the plan in 1979.