HARVEST FEST – 3 – 6 p.m. Celebrate Summer Harvest featuring Farmers Market, Live Music, kids zoomobile, more. Free admission, food. Guy Rathbun Park (behind firehouse), 117 Main St., Morris. Visit butternutvalleyalliance.org
CABARET – 7 – 8:30 p.m. Join the Guilty Pleasure Cabaret for a fun, all-levels, dance class sure to get you sweating. Combines elements of Jazz, Hip Hop, fitness, stiletto heals to bring out your inner diva, build confidence, find your fierce. Bring water, active wear, sneakers. Cost, $15/adult. THE CHURCH, 2381 NY-205, Mount Vision. 607-638-5119 or visit www.upsi-ny.com/upcoming-events-news/
THEATER – 2 p.m. Operatic rendition of Homer’s “Odyssey” features rollicking sailor songs, storms, siren songs, more. General admission, $20. Auditorium, Cooperstown Central School. 607-547-2255 or visit glimmerglass.org/events/odyssey/
CONCERT – 7 – 8 p.m. Glimmerglass Opera Young Artist Quartet performs mix of opera, classic musical theater, including selections from West Side Story. Huntington Park, Oneonta. 607-432-1980 or visit hmloneonta.org/calendar/
THEATER – 1:30 p.m. Showing “Silent Night.” About the Christmas Eve Truce between German, Scottish, French soldiers during WWI. Cost, $26-$126. Glimmerglass Festival, 7300 St. Hwy. 80, Cooperstown. Call 607-547-2255 or visit glimmerglass.org/events/silent-night/
ROUNDTABLE – 7 – 8 p.m. Presenting TV personality who hosted “One on One,” author Jane Mitchell discusses Hall of Famers Trevor Hoffman and Alan Trammell, other sports celebrities from Ted Williams to Dick Enberg. Cooperstown Village Library. 607-547-8344 or visit www.facebook.com/VillageLibraryOfCooperstown/
DEBUT – 7:30 p.m. Midwest A Cappella group “No Promises” makes NY Debut/release album. Performance features innovative arrangements, harmonization of jazz, motown, contemporary music. Admission, $10. The Star Theater, The Foundry, 44 Main St., Cherry Valley. 607-264-3080 or visit www.facebook.com/The-Star-Theater-at-The-Foundry-1921514351442514/
BASEBALL – 7 p.m. Support the Oneonta Outlaws against Albany Dutchman. Damaschke Field, 15 James Georgeson Ave., Oneonta. Call 607-432-6326 or visit www.facebook.com/oneontaoutlawsbaseball/
DANCE PARTY – 6 – 10 p.m. Back to the 80’s with cover band “Flux Capacitor.” Includes snacks, beer, wine, soft drinks. Cost, $25. Proceeds to Greater Oneonta Historical Society building fund. Deer Haven Campground, 180 Deer Haven Ln., Oneonta. 607-432-0960 or visit www.facebook.com/OneontaHistory/
FIREMANS CARNIVAL – 6 p.m. – Midnight. Features rides, Elk Creek Sky Divers at 6:30 to kick off the festivities, live music by the Jason Wicks Band. Free Parking/admission. Rt. 7, Schenevus. Visit www.thisiscooperstown.com/events/schenevus-firemans-carnival-2018
PERFORMANCE – 8 p.m. Sing an original arrangement with Toronto based group “Choir! Choir! Choir!” Cost, $23/adult at-the-door. West Kortright Center, 49 West Kortright Church Rd., East Meredith. Call 607-278-5454 or visit westkc.org/event/choir-choir-choir/
COLOR RUN – 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. Run/walk through several color stations with friends/family to support the American Heart Association. Registration 7:30-8:30. Start & End at Cooperstown High School. Call 607-547-8181 or visit www.cooperstowncs.org
From the fields at the end of Graves Road, Cherry Valley, recently acquired by Caleb Wertenbaker’s Glensfoot farm, no human habitation is visible.
People generally recognize Otsego County’s geographic schizophrenia. (Schizophrenic, in the best possible way, of course.)
To the south, there are 10 Interstate exits – 11 if you count Sidney’s – largely undeveloped (except Exits 14-15, at Southside Oneonta), ideal for commerce, manufacturing, distribution and other job-creating uses.
To the north is the pristine Glimmerglass watershed, a national environmental icon, surrounded by pretty hamlets and villages, most of them in sad states of deterioration. (Wouldn’t Westford and Westville, to pick two, be delightful with an influx of young families and new incomes?)
Jobs on the highway. Homes amid lovely hills and valleys. An ideal future to contemplate.
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The Otsego Land Trust, which achieved its goal of bringing 10,000 acres under conservation easements by 2010 (a little late, but no matter), is an important piece in achieving the happy equation: When the jobs inevitably arrive (fingers crossed), entities like the Land Trust, it is to be hoped, will have ensured sufficient protections are in place to avoid ruination.
So how nice, on the one hand, is it to reflect on Princeton, N.J., developer Harry Levine’s successful conclusion of 12 years as Land Trust president, and his succession by Caleb Wertenbaker, a ninth-generation member of a family that has tended Glensfoot farm in Cherry Valley since the 1790s. (Currently, Todd Gohde is managing production of certified organic hay there.)
Glensfoot now encompasses some 1,200 acres, and Wertenbaker underscored the importance of the Land Trust’s mission the other day during a walk on rolling hills at the top of Graves Road, the latest 500 acres added to the family’s holdings, now being placed under conservation easement.
At the top of a meadow, less than two miles from busy Route 20, and half that from the Village of Cherry Valley, there was no sign of human habitation in any direction, only fields, forest and blue sky.
“It’s always been here and will always be here,” said Wertenbaker, who since graduating from Oberlin in 1996 has made a living in set design in New York City and Boston, escaping up to these parts whenever he can.
LevineSzarpa
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Harry Levine, by all accounts, has been an activist Land Trust president. Foremost, he raised staffing from a sometimes half-time executive director to five professionals, including the latest executive director, Pat Szarpa, about to mark her first anniversary. She served for six years as executive director of the Western New York Land Conservancy, based in East Aurora, the Buffalo suburb, before moving to Cooperstown in 2012.
To the heartfelt thanks of many, Levine and the Land Trust board stepped up and saved Brookwood Gardens, 23 acres on Otsego Lake a mile north of Cooperstown, from falling into private hands and, thus, lost to the public forever. A businessman, though, he was particularly concerned about the P&L.
Making Brookwood financially sustainable requires $25,000-40,000 a year, depending what Land Trust overhead is assigned to it, Wertenbaker said. Shortterm, Levine had lined up a handful of donors to keep Brookwood going.
But it’s no surprise that Szarpa, when asked for her three top priorities, listed Brookwood as one of them. Some of that will be generated by giving a franchise to Brent Baysinger’s Canoe & Kayak Rentals of Portlandville to enable canoe rentals at Brookwood.
Additionally, the northern half of the property, the deteriorating home there razed, the two bridges over Leatherstocking Creek repaired, will soon be reopened, enhancing weddings and other uses on the southside – and, meanwhile, available for birding and other passive uses.
For the Land Trust to flourish, the general public has to care, and Szarpa is working with the national Land Trust Alliance “to create strong images so we can tell our story,” an outreach effort in its early stages. Plus, she is preparing for reaccreditation and taking other steps to make sure the organization is as strong as it might be.
(Plus, expect additions to the “Blueway,” a trail of publicly accessible sites from Deawongo Island in Canadarago Lake to where Oak Creek meets the Susquehanna, (near the site of David “Natty Bumppo” Shipman’s cabin.)
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Whereas Levine, out of necessity, took the lead, Wertenbaker inherits a more mature organization, and sees his role as helping the Land Trust work. “I’m not going to be the driver. I’ll play a leadership role, but ‘leading from behind’,” he said. “The day-to-day business is 100 percent in the hands of the staff.”
As a set designer – and, mostly recently, as creative services director for productionglue, a New York City events company – Wertenbaker as manager helps “creative projects and creative people” accomplish their goals, rather than his agenda. “What I want (in the Land Trust) is a group of people to work together on a common goal.”
The right leader at this particular time, wouldn’t you say?
OPENING DAY – 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. Kick of the 45th season the museum with guided tours of the water-powered sawmill, gristmill, woodworking workshop. Admission $9/adult. Hanford Mills Museum, 51 Co. Hwy. 12, East Meredith. Call 607-278-5744 or visit www.hanfordmills.org
BE INFORMED! – 6:30 – 8 p.m. Learn about food gardens, including what plants are best for our climate, when to start planting and how to care for your garden. Clark Sports Center, Cooperstown. Call 607-282-4087 or visit occainfo.org/calendar/be-informed-lecture-series-food-gardens/
CONCERT – 4 p.m. The prize winning Argus Quartet perform program entitled “Visions and Miracles” featuring music from the renaissance to the present with composers like Josquin, Haydn, Mendelssohn, others. Christ Episcopal Church, 46 River St., Cooperstown. Call 877-666-7421 or visit www.cooperstownmusicfest.org
PANCAKE BREAKFAST – 8 a.m. – Noon. Enjoy all-you-can-eat breakfast of pancake, eggs, sausage, maple syrup, applesauce, more with your friends. All donation go to upkeep of the Historical Building. Suggested donation, $8/adult. The Old Grange, 210 Cemetery Road, Fly Creek. Call 607-547-1275.
COMMUNITY PROGRAM – 6:30 p.m. Patricia Szarpa, Executive Director, Otsego Land Trust, shares how to identify different species of blackbirds in her presentation “Birds of a Feather Flock Together: Blackbird ID.” Woodside Hall, 1 Main St., Cooperstown. Call 607-547-0600, ext. 101 or visit www.facebook.com/Woodside.Hall/
EXHIBIT RECEPTION – 5 – 7 p.m. Public reception for the opening of “Old Dog, New Tricks.” An exhibition of oil paintings exploring a range of portraits by artist Page, and landscape close-ups revealing seasonal changes by artist Falco. Project Space Gallery, Fine Arts Building, SUNY Oneonta. Visit oneonta.campuslabs.com/engage/event/1920415
LIONS CLUB – 6:30 p.m. At this meeting Patricia Szarpa, Executive Director of the Otsego Land Trust, will speak. The Tunnicliff Inn, 34 Pioneer St., Cooperstown. Visit www.facebook.com/CooperstownLionsClub/
HISTORY DISCUSSION – 6:30 – 8 p.m. Introductory Session of 6 discussions on “Making Sense of the Civil War” facilitated by SUNY Oneonta’s Susan Goodier. Readings available for loan while supplies last. Registration required. Huntington Memorial Library, 62 Chestnut St., Oneonta. Call 607-432-1980 or visit hmloneonta.org/adult-programs/
BE POSITIVE FESTIVAL – 10 a.m.-10 p.m. The first annual festival for all ages. Activities include speakers, volunteer opportunities, workshops, art, music, food, and dancing in locations in Downtown Cooperstown. Call (607)638-5538 or visit www.facebook.com/BePositiveFestival/
DANCE – 7-10 p.m. Everyone is invited to the multi-cultural and multi-generational dance capping off the BePositive Festival with music by local bands. The Farmers Market, Cooperstown. Call (607)638-5538 or visit www.facebook.com/BePositiveFestival/
DEOWONGO ISLAND DAY – Noon-3 p.m. Paddle to the island for a picnic that includes live music, food, and a kayak raffle. Or ride the ferry from Bakers Beach, 8114 State Highway 28, Richfield Springs. www.facebook.com/OtsegoLandTrust/