1.4 Miles, Two Counties

I was determined to at least put a foot on the Finger Lakes/ North Country Trail on this trip. It will be the first year in a long time that I won't get my 50-mile FLT patch, but I don't want it to be ZERO miles.

I had hoped to get on the trail between Irene and Elaine. No time. I marginally thought I might do so between Elaine and Diane. No time. Today, I made it happen. It wasn't much of a hike, but it counts.

On the way to Marie's, I crossed the trail on NY 79. Neither FLT parking was open. The snow was pretty deep on the trail. I put the car on the edge of a trailer park with a note on it because no one seemed to be home that I could ask for permission.

Then I basically hiked the road piece in both directions. I did post-hole in to the kiosk at the west end.

This pretty swale is called Mallow Marsh and it's part of the Cornell University natural area. However, you may be able to tell that the snow is deep, it's not clear that there's not standing water underneath, there is about a six-foot dropoff that may have steps under the snow, but who can tell?

So I walked back on the road.

This is West Owego Creek, the boundary between Tioga and Tompkins Counties. So I hiked in two counties.

I won't even bother showing the other end where the trail goes back into the woods. It was straight up a hill in unbroken snow. But, hey, I was on the trail. And, hey, no one towed my car away.

Just after leaving Interlaken this morning, I passed the house where I grew up that my grandfather built. It's being taken care of nicely, which makes me happy.

Other scenes on the way across the state include the Susquehanna River.

And the New York hills that you know I love.

I am safely at Marie's and here is the sunset out her back door. Pictures with her tomorrow.

Miles walked in 2026: 52.4
Hike 100 Challenge 2026: 11.6

Finger Lakes/ North Country Trail, New York, Tompkins/Tioga county border, 1.4 miles.

See Did You Guess Diane?

Hometown "Stuff"

  I went to my home church this morning. Lots more pictures at the link below.

And the interior. They only use this big sanctuary in the summer because it's too expensive to heat in the winter.

I took a little walk out front to take a picture down Main Street. Not very many viable businesses left, but it still looks like a small town rather than a ghost town.

No pictures of people today, although there were interactions. I spent the afternoon with Diane... you'll see her tomorrow. Today you'll have to make do with her model railroad. We drove around a little bit looking at local history stuff, and then we did trail talk.

She also keeps the cemetery records, and we walked around there. You may recall that it was Diane who found out that my adoptive grandfather Jack Leary had Seven Sisters. One of the two that I ever met was Cora. And Diane showed me where she is buried. She married a man named Levi Beach.

Tomorrow, we are going to roll out and have a fun activity. See you then.

See Home Church

To the Library and Beyond

The day began with my program at the Interlaken Library. This is where I had my first library experiences, reading my way through the entire children's section. There was one book I took out so many times that when the library discarded it (many many years later), they sent it to me!

Now the children's section is that whole new wing off the back left, which was where I gave my program. Someone took a picture of me doing that, but I don't have it yet, so you'll just have to imagine it.

Then a lady, Diane, had planned a luncheon at her house for a few of us who all went to school together. She has gotten interested in hiking. She's been doing some pieces of the North Country and Finger Lakes Trails, and is so excited that she wants to do pieces of the NCT in each state. We have a lot of interests in common, and it's fun to discover we might end up as more than childhood acquaintences.

The picture shows Diane and her granddaughter, Dani, who likes to hike with her. Hooray for the next generation of hikers! You can see the great pile of food that was spread out for us.

One of our other common interests is history, especially railroad history, and she also likes model railroads! She has N scale. You may remember that I play with HO (except it's all packed away now). Notice the Lehigh Valley theme. You may recall that's my passion, too.

You've heard about Diane before, but you may not remember the name. She is the person who found out where my biological grandmother is buried. See Finding Ada.

Finally, Marie and I were on the road for our campsite for the next week. We got set up just before dark.

Diane gave us mac and cheese (homemade), and Marti gave us a huge bag of veggies, so we had a wonderful dinner.

Then we took a little walk around the campground in the dark, and now we are crashed in the tent. We do have electric.

Tomorrow we hike!

See Hometown Time

Dad's Graduation, 1922

  I have one other special item from Dad's high school years. This is the cover of the program for his graduation ceremony. It says "Class of 1922, Interlaken High School, Commencement Exercises, Monday evening, June 26, 1922, at eight o'clock, Reformed Church."

On the other flap is "Class Officers President: Floyd Wyckoff, Vice-President: Margaret Stearns, Secretary-Treasurer: Marian J. Marsh." and "Class Roll Mary L. Bond, Marian Cole, Julia A. Essom, Alice M. Laycock, Ray F. Leary, Marian J. Marsh, Margaret E. Stearns, Milton J. Wickham, J. Floyd Wyckoff."

The program was folded and slipped into the cover. This is the outside of the program. "Commencement Exercises of Interlaken High School held at the Reformed Church on Monday evening, June twenty-sixth 1922. 'Never Give Up' (class motto), Class Colors: Blue, Pink and Bronze."

The other face says "Principal Gordon B. Springer, Board of Education J.B. Bradley, B.R. Hewlett, T.B. Freestone; Class Officers Floyd Wyckoff, Margaret Stearns, Marian J. Marsh." (That last name is going to be familiar to some readers, and in fact, Dad went to school with her from elementary grades upwards.)

Finally, the actual order of the program.
Music.... Orchestra (one has to wonder how many pieces were in this orchestra in a school of an estimated 50 students, tops)
Invocation.... Rev. Reller D. VanWagenen
Salutatory.... Homemaking a Profession... Mary L. Bond
Vocal Solo.... Mrs. M.B. Morehouse
Physical Education.... Marian Marsh (and she did become a physical education teacher)
English as an Art.... Marian C. Cole
Choosing a Vocation... Julia A. Essom
Piano Duet "To Arms" Ortlepp Op 2.... Marjorie Slaght, Frederica Young
Athletics.... Ray F. Leary (with only 3 boys in this class, probably every boy in the high school was on every team!)
Friendship.... Margaret Stearns
Russia, A Land of Opportunity.... Alice M. Laycock (interesting topic- at the time Russia was a socialist republic, but in December of 1922 the USSR was formed)
Violin Solo "Bolero" Bohm.... Milton J. Wickham
Valedictory.... The Greatest Invention.... J. Floyd Wyckoff
Presentation of Diplomas President of the Board of Education.... Mr. Jay B. Bradley

I did find a photo of the school building at that time. It was across the street from the school I attended, and the builing had been torn down before I was born. It had a short life for a brick building. It was dedicated in 1905, and gone by 1950. The school I attended was dedicated in 1935, so perhaps it was razed not long after that.

I copied all those names because many of them will be familiar to folks local to that area.

In other news: I suddenly have four editing jobs, and I worked on them. I walked to the Post Office, did laundry, and worked on my other project.

See Dad's Football Uniform

Dad's Football Uniform

  I have one other sports set that was my dad's. This is his high school football uniform- most of it anyway. Again, like the baseball uniform from yesterday, this is 98 years old. Here are the pants. Oddly enough, I remember Dad wearing these to work in the garden because the knees were padded. But I guess he didn't wear them out- no holes. Maybe he decided that he didn't want to wear them out.

The mice did not get into this!

There are two surviving pieces of undergarments that went with it. There is a sort of jerkin-like top, and undershorts. Both lace up the front. The pants and undershorts are both made of canvas.

I do not have any kind of jersey that would have had an "I" or other logo on it. And these clothes do not have a manufacturer tag. However... how cool is this? I have the shoes.

You might be interested in seeing the thigh pads. These tie inside the pants. They are quilted cotton, like ancient Chinese armor! It seems to me they don't have enough places where they are secured. I think a player would have had trouble keeping them in place! But maybe they were to be worn inside those brown shorts.

I do not know what position he played. However, he was tall and very thin, so probably not one of the backs!

In other news: It was a beautiful day, and I should have walked. But somehow other things just filled the whole day. I did another tub of cement in the well pit and did some cleaning up. Now the cement just needs to set up for me to finish this fall's jobs down there. The temps in the 40s is not great for that, but hopefully, it will be ok in a few days. I have suddenly been hired for quite a few editing jobs, one of them a rush, so I'm spending quite a bit of time on that. And then there is my other project... having fun... may reveal it soon.

See Dad's Baseball Uniform

Dad's Baseball Uniform

  One of the things I re-homed in this great sorting project of the last few weeks was my father's high school baseball uniform. He graduated in 1922, so this is 98 years old. I was very, very unhappy to discover that the mice had been in it. I carefully washed everything, but it has holes it did not previously have. This is the warm-weather uniform- cotton pants and top. The socks are in rough shape- the mice really used them for the potty room, but I gently washed them multiple times until the water finally came clear.

There are wool pants, and a wool jersey undershirt too. I don't know if there was a wool shirt, or if the undershirt was just worn under the other one.

The uniform included underwear. They are plain cotton with a button fly. The back has a lacing to adjust the waist, taking the place of elastic. Actually, I think that would be comfortable. Elastic itches.

Everything was made by Treman, King & Co. of Ithaca, New York. Athletic Outfitters. They were still in business in the 1930s, and I found one article that said the building eventually became Montgomery Wards. The building is a big square half block in downtown Ithaca, and is now on the National Register of Historic Places.

And you can see the "I" on the front of the shirt for Interlaken, the hometown. It seems subtle, but maybe that was the style at the time. Or, there was a different piece of fabric for the "I" that has completely disappeared and the color difference is showing the original color of the uniform. We have no pictures to give us a clue.

Dad was a big baseball fan. In fact, he played in the minor leagues in the late 1920s. For a Rochester, NY team. I am not sure of the team name. He played 3rd base, and the story is that he was told he'd never make it in the majors because he was too lightweight. He was six feet tall and weighed 135 pounds.

You've seen it before, but this is a picture of Dad, Ray F. Leary, from about the time he would have been wearing the uniform, although this might be from his college years. Still- fairly close.

In other news: I did a lot, but you'd never know it. I didn't get to sleep last night till 4 am, so the morning was a waste. But I did do some editing for other people, wrote a pathetic 254 words- but at least it was progress, did the next to the last tub of cement for this year in the well pit (I was hoping to finish, but although it was above 40 degrees, the cement doesn't set up very fast), and I did a lot on the big project I've been hinting at. Not ready to 'fess up yet, though. You'll have to wait. Paid some bills, made phone calls, blah, blah...

See A Few More Family Goodies

More Reconnections

 
I have a few more pictures to post from Saturday of people I knew long ago. All these people are a few years younger than I am, which makes a huge difference in how well you know each other when you are still kids. They were just coming into youth group when I was leaving for college.

This is friend, Dick Ross, who was also at the funeral. We think we hadn't seen each other since 1974. That's a bit better than the full 50 years since I've seen most of the others. He's now an Elder at the church. Dick and I have reconnected on Facebook, and we seem to have quite a bit in common.



Jon and Eda Baldwin- My apologies for not getting better pictures.



And Becky Fulkerson.


Quite a bit of visiting with Marie's friends today, but I wrote 1500 words in the morning, and we also walked 3 miles at the mall.

And, speaking of writing on North Country Quest, look what word I got in our favorite game, Quiddler, this evening. Portentious? or Coincidence?

	See Home Church
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Home Church

 
This is the church I grew up in. This picture is before my time, but I didn't take an exterior one yesterday because the snow wasn't even pretty. We found some historic photos in a box, so this is more interesting anyway. The white top of the steeple is gone (I think it was hit by lightning or something), and the trees are fewer and much bigger. I'm thinking this is maybe from around 1930. Romanesque style.


I found out yesterday that the 200th anniversary of the church will be this summer. This building was built in 1860, but the church was founded in 1819. Wow. Not sure I can manage another trip east this year, even if I'm free when the date is set.

This is what the interior looked like sometime before 1911. We found a box of photos yesterday, so I took pictures of a few. That pipe organ was still there when I was very small.



Here's what it looks like today.



The Bible verses in the front were added when I was about 10.





One has to wonder where the money came from to build such a beautiful church in such a small town. The congregation has never been able to afford the building for as long as I can remember. Currently they don't use the sanctuary at all in the winter because they can't afford to heat it.

Many mixed feelings about the whole place.

I stayed overnight with Elaine last night, but now I'm back at Marie's.

	See Celebrating Elaine's Mom
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