PS - Nick also wrote back to Richard and I will post his response tomorrow. Thanks Richard for sending us this cool info and photos.
Yesteryear in Woodland Valley
My father, Fred (Fritz) Graefe, was born in a house on 140th St. in New York City, “among the slaughterhouses” and with the toilet “out back.” He was the youngest of 7 children of 44 year old German immigrant parents. The family also owned the Woodland Valley house now owned by Nick Alba.
I composed the following reminiscences by my father from a conversation I had with him when he was 93 years old. He died in 2001 at age 94 and is buried in the Shandaken Rural Cemetery, along with his parents and 4 of his siblings.
“When I was a teenager, the family went to Woodland Valley in the Catskills each year. We would take the Hudson Dayliner (boat), then a train to Phoenecia, then stop at Simmon’s store to buy supplies for the season (e.g., a barrel of flour). Then then we’d rent a wagon to take us up the valley.
We’d go to the Catskills in May. I would always leave school early each year to do so. That’s why it took me a long time to get through high school. My brother, Al, worked many different jobs before becoming a New York City cop. Each year, he would quit one of these early jobs to go to Woodland with the family.
Clara (my eldest sister) owned an Essex car. You had to crank it. In Woodland, you had to be sure to get a running start to get up the hill at Craig’s”
I too, have many recollections of Woodland Valley as a child, when the family home was owned by my Aunt Clara and her sister Margaret (Miggie). It was really “roughing it.” There was no electricity or plumbing – just an old icebox and an outhouse. Cooking was done on a wood stove, and wood was stored in an old woodshed on the property. We hauled drinking water from a nearby spring. We used only the kitchen and the upstairs bedrooms. As we walked through the living room to get to the stairway, two mounted squirrels and a pheasant peered at us from among the host of items stored there.
There was the “old house,” too – a dilapidated locked-up structure with a lean-to garage attached, down by the road. As kids, we would peek through the smudged windows at the hoard of “treasures” that filled the old house – mostly items given to my grandfather by the wealthy families he worked for as a butler and valet.
We loved the woods and streams and especially the swinging bridge, down where the campsite now stands.
From his humble beginnings, my father got a job at age 18 as a messenger at the bank in New York City that would eventually become Chase Manhattan Bank. He retired at 65 as an officer at one of the bank’s branches.
My brother (age 76) and I (age 72) stopped and chatted with Nick Alba in September when we were in the area to do some maintenance at the family cemetery plot at Shandaken. It was great to see what he has done to the house and to share memories with him. Following are some pictures from the past
Richard Graefe
