photos from the plains of abraham (part 1 of 2)

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This is the largest, most comprehensive collection in existence of images depicting the history of Lake Placid, consisting of the 333 historic slides compiled by the late public historian Mary MacKenzie, digitally restored by Lee Manchester. TO PURCHASE A BOUND, PRINT EDITION, GO TO http://stores.lulu.com/marymackenzie

TRANSCRIPT

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Photos from the Plains of Abraham

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Photos from the Plains of Abraham

The Mary MacKenzie Historic Slide Collection

333 historic photographs of North Elba township and the village of Lake Placid,

Essex County, New York

Curated by Lee Manchester

The Mary MacKenzie Project Lake Placid Public Library

January 2010

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Contents About this collection................................................................................................................... ix Hotels........................................................................................................................................xiii Winter sport ............................................................................................................................... 91 1932 Olympic Winter Games.................................................................................................. 147 The village ............................................................................................................................... 217 Newman................................................................................................................................... 247 Placid Lake .............................................................................................................................. 261 The Doris ................................................................................................................................. 269 Early churches ......................................................................................................................... 277 Schools..................................................................................................................................... 297 Roads ....................................................................................................................................... 303 John Brown.............................................................................................................................. 309 Moving pictures....................................................................................................................... 321 Farming.................................................................................................................................... 327 Lake Placid Club ..................................................................................................................... 335 Placid at war ............................................................................................................................ 347 Miscellaneous personages ....................................................................................................... 355 Miscellaneous .......................................................................................................................... 363

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About this collection This is the third and final component of the intellectual legacy of Mary Landon MacKenzie, who died in 2003. For more than 40 years, Mary MacKenzie was the official historian of the town of North Elba, within which is situated the village of Lake Placid. Shortly after her death, I began combing through the papers she had left behind, preparing to edit her collected historical writings. Mary’s first posthumous book was not, however, a historical publication; it was a collection of nearly 150 poems she had written as a young woman in the 1930s and quietly preserved in her desk, unbeknownst to her family. That collection was first published in 2005 by Blueline, the literary magazine of the Adirondacks, as its first-ever book-length supplement. It has been reprinted as “The Secret Poems of Mary C. Landon.” In 2007, Nicholas K. Burns Publishing of Utica, N.Y., came out with the crown jewel of Mary MacKenzie’s legacy, “The Plains of Abraham: A History of North Elba and Lake Placid,” a 400-page collection of the research left behind from her four-decade career as an Adirondack public historian. I have recently released a supplement to that major collection, “More from the Plains of Abraham,” which contains a number of publishable items from Mary’s files that were left out of the original anthology. The final component of Mrs. MacKenzie’s intellectual estate is the Mary MacKenzie Historic Slide Collection, which contains the restored images from 333 film slides collected by Mary and used as illustrative material for her public lectures on local and regional history. It is, to my knowledge, the largest, most comprehensive collection in existence of images depicting the history of Lake Placid and environs.

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After scanning all 333 of Mary’s slides for electronic storage, I spent several months digitally restoring the images. Most of them had sustained at least some damage from rough treatment over the years, and some were in very poor condition. The image collection was initially published online by the Lake Placid Public Library in conjunction with the release of “The Plains of Abraham” in 2007. I have recently reformatted the material for print publication. Several images in this volume appear “cockeyed.” They were either originally photographed, or were transferred to film slides, at a slightly “off” angle. In the process of restoring these images, I straightened them up, but I did not want to trim away the visual information that would be lost if I were to square these photographs off, which is why you see them here as they are. I have written captions for the photos in this collection that should be sufficient to identify them for those familiar with Lake Placid and North Elba history from reading “The Plains of Abraham.” Any questions about the images in this collection should be answered by referring to Mary MacKenzie’s magnum opus. A very few captions in this book identify the image’s photographer. Those were cases where Mrs. MacKenzie had actually recorded that identification on the cardboard frame of the slide itself. I did not take any extra steps to systematically identify the many photographers whose work Mary had appropriated as she interpreted the history of North Elba and Lake Placid for the members of her community and those who love it.

Lee Manchester Jay, New York November 23, 2008

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Hotels

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The story of the resort village of Lake Placid and the tale of its hotels are inextricably

intertwined. For instance, the very first house (1852) built within the territory that would one day become Lake Placid village was also its first hostelry. This 1873 photo shows the famous

Red House, home of Joseph V. Nash, who also boarded guests who were visiting the lake.

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Joe Nash was later considered to be the “founder” of Lake Placid, subdividing his farm property on the west side of Mirror Lake and encouraging the development of a new village there.

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A guest lolls on the lawn of the Red House before the development of Lake Placid village, enjoying the serenity of Bennet’s Pond, as Mirror Lake was previously known.

(Photo by S.R. Stoddard, 1873)

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The Red House in its heyday.

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In 1871, Benjamin Brewster, Joe Nash’s brother-in-law and next-door neighbor, built the first real hotel in Lake Placid. He called it Lake Placid House, but most folks just called it

Brewster’s. This stereopticon photo of Brewster’s was taken in 1873 by Seneca Ray Stoddard.

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This ca. 1885 photo of Signal Hill shows Brewster’s and the Mirror Lake Inn.

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Looking north on Mirror Lake, before the Lake Placid House’s “grandification.”

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After Brewster’s major (some would say grotesque) expansion in 1897, it was no longer known as the Lake Placid House. This July 12, 1901 photo shows the hotel that had come to

be called the Lake Placid Inn. On the far right is St. Eustace-by-Lakes Episcopal Church.

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Looking up Mirror Lake toward the Lake Placid Inn, post-expansion.

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Signal Hill and the expanded Lake Placid Inn, from across Mirror Lake.

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This 1910 photo shows the Lake Placid Inn in its full glory. Just 10 years later, though, Brewster’s burned to ground, never to be rebuilt.

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The Excelsior House, built in 1876 atop Signal Hill, was Ben Brewster’s second hotel. Brewster sold it in 1878 to 30-year-old John Stevens, from

Plattsburgh, who renamed it the Stevens House. This photo was taken about 1880, five years before the fire of Dec. 24, 1885 that destroyed the building.

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The Stevens House was rebuilt, bigger and better than ever, to become one of early Lake Placid’s signature hotels.

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The parlor of the new Stevens House.

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The Stevens House lobby.

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The Stevens House stagecoach, 1890.

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The Stevens House was decorated for the visit of President McKinley on Aug. 11, 1897.

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The Stevens House at about the turn of the 20th century, seen from the corner of Main Street and Saranac Avenue. At streetside is the home of William Lamb.

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The Stevens House on Signal Hill, seen from across Mirror Lake, ca. 1900.

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Around 1900.

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This shot is similar to a photo in the Library of Congress collection that was taken in 1902.

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The Stevens House and Signal Hill, seen from across Mirror Lake, 1920.

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The Cascade House was a popular retreat built on the isthmus between the twin Cascade Lakes in 1878.

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The Cascade House, after significant additions were made in 1885.

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Cascade House, ca. 1900.

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The Cascade House boathouse.

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On Cascade Lake.

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At play at Cascade House.

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The road past Cascade House. It was the upgrading of this road in 1927 that probably doomed the hotel; stories say that road blasting blew so many holes in the roof that the

Lake Placid Club, which had bought the place four years earlier, never reopened it.

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The original core of the Grand View Hotel, built in 1878 on the current site of the Crowne Plaza Lake Placid Resort.

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The Grand View. Next to it is the house known as Robin’s Nest.

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This photo, taken from across Mirror Lake around 1890, shows a much- expanded Grand View Hotel, with the Mirror Lake House below it.

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The Grand View stagecoach, 1890.

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The Grand View, as seen from Mirror Lake.

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The view of Lake Placid village and Mirror Lake from the Grand View. The Lake Placid House, before its 1897 expansion, can be seen across the lake.

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Grand View Hotel and Robin’s Nest, ca. 1895. In the foreground are the ruins of the Mirror Lake House, which burned in the fall of 1894.

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Adirondack Lodge, built by Henry van Hoevenberg in 1880. The legendary log hotel was destroyed in the catastrophic firestorm of 1903.

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Henry van Hoevenberg was, himself, one of the major attractions of his Adirondack Lodge. In this photo, Henry tells tall tales to his guests around the campfire.

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After the 1903 fire, Henry van Hoevenberg went to work as chief engineer for the Lake Placid Club. He is seen here, as in most photos, in his customary all-leather attire.

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Henry van Hoevenberg, right, with an unknown woman.

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Henry van Hoevenberg, right, with an unidentified man.

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Henry van Hoevenberg, right, with Bert Hinds, left.

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Henry van Hoevenberg, left, with two unidentified persons, center, and Godfrey Dewey, front right, seated.

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Mirror Lake House (opened spring 1882) and Allen House (1880) stood side-by-side for a few years on the lower slopes of Grand View Hill. In this 1883 photo, Mirror Lake House is on the left, Allen House on the right. Just three years later, the Allen House burned. Its owner, Henry

Allen, consolidated his operations in the Grand View Hotel, which he had bought in 1881.

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This pre-1886 photo, taken from the north end of Mirror Lake, shows both the Mirror Lake House and adjoining Allen House below the early Grand View.

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Mirror Lake House and Main Street, as seen from the northern end of Mirror Lake, 1890.

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Mirror Lake House, front view, ca. 1893

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Mirror Lake House, north side, ca. 1893.

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The Mirror Lake House fire, fall 1894.

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Another one of the area’s grand hotels was the Whiteface Inn, built in 1882, originally known as the Westside for its location

on the West Lake of Placid Lake. This drawing dates from 1887.

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The front lawn of The Westside, leading down to Placid Lake, ca. 1890.

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The Westside, renamed the Whiteface Inn in February 1891, photographed in 1895. The first Whiteface Inn was torn down in 1901 so that a second Whiteface could be built in its place.

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The second Whiteface Inn, built in 1901.

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Whiteface Inn No. 2, built in 1901, burned in 1909.

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The Ruisseaumont Hotel, looking out over Placid Lake, dominated the scene from its construction in 1891 until it burned on July 2, 1909.

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The Ruisseaumont, 1893

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The Ruisseaumont, 1900

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Lake Placid’s hotel history was everywhere. This house (current address 2512 Main Street) was built in 1880 as the home of Marshall Lamoy. It was sold in 1900 to Episcopal rector Rev.

William Wilmerding Moir, who died just two years later. The house was then bought in 1906 by Charles Kennedy, owner of the neighboring Northwoods Inn, who used it for overflow. Kennedy

sold the house in 1919 to Harvey Alford. Alford enlarged the house on the south end in 1925, and it became the Alford Inn. Today, it is the Adirondack Decorative Arts and Crafts store.

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In the foreground is the old Leahy House, which later became the site of a Ramada Inn, expanded and renamed the Summit Hotel Resort & Suites in 2005. Its owner,

Thomas Leahy, operated the nearby Lakeside Inn from 1920 until his death in 1947.

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This photo shows the first Ray Brook Inn, which burned in 1907.

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The second Ray Brook Inn, torn down in the early 1950s.

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A hand-tinted postcard shows The Pines, on Saranac Avenue, built in 1900. It was greatly expanded in 1926 and renamed the St. Moritz.

Then, in 2004, new owners gave it back its original name, The Pines.

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The Pines, ca. 1900. Interestingly, this post card appears to have been made from the same photograph as the previous image, but it has been reversed and cropped more generously.

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This photo from a promotional brochure shows the Mountain View House on the Cascade Road around the turn of the 20th century. Originally the 1850 frame home of Robert G. Scott, the farmer started taking in boarders. By 1877 it had been expanded into its final form.

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In June 1903, a chimney fire burned the Mountain View House to the ground.

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The Lakeside Inn, on Mirror Lake, ca. 1900. This small hotel was built by Carrie Lamb Ware, who was given the land by her father Joseph Nash. Carrie ran the hotel for many years. It later burned and was replaced by the current lakeside annex of the Hilton hotel.

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The Lakeside Inn

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The Lakeside

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The Homestead, which became one of Lake Placid’s better known small hotels, started out in the 1880s as a private home on the southwest corner of Main Street and Saranac Avenue.

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In 1922, Charlie Green, son-in-law of village founder/developer Joe Nash, sold The Homestead to the Roland family. Peter Roland tore down

The Homestead in 1979, in the runup to the Olympics, to build the Hilton Hotel.

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Charlie Green also operated the Green House, later called The Adirondack. It stood just to the south of the Adirondack Baptist Church on Main Street.

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The American House (or Lodge) was built in 1894 by the Hurley Brothers. It stood on Mill Pond directly across Station Street from the railroad depot.

On July 21, 1941, the 30-room hotel was destroyed by fire. A hardware store now stands on the site, but the American House stables still stand behind it.

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A colorized postcard shows the Belmont, which stood on Saranac Avenue.

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William Fox Leggett’s storied log hotel, the Castle Rustico, on the west side of upper Placid Lake. The hostelry was built as a private home in 1873-74 and opened for business in 1879.

The Leggetts ceased operating their business in 1888. The property was subdivided into smaller camps. The “castle” itself fell into disrepair and was demolished in the 1950s.

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A photo of Lyon’s Stagecoach Inn in 1930. Once thought to have been an expansion of the original Osgood’s Inn, built in the 1830s, it was later demonstrated to have been entirely separate and of later construction, possibly around 1850. Though the Stagecoach Inn still

stands on Old Military Road, a fire severely damaged the structure’s interior in 2002.

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The Albert and Ella (Brewster) Billings residence, built in the 1890s, later became the Mirror Lake Inn’s Colonial House; it was demolished in 2006. Albert and Ella’s first home, on Mirror Lake’s east shore, later became Bonnieblink, the core of Melvil Dewey’s Lake Placid Club complex. Billings started a Placid Lake marina that, after his death in 1903, became the famous George & Bliss marina.

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The National Hotel, built in 1909 by Henry Allen, stood on the east side of Station Street just north of the railroad depot. It was torn down in 1959.

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The Northwoods Inn, opened in 1897 by Wes Kennedy. It is not known whether the hotel was built in that year on the former site of Kennedy’s house, which was built in 1880, or if the hotel was itself an expansion of the Kennedy home. The Northwoods became an annex to the Hotel Marcy when the latter opened in 1927. The Northwoods burned on

Dec. 28, 1966. Another building took its place, and the Hotel Marcy took its name.

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The Forest View House, ca. 1910, built ca. 1895, run by W.H. Bennett. Located at the foot of Cobble Hill, overlooking the main Lake Placid Club

campus on Mirror Lake, it was bought by the LPC in 1925. It burned in 1944.

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The Forest View.

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The house known today as High Knoll, built ca. 1899, was once the Placid Shore Inn. It stands on the crest of Victor Herbert Drive.

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Winter sport

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Almost from its inception, the Lake Placid Club, on Mirror Lake, played a central role in the creation and development of winter sport in Lake Placid.

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The very concept of winter sport in North America was created by members of the Lake Placid Club. In the winter of 1904-05, ten men and women stayed over at the summer resort.

They skied, skated, tobogganed, snowshoed, and otherwise gamboled in the snow, the women’s petticoats sweeping the drifts. The experiment was a smashing success!

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Those 10 hardy pioneers were author Irving Bacheller, his wife Anna Schultz Bacheller, Mrs. Ackerman, Dr. and Mrs. Edgar VanderVerr of Albany, the latter’s sister Miss Wooster, Mrs. Ella B. Dana and her son Ted (Edward C.) of Metuchen, New Jersey, Godfrey Dewey, son of LPC founder Melvil Dewey, and Henry Van Hoevenberg (at the far right above). It’s certain that some of those 10 are included in the photo above, but not how many or whom.

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The next winter, more visitors came than the Club could provide for. After just two winters, a new, year-round clubhouse had to be built. By 1908, outdoor teas, camp dinners, climbing, and even all-night camping parties were on the winter

agenda. The photo above was taken during a Club outing in the early 1920s.

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As early as January 27, 1906, Lake Placid was being actively marketed as a winter playground resort, as evidenced in this famous publicity photo.

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The concept of winter sport was quickly picked up in the new village of Lake Placid, where this toboggan run off Signal Hill onto Mirror Lake

was in operation by 1910, when this and the next two photos were taken.

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Ice trotting on Mirror Lake was a very popular sport in Lake Placid, actually predating the LPC outings by more than a decade, though it went out of vogue for a time. This photo, from

1911, marks the brief revival of the sport under the auspices of hotelier John Stevens. With the onset of U.S. involvement in World War I, ice trotting disappeared here, never to return.

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At around the same time, ice sailing races were also held on Mirror Lake, as seen in the photos on this and the following page, both from 1915.

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And then, there was Winter Carnival …

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The municipal skating rink on Mirror Lake was the center of activity for the community festival, which ran each February in the early years of the 20th century.

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Revelers going down to Mirror Lake in the winter of 1918-19.

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The entire village participated in the festivities. In this photo, the William Lamb house on Signal Hill is decked out for the first Lake Placid Winter Carnival in February 1914

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Saranac Lake’s Lamy brothers — Edmund, Ernest and Claude — were staples on the Mirror Lake winter sport scene around 1920 with their famous barrel-

jumping act. Jumping the barrels above is Claude Lamy, better known as “Bucky.”

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The Lamy brothers perfected an act on Mirror Lake that they took on the road in the Roaring Twenties. Above, Ernest Lamy, playing the clown,

“jumps” the barrels while brothers Bucky (center) and Ed (far right) look on.

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Ski joring, 1920s.

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Dog sledding was very popular in Lake Placid through the 1930s – so much so that it became a demonstration sport in the 1932 Olympic Winter Games.

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Explorer and animal trainer Jacques Suzanne with a team on Placid Lake in the late 1920s

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The Lake Placid Club ran this toboggan slide in the 1920s.

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Main Street toboggan chute, ca. 1930

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In the early 1920s, this was the Lake Placid “ski lift.”

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Skiing in Lake Placid got a boost from the legendary H. Smith “Jackrabbit” Johannsen, seen here with a ski class in the early 1920s.

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Founders of the LPC’s Sno Birds on the Lake Placid Club ice rink, 1921. The Sno Birds became a major force in organized winter sport competition in the

1920s, contributing directly to Lake Placid’s first successful Olympic bid.

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Godfrey Dewey’s Sno Birds bob team, in a Lake Placid Club sled

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An unidentified bob team

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Early LPC ski jump, 1920

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Early LPC ski jump, 1921

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A race under way on the Mirror Lake speed skating oval, 1925

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Spectators pack the stands on Mirror Lake for the races, ca. 1920

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The judges’ stand

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Olympic speed skater Jack Shea and Lucille Hickey were named king and queen of winter at the Coronation Ice Festival in January 1932, just one month before Shea took the gold in two Olympic speed skating events.

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Big band leader Ozzie Nelson and lead singer Harriet Hillard, later of “Ozzie and Harriet” TV fame, were Lake Placid’s king and queen of winter in 1935.

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Painted ice decorated the Olympic Arena for the 1935 Coronation Ice Show.

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The Coronation Ice Shows were by no means the only grand spectacles staged in the Olympic Arena. In this photo, dancers perform in a summer ice operetta featuring a cast of 133 that was staged in August 1935.

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Plenty of celebrities have come to enjoy Lake Placid’s winter sport offerings, including Rudy Vallee, seen here in the late 1930s.

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Commander Richard Byrd

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Buster Crabbe (“Tarzan”) and Kitty Kallen ready for snow joring; the two were king and queen of winter in 1951, when this photo was shot.

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New York Governor Averil Harriman. With Art Draper, former Marble Mountain ski center chief, Harriman pushed through a state constitutional amendment that allowed the development of a ski center within the “forever wild” Forest Preserve on Whiteface Mountain.

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Bob Birk, left, later the athletic director for Lake Placid Central School, with Ron MacKenzie, the leader of Lake Placid’s longstanding drive to win a bid for a second Olympic Winter Games. MacKenzie, “the Patriarch of Winter Sports”

died in 1978 while preparations were under way for the XIII Winter Olympiad.

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The 1980 Olympic ski jumps

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A modern ski jumper flies off the new jumps

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An unidentified bobsled team in modern sled, emblazoned “USAF,” shoots down the 1980 bob run.

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Unidentified luger rides the 1980 Olympic track.

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1932 Olympic Winter Games

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In 1884, the area that was to become the famous Olympic Village of Lake Placid was first being developed from the Adirondack fields and forestland. This photo shows the location that, nearly

half a century later, would be excavated for the 1932 Olympic Arena and Fieldhouse.

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The tremendous success of Lake Placid speed skater Charlie Jewtraw, photographed here in the early 1920s, was one of the elements that contributed to the village’s success in its bid for the 1932 Olympic Winter Games.

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Charlie Jewtraw

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The very first event in the very first Olympic Winter Games (held in Chamonix, France, from January 25 to February 5, 1924) was this 500-meter speed-skating race. Charlie Jewtraw won.

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Charlie Jewtraw, right, winner of the first gold medal ever awarded at the Olympic Winter Games, shakes hands with the Canadian speed skater who took the silver.

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Godfrey Dewey, son of Lake Placid Club founder Melvil Dewey and one of the 10 Club members who pioneered winter sport at the LPC in 1904-05, accompanied the U.S. ski team to the second Winter Olympiad in 1928. The next year, Dewey sailed alone for Europe, posing here on the deck of the Ile de France before it set sail. Dewey met with the International Olympic Committee in Lausanne and successfully bid for the 1932 Olympic Winter Games.

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In 1931, the town of North Elba began excavating this site on Main Street for the 1932 Olympic Fieldhouse.

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The Zig Zag curve on the bobsled run, shown here under construction. Work was begun on Aug. 4, 1930; it was completed in just 148 days.

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Here is the Zig Zag curve on the 1932 bobsled run, after completion and dressing for competition.

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On the flooded tennis courts behind the Lake Placid Club, college hockey tournaments were held before the start of the Olympic Winter Games.

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Franklin D. Roosevelt, then governor of New York, filled in at the February 4, 1932 opening ceremonies for President Herbert Hoover.

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The review stand, set up above the “Olympic Stadium” (where the speed skating oval is now located) on the slope below the Lake Placid High School. At left, in a ball cap and glasses, is Godfrey Dewey; at center, FDR; between them, Count de

Baillet-Latour, president of the International Olympic Committee.

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The athletes’ parade, during the opening ceremonies.

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American dignitaries on the review stand doff their caps as Old Glory is carried past them by the U.S. team.

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The Olympic Arena during a hiatus in the opening ceremonies.

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With 1928 bobsled champ Billy Fiske holding the American flag, U.S. Olympian Jack Shea of Lake Placid takes the Athletes’ Oath on behalf of all competitors in the 1932 games.

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Godfrey Dewey introduces Governor Roosevelt during the opening ceremonies.

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At a Lake Placid Club banquet, left to right: Godfrey Dewey, Lady Fearnley of Oslo, FDR, and Eleanor Roosevelt. (Photo Irving L. Stedman)

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Let the games begin! A ski jumper flies off the Olympic jump at Intervales.

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Grooming the jump.

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Officials gather at the base of the jump where Japanese jumper Yoichi Takata lies, knocked unconscious and suffering a dislocated shoulder after turning over twice in midair and landing on his back during the Special Jump event.

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The parking lot for the Intervales ski jump during the 1932 Olympics.

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The U.S. ski team.

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The Japanese ski team.

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Another shot of the Japanese Olympians.

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The Norwegian Olympic Nordic ski team.

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The Rudd brothers, from Norway.

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Sven Utterstrom, Sweden, winner of the gold medal in Nordic skiing.

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Crowds gathered on the Zig Zag curve.

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Unidentified two-man bob team

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Hubert and Curtis Stevens, Placid men who won the gold medal in two-man bobsled

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Billy Fiske’s four-man U.S. bob team. Fiske, just 20 years old, had already won Olympic gold on a five-man sled four years earlier in St. Moritz

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Billy Fiske and teammates Edward Eagan, Clifford Gray, Jay O’Brien.

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Billy Fiske’s team shoots down the track at Mount Van Hoevenberg.

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Gold medalists Billy Fiske and team at the four-man bob award ceremony.

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Werner Zahn (in overcoat), captain of the 1931 world-champion German bobsled team, presenting the Martineau Challenge Cup to Billy Fiske. On the far left is Paul Stevens of the second-place U.S. bob team.

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This was an extraordinary gesture of good sportsmanship. Zahn had lost two experimental sleds in his warm-up heats on the Mount

Van Hoevenberg run, forcing him out of the 1932 Olympics.

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A final shot of Billy Fiske and team.

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U.S. Olympic bobsled team No. 2 won the silver medal. Calling themselves the Red Devils of Saranac Lake, they were Ed Horton, Paul Stevens, Percy Bryant and Henry Homberger.

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USA speed skater Jack Shea in the lead

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Jack Shea being awarded one of his two gold medals. Godfrey Dewey looks on from the far left.

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Jack Shea poses for his trading card.

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The second heat of the 10,000-meter speed skating race. Though two Norwegians are in the lead here, it was American Irving Jaffee, closely tailing them, who eventually proved to be the winner.

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Distance speed skater Irving Jaffee, of New York City, took gold in both the 5,000-meter and 10,000-meter races.

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Double-gold medalist Irving Jaffee, left, poses with three other members of the 1932 U.S. Olympic speed skating team.

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Andree and Pierre Brunet, of France, gold medalists in the pairs figure skating competition. (Photo Roger I. Moore)

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16-year-old figure skating legend Sonja Henie in the Lake Placid Olympic Fieldhouse. (Photo Roger I. Moore)

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Figure skaters Sonja Henie, Karl Schafer, Hedy Stenof

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Phil Taylor, of England, conducts a stunt-skating exhibition during the 1932 Olympics.

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Canada’s undefeated Olympic hockey team; sweater letters indicate the players are from Winnipeg.

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Dejected Polish goalie Josef Stogowski waits for yet another puck to go into his net as Canada shuts out Poland 10-to-0.

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Group photo of the New York State Police contingent assigned to the 1932 Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid.

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A group photo of the Lake Placid Olympic Committee staff.

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Closeup: At center is Mary C. Landon (later Mary MacKenzie), who compiled the slides contained in this historic collection. In 1930, at age 16, Mary’s first job after graduating Lake Placid High School was to work as the assistant to Ernest Gamache, executive secretary of the local Olympic organizing committee.