Thursday, January 1, 2015

Not to Be Missed

There are two more chances today to see The Neighborhood That Disappeared, the excellent documentary about the area of Albany that was leveled in 1962 to build the Empire State Plaza--a project that demolished more than a thousand buildings, displaced 3,600 households, and closed 350 businesses. The documentary can be seen today at 3:30 p.m. and again at 9:30 p.m. on WMHT-TV. It's a story that resonates for Hudsonians. Perhaps someday someone will make a documentary about the neighborhood that disappeared in Hudson during the same era.
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12 comments:

  1. perhaps a documentary about the disappearance of the community that was the North Dock. the lives of the world war II vets that built much of it, the hunters and fishermen that started the place a hundred years ago. it could be a soap opera including the crooked attorney, poorly informed mayor, arrogant greedy real estate management company with a "green" label. no, call 60 minutes and the FBI...we have a neighborhood "disappeared" right now before our eyes...

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    1. What a bitter disappointment for the Landgators and their attorneys, to discover that fisherfolk are equal shareholders of shore, because there is "only one rule for rich and poor, for the favorite at court, and the country man at plow."

      924 days and waiting to be served an equal share of shore by Hudson's hit men with harpoons, who are obligated to provide a safety net for city and county fisherfolk.

      1 Riparian

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    2. The National Organization for Rivers states that blocking the (pre)historical use of North Dock is a criminal act, and the first step toward a solution is to report the crime to make someone accountable.

      By hook or crook, we shall once again, gather at river.

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  2. Unfortunately for Hudson, whole neighborhoods were never photographed before being razed.

    But if a pictorial documentary proves elusive here, the more important task is to collect people's stories and memories on any kind of audio device you can get your hands on. Even a cell phone would do the trick.

    The folks at the Hudson Area Library History Room are currently resuscitating a too often neglected oral history program. There will be some loose guidelines as to how to conduct these interviews - mostly by asking good questions and being a good listener - and then later we can find a place to store them for posterity.

    But you don't need anyone's permission to save your grandmother's memories in her own voice. The most priceless piece of equipment is a neighbor or a family member with a long memory. I taped one conversation between old-timers that was not only fascinating, it proved invaluable for exposing the city's lies about the long-gone Standard Oil depot in the South Bay.

    Next I'd like to know more about the "Furgary" neighborhood in the North Bay, and to get some old-timers' take on the 1889 map when the camp was labeled a "Fish Market," and also subsequent Sanborn maps. All those maps outlined many of the surviving shacks, and the city and state ought to know which is which before someone attempts to knock one down.

    Incredibly, in 2015 the city is still bent on razing neighborhoods.

    Anyone who loves history feels shame over Hudson's routine municipal vandalism, in the past, in the present (by tolerating "demolition by neglect"), and if City Hall is on track, the future too.

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    1. Ah, unheimlich, you are so right to state how urgent it is to record oral history of those people, HBB, not only their memories of a Hudson past but share their opinions on what is the truth. And you are so correct to state that it can be accomplished with the everyday tools at hand and not limited to a pre-decreed formal or right way to do oral history. It's called a conversation.
      As it is said, "the truth shall set you free."
      Now let's see; Albany has the NYS Library, Archives, Museum, Office Complex, The Egg, Civic Center and parking. Hudson has Bliss Towers, Hudson Terrace Apts., Schuyler? Court, Boat Launch & waterfront park. What more could we Hudsonians want?

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  3. I remember that part of Albany well. I lived there, on Hamilton St, just before they tore at all down. Today, it would have been rehabbed and lovely, similar to Willett Place.

    The landlady volunteered that there were no "colored" in the block, yet, that they stopped at the block below. I suppose rehabing/gentrification/dispersial of poor people, especially Blacks, are all interlinked. Sadly this has been true in cities across the country.

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  4. A Furgary oral history would be a start...

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    1. In 2013, a few of us began to record old-timers' recollections of Furgary in conjunction with an exhibit of Furgary themes, paintings, and history at the Columbia County Council on the Arts.

      For one gentleman in his 90s, most of his memories of the waterfront predated WWII. He remembered the camp as THE source of locally caught fish. Fish mongers (he knew their names) would cart Shad up and down the streets blowing a strange horn to alert the housewives. He remembered all sorts of surprising little details about waterfront life in Hudson in the 1930s.

      Funnily enough, he didn't know that in recent times the camp came to be called "Furgary."

      There are other people in their 90s with memories like this, and they might just enjoy talking about them.

      Yes, we really must get back to that project. With all the advances in portable sound technology, there's no good excuse not to.

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  5. I would beg my folks to take me to Albany weekly to witness the bazaar destruction of blocks of houses better than anything we had ever lived in.

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  6. Then after college my father brought me to his home town - Hudson - to witness the demolition of her historic waterfront area.

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  7. My hubby and I watched this documentary. It was fascinating. A part of the history of Albany we were previously completely unaware of. Amazing.

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  8. Rockefeller's "edifice complex" as we locals called the cause of this 'thing'.

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