The Daughters of Columbia County

That 2016 marks the 100th anniversary of the Columbia County Historical Society has inspired Gossips to pore through the old newspapers at Fulton History in search of news about the society's beginnings. It seems it started out as the Daughters of Columbia County and soon after changed its name to the Columbia County Historical Society.

This morning I discovered an account in the Chatham Courier of the second annual meeting of the Daughters of Columbia County, which took place on May 5, 1918, at the Hotel McAlpin in New York. According to the report, "the room was filled to its capacity with members and their guests." It doesn't indicate which room was filled with ladies from Columbia County. I would like to think it was the Ladies' Cafe, but there is no mention of luncheon, only of tea being served at the end of the meeting, so it probably wasn't the Ladies' Cafe.

Hotel McAlpin Ladies' Cafe | Photo: Museum of the City of New York

At the meeting, annual reports were presented, new members elected, and new officers installed. The Chatham Courier reports: "The officers responded to their names as they were installed and in every case pledged loyalty to the county and to the society, whose aim is to honor it." That being done, those assembled sang "with great feeling" the following verses, to the tune of "Juanita." (Click here if you need to be reminded of that tune.)  

There is a place we love,

To each one of us it's dear.

When you have been there once,

You'll return each year.

Yes, we love Columbia,

Every inch is hallowed ground.

Such good times we've found.

Columbia, dear Columbia,

Thou art throned in every heart.

Columbia, dear Columbia,

O, how fair thou art.

You'll find a spirit there,

Which is very hard to name,

But if you've felt it once,

You're not quite the same.

All the cares and worries

Do not seem to matter there;

Mean and petty troubles

Vanish in the air.

Columbia, dear Columbia,

Thou art throned in every heart.

Columbia, dear Columbia,

O, how fair thou art.

COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK