In his 2008 book The Spirit of the Place, set in Columbia, NY, an only slightly fictionalized Hudson, native son Stephen Bergman, writing as Samuel Shem, characterizes our city as "a town of breakage."
At public events things would unerringly break. School microphones would consistently give out just after someone said, "Testing, testing." On Memorial Days in Columbian cemeteries just as the Gettysburg began, viewing stands would collapse. In deep summer at public tennis courts, water fountains were always going dry so that if, after a hot game of tennis on the asphalt courts, when your feet felt like grill-side-down burgers and your tongue like a bun, you went to the water fountain and turned the handle, the one thing you could be sure would not come out was water.
Bergman's criticism of the city of his birth, in his novel and in person, always seemed laced with humor and genuine affection, but if you prefer your criticism unadulterated, there's a new blog that might be just your cup of tea: Hudseen. Its creator, Bill Huston, describes the effort as "a mostly pictorial blog dedicated to exposing all things dangerous, ugly and inexplicable in Hudson, NY, that go unseen or ignored by Hudson City Hall. As well as other random, curious, concerning and interesting things seen and tripped over in Hudson."
Huston, who moved to Hudson in the past decade, has made it his mission to find and bring to light all of our city's flaws. The most recent post on his blog features this fire hydrant on Front Street, out of service and covered with a plastic bag.
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| Photo: Bill Huston |
A basic google search of Why are fire hydrants covered with trash bags?
ReplyDeleteThe plastic bags protect the hydrants during winter months from salt and de-icing chemicals used on the roadways, which can have a corrosive effect.
Thanks for clearing that up, MS. Did you Google WHY ARE FIRE HYDRANTS COVERED IN PLASTIC BAGS IN THE SPRING SUMMER OR FALL?
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