Where were you ......... ?
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It's 40.6 degrees down in the Hollow
and just a hair above 30 degrees uptown!
and just a hair above 30 degrees uptown!
A massive area of high pressure will dominate the eastern seaboard through the week. This will bring sunny and dry weather. Initially temperatures will be cool, but as the high slides east for midweek and winds turn around to a southwesterly direction, we expect a warmup."
All eyes are on the forecast for Saturday,
and it looks good for
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A SPECIAL REQUEST
- from Cindy Gallagher who asks for prayers for Frank Furner:
"Frank was hurt badly in a farm accident yesterday and is in critical condition (last I knew)."
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GOOD NEWS!
Welcome to the World
Cooper James Beasley
and Congratulations to his parents,
Tracy (Tanner) and Tom Beasley.
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Here & There
I was really looking for more hop vines, but couldn't resist stopping to talk with Mrs. Landis on Shanley Road where she was just assembling a display of pumpkins.
Unfortunately, she opted out of the pretty scene!
IN THE MAIL
IN THE MAIL
Speaking of Pumpkins, I've just received an Enote from Brian Staring, the Pumpkin King of Sanger Hill, who writes:
"I have two over 1,000 and one is on it's way to being the biggest I have ever grown. Plus I have a squash that is the biggest that I know of that has been grown in Central New York. The squash should end up being somewhere between 900 to 1,000 lbs. Now this all depends on the weather. These cold nights this week are a killer. You have to tuck them in at night. Pumpkins, squash quit growing when the weather gets in the 40's. So they're covered in layers of old bed comforters then a tarp to keep the heat in the pumpkin/squash over night. This is to trick mother nature of the pumpkin/squash to keep growing to they're picked. One pumpkin is going to Cooperstown, September 22. Another along with the squash is going to Oswego on September 29th. I'll have to get some pictures down later this week."
Thanks, Brian! I'll be watching for the photos!
and Good Luck!
and Good Luck!
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Back to the search for home-grown Hop Vines
Back to the search for home-grown Hop Vines
Thanks to a tip from Linda Rauscher, I knew that I'd find a fine hop vine at the home of her parents, Bill and Myrt Furness, on Osborn Avenue. Myrt told me that she bought the hop rooting at a Garden Club sale a few years ago and - because Liz Kane was there - she thinks that the hops had come from the Kane's crop on Bogan Road.
Right around the corner, on Route 20, Heath Zwaylen's hops look heavy enough to take down the barn wall!
The hop vines strung up on the garage behind the St. Bernard's rectory have thrived despite competition from some volunteer saplings.
Other local "hop growers" include Bill O'Dowd, whose two backyard hop poles seem to sway under the weight of the vines; Tom Bogan has several poles at his hillside home on Bogan Road, the Copes, out at Conger's Corners (the junction of Madison Street and Route 20) and I know that the Falks on Putnam Street always have a good crop. My vines aren't very good, this year: they simply grew too tall too fast for me for anyone to spray them before beetles arrived.
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Newcomers to the area may be puzzled by our fondness for hops - if, in fact, they even know what they are. So, for them, and any of you who feel like taking the time to read a while, here is something of the history of Waterville's hops.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I suppose having a hop vine is like keeping a family hand-me-down; a fondness for an old table or rocking chair that evokes memories of the past or taking pride in making the effort to carry on a tradition.
Waterville did not actually invent hops!
The history of beer.
Beer is the world’s oldest and most popular alcoholic
beverage.
Recipes found on Babylonian clay tablets dating to c. 4300 BC, list at least 20 types of beer, with and without hops.
America’s own Ben Franklin is said to have made this universally popular statement: “Beer
is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy!”
Commercial hop production cultivation began in northern
Germany during the 12th or 13th century.
In beer, hops provide bitterness to balance the sweetness of
malt sugars, as well as flavors, aromas, resins that increase in retention, and
antiseptics to retard spoilage.
Hop flowers or cones resemble pinecones what are composed of
thin, green, papery, leave – like bracts. At the base of these bracts are waxy,
yellow lupulin glands that contain alpha acids responsible for bitterness and
essential oils that give beer flavor and aroma.
Hops were introduced in Sangerfield about the year 1820. By
1885, looking at the "bird's-eye view" map that is so well-known around here, you
can see how much farmland had been turned to hop production by the great
numbers of hop pole teepees seen. In many cases, simple farmers suddenly became millionaires.
A number of local machinists profited from their
inventions which included the Beardsley hop press, the Beardsley hop stove and the Harris Press.
In Meeker’s treatise on hop culture in the United States
published in 1883 he writes:
“The press used almost universally in New York State and, indeed I may say, in the United States, is the Harris press. It was invented by
Louis W Harris, of Waterville, N.Y. about 25 years ago, (the late 1850s) and it remains the same
press today. Mr. B.A. Beardsley now manufactures these presses in Waterville."
Another of the several inventions that put "Waterville" on the map was that of the world's first Hop Extract, developed in 1874.
A lengthy but interesting history of the New York Hop Extract Works " appeared in The Waterville Times in 1936 and I've just added it to the blog called "Heaps of History."
Widespread hop production in the Waterville area continued
to grow until soon after 1900 when, it was said, every farm had a hop yard and
every hop yard had a kiln.
Still standing, this restored hop house at "Parkwood" on Sanger Hill Road.
By 1920, however, hop crops were failing due to a
couple of reasons – the one usually given is that the crops were afflicted by
something called the “blue mold.”
Hop culture on the west coast had grown and grown for several years
and was more productive due to the cheapness of labor, there, and was giving
the Waterville market stiff competition. One newspaper article suggested that west coast workers also
picked hops “more cleanly” than those in New York. Any hopes for
the continued profitable production of hops were dashed
completely by the onset of Prohibition, which lasted from 1920 to 1933, during
which time most of the local hop yards were returned to cropland and
pasture. And, in time, nearly all the oddly-shaped hop kilns disappeared.
At the old Fusek Farm on Upper White Street.
More hidden by greenery, now, than it was 25 or more years ago.
This hop kiln next to Route 12 in N. Brookfield was taken down about ten years ago.
But that was not the end of Hops in Waterville! The story continues tomorrow - with anecdotes by some of the folks who remember the hop yards of the 1940's and 50s!
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This history project, one that I've wanted to do since I began this blog, has been made much easier than I thought it would be by
a function found in my iMac computer with the new "Lion" Operating system: it takes dictation!
Wow!
(Thanks for the tip, Allison!)
(Thanks for the tip, Allison!)
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Have a good day, everyone!
