Tag Archives: Glenn Curtiss Museum

“The Best Of”… In My Humble Opinion

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Our region is packed with wonderful places to enjoy, but where are the BEST of each category? Here’s a subjective, incomplete, and individualistic – but heartfelt! – list of recommendations.

Best Open-Air Museum: Genesee Country Village, in Mumford. 600 acres to stroll, with 68 period houses collected from the region and re-erected as a developing 19th-century village. It includes an octagon house from Friendship; a mansion from Campbell; a country store from Altay; a church from Brooks Grove; a one-room school from Rush; and Nathaniel Rochester’s plank house, from when he was still living in Dansville. (But don’t overlook the Farmer’s Museum, in Cooperstown.)

Best Kids’ Museum: The Strong National Museum of Play, in Rochester. Toys, games, playthings, and recreational books – you MUST like at least one of those! (I like ’em all!) I’m not sure how many acres there are under roof, but it’s all dedicated to recreation and play – last time I was there, there was even a Penn Yan Boats fishing boat on exhibit. Strong also has the National Toy Hall of Fame (find your favorites, or make a nomination!), a large dollhouse collection, and a wonderful indoor butterfly garden. Even with all those playthings (many of the hands-on) just a few steps away, what is better than a butterfly?

Best Aviation Museum: The Glenn Curtiss Museum, in Hammondsport. Follow the life of America’s first aviation titan, who made multiple millions within seven years after he and his friends built their first airplane. (The first airplane they ever BUILT, was also the first airplane they ever SAW.) And explore the life of the little home town that rode the roller-coaster with him. Years ago, I was the director here. I think you’d like it.

Best Local History Museum: The Buffalo History Museum, in Buffalo. The museum is historic all by itself, for it’s the only building preserved from the 1901 Pan-American Exposition, or world’s fair. (President McKinley was fatally shot just a few blocks away, and the museum owns the murder weapon.) The museum is fun, but it also doesn’t pull any punches on facing the community’s history of prejudice. One fun little curio – former president Millard Fillmore was one of the founding members of the Buffalo Historical Society, which operates the museum.

Best Place to Lose Yourself in Flowers: Cornell Botanical gardens, in Ithaca. Tiptoe through setpiece flower beds, or ramble among broadcast dame’s rocket.

Most Beautiful Place to Hike: The Finger Lakes Trail section between Steuben County Route 13 (Mitchellsville Road) and State Route 54, outside Hammondsport. Sometimes deer and wild turkey… hepatica and may apple in season… always the woodland, the nearby gorge and stream, the Keuka Inlet, and the lovely vineyard in Pleasant Valley.

Best Gorge: Watkins Glen, in… Watkins Glen! Letchworth and Stony Brook rightfully have their boosters, but you can walk the gorge at Watkins and get wet along the way. The gorge hoots and hollers and sprays, but you meet it, and enjoy it, on a human level.

Best Waterfall, NOT Counting Niagara, Which is in a Class by Itself: Taughannock Falls, near Cayuga Lake, outside Ithaca. A half-mile walk-in, and a single drop longer than Niagara’s, although noplace near as wide. Close second goes to Shequaga Falls, right at the end of West Main Street in Montour Falls.

Best Scenic Overlook: Mossy Bank Park above Bath, and Harris Hill Park near Elmira. Local folks have been enjoying Mossy Bank for 200 years, and I imagine the same is true for Harris Hill. Sailplanes take off and land right near the Harris Hill overlook. This is also the spot from which young Tommy Hilfiger saw the wall of water thundering down the Chemung in 1972, then raced it back to his first shop to save the stock by rushing it to an upper level. Mossy Bank used to be part of the Davenport estate, and girls from the Davenport orphanage loved to hike up there for picnics. You sometimes see eagles nowadays. (More “Bests” to come, from time to time!)

Rainy Day Museums

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Rainy summer day? Visit the museum.

Ah, but WHICH museum, you wisely ask. For we have quite a few to choose from!

We recently visited the ROCKWELL MUSEUM in Corning, as we often do when there’s a special exhibit on. Just now there are two complementary photo shows. One is a set of Kodachrome photos from 1975 by Nathan Benn, who was commissioned to take a year shooting film for a “National Geographic” feature on four seasons in the Finger Lakes. I quickly spotted the faces of vintners Walter Taylor and Konstantin Frank, and I loved the view of wine casks in the rising sun. Maybe the most fun picture was the tour boat on Skaneateles Lake, but you could also enjoy Waterloo Memorial Day, Cohocton Fall Festival, or behind-the-scenes at the Glass Works.

The contemporary portrait photo exhibit, by Chris Walters, included Megan Frank (Dr. Konstantin’s great-granddaughter) and Corning Inc. president Wendell Weeks, but particularly aimed to move past the lily-white 1975 collection into non-white and marginalized groups. The photos focused on Asian Americans, Native Americans, African Americans, women Americans, Americans in drag, and Americans protesting or campaigning for a BETTER America. Each exhibit is worth seeing, especially for we who know the region – both together are even better.

We also made a recent visit to GLENN CURTISS MUSEUM in Hammondsport, where “Art at War” is showing through December 31. This exhibit was built from two remarkable collections of fuselage art. Movies and family history have made many people familiar with “nose art” in World War II airplanes, showing pretty girls, menacing monsters, or cartoon characters. These are earlier versions, going back to the Great War, where the art and symbols were painted right onto the fabric covering the airplane’s framework.

Fabric damaged easily, and was routinely replaced, with the old material (including art) often tossed onto the fire without a second thought. For this exhibit we can thank a couple of individuals a hundred years ago, who preserved the art and even the camouflage for us to see today. Of course the museum also includes Curtiss aircraft, early motorcycles, Hammondsport history, and turn-of-the-century life – not to mention the always-popular workshop, where volunteers repair, restore, or reproduce historic aircraft.

Earlier in our summer season we visited SENECA ART & CULTURAL CENTER at GANONDAGON STATE HISTORIC SITE, near Victor on the site of one of the Seneca cities. Besides its captivating museum exhibitry, Ganondagon screens “Iroquois Creation Story,” a remarkable 17-minute film that has won awards from Stuttgart to Los Angeles. It combines animation and live-action, dance and mask. A short walk uphill is a reproduction Seneca longhouse, offering a good chance to get a feel for local life in the 1500s through 1700s.

We actually started our (personal) season at Arnot Art Museum in Elmira, and just last week enjoyed Gmeiner Art & Cultural Center in Wellsboro. Locally we also have Finger Lakes Boating Museum and (of course) Corning Museum of Glass. Our region further offers Rochester Museum and Science Center, Memorial Art Gallery, George Eastman Museum, and the Strong National Museum of Play… Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Museum of the Earth, Roberson Museum and Science Center… not to mention small historical museums broadcast through our counties and communities. Enjoy yourself!

Hammondsport Keeps ‘Em Flying in World War II

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This year will mark the 80th anniversary of our entry into World War II. During that war tens of thousands of people here in western New York worked at the Curtiss-Wright plants in Buffalo, making airplanes and components for the war.

But the story comes even closer, to Hammondsport, where the almost-extinct Mercury Aircraft (down to one employee in the Depression) suddenly had 850 workers!

Army planners had designated Mercury as a major subcontractor for Curtiss-Wright, inundating them with orders for mountains of components – mostly oil tanks, gas tanks, tail fins, and control surfaces – to go to Buffalo and be installed on Curtiss airplanes, and from there be taken into combat around the globe.

Which warbirds was Mercury fabricating for? One obscure type was the O-52 Curtiss Owl, which was a “heavy” observation (scouting) airplane. The Owl was a good aircraft, but maneuvers in 1941 made the army recognize that the job could be done just as well by the smaller, lighter, cheaper Piper Cub and its imitators, so the Owl didn’t see much service in combat zones.

Not the case with the Curtiss P-40, also called Hawk, Warhawk, Tomahawk, and Kittyhawk! Curtiss made 14,000 of these fighters, and they were our fourth most-produced warplane of the period. British pilots in the Sahara painted the shark’s mouth on the nose, starting a world-wide fad. Those teeth have become just as famous as the airplane itself.

A great airplane for 1940, they were becoming obsolete by 1942, but they kept on flying, for America, Britain, France, Canada, New Zealand, China, and the Soviet Union, among others. They were designed to deliver a lot of firepower, take a lot of punishment, and bring the pilot home. Two inexperienced pilots at Pearl Harbor flew almost alone against both Japanese waves, shot down seven attackers, and landed safely at the end of it. Curtiss Museum is restoring a P-40, and has a 3/4-scale reproduction on exhibit.

Another aircraft Mercury made parts for is the C-46 Commando, or R5C in navy/marine corps lingo. This was a cargo airplane, less famous than the C-47, but those who’d flown them both loved the ’46. The Commando was bigger (carrying more cargo, or more personnel) and faster (burning less fuel on faster trips). It was also pressurized, making it much more comfortable and making oxygen masks unnecessary. So it was ideal for long high flights “over the hump” of the Himalayas, keeping China in the war from bases in India. That big airplane in front of Curtiss Museum is an original C-46. The U. S. military was still using them in Vietnam, and half a dozen are still flying worldwide.

The third major warplane that Mercury supported was the SB2C Helldiver, a three-man navy dive-bomber deployed from aircraft carriers. It got off to a bad start, and angry pilots called it by many a foul name. It did have a lot of bugs that needed to be worked out, but worked out they were. Also, you had to be a GOOD pilot to get the best from the Helldiver, and even in our navy, not every pilot could handle it. By the war’s last year or so, the SB2C had replaced all other dive bombers in our fleet. The list of battles in which they fought is long, and they shared in the sinking of two Japanese battleships.

By the way, Paul A. Schweizer told me that the army was originally considering Schweizer Aircraft in Elmira, rather than Mercury, as the major subcontractor. They changed their minds, though, after watching workers lower completed glider fuselages out through the window of the knitting mill, where Schweizer had the second floor! They did buy some training gliders, though.

Out of the House, and in From the Cold — Check Out Our Museums!

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Last week we looked at places to get out of the house, while still keeping warm, and we put the spotlight on our wonderful public libraries. For more great places to get out of the house but in from the cold, try our region’s many museums.

*The huge CORNING MUSEUM OF GLASS is rightly world-renowned. If you haven’t been for a while, stop in again. It’s constantly growing, constantly changing. It’s art, industry, science, local history, and pop culture. (Look for your Mom’s Pyrex, Corelle, and CorningWare.) EXTRA SPECIAL: the hot glass show, where glass artists create while you watch.

*Corning’s “other” museum sometimes gets unjustly overshadowed by the Glass Museum. But the ROCKWELL MUSEUM is worth repeat visits all on its own… to be honest, we’re at the Rockwell more than we are at the Glass Museum. It’s a worthy memorial to Mr. and Mrs. Rockwell… I knew him, and he was always a pleasure to visit. The Rockwell has had a history of groping for its own identity, but is now a Smithsonian Affiliate, focusing on art of the American experience. EXTRA SPECIAL: contemporary art by Native American and Latin American artists.

*I used to be director of the GLENN CURTISS MUSEUM, and I’m always amazed at the number of local folks who haven’t been, or who think it’s still in the old 1860 academy building. Curtiss Museum tells a triple-barreled tale… the Curtiss story, the early aviation story, and the story of a typical small town experiencing the flood of change in the early 20th century. EXTRA SPECIAL: the workshop, where volunteers restore of reproduce flying aircraft.

*Curtiss Museum’s sister institution is the NATIONAL SOARING MUSEUM atop Harris Hill, overlooking Big Flats. Snowy windy days are not the best for driving up that hill, but otherwise make a stop if you haven’t done so. Maybe you think you’re not especially interested in “the silent grace of motorless flight” – but soaring, gliders, and sailplanes have been an important part of our region’s economy and heritage. Why not learn something new? EXTRA SPECIAL: a large guest exhibit of dollhouses and miniatures.

*The OLIVER AND UNDERWOOD MUSEUMS in Penn Yan center on life in the Yates County area, from pre-contact Native times onward. EXTRA SPECIAL: Jemima Wilkinson’s coachee (a cut-down carriage) and other memorabilia. To her 18th-century followers Jemima’s word was not law… it was Divine Law. Eccentric she may have been, but she’s one of the founding figures of our region.

*CHEMUNG VALLEY HISTORY MUSEUM focuses on life in and around Elmira, including Mark Twain and the “big horn” (a mammoth tusk) which gives Chemung its name. EXTRA SPECIAL: this is the original home of Chemung Canal Bank, so you can still see the vault.

*Where would we be without our lakes? Check out the still-new (and ever-growing) FINGER LAKES BOATING MUSEUM near Hammondsport. Besides seeing the boats (and getting a whiff of summer), you can often watch restoration work, just as you can at nearby Curtiss. EXTRA SPECIAL: FLBM’s main building is the old Taylor (originally Columbia) winery, with its lovely 19th-century stone vaults and dark woodwork.

*And all that’s just for starters! Watch this space – more to come!

Making Airplanes at Mercury

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The Hammondsport company that we now know as Mercury Aircraft, or Mercury Corporation, got its start in 1920 as the Aerial Service Corporation.  Founder Henry Kleckler, and others in key positions through the years, were former Curtiss men.  (Ownership changed hands several times in the first twenty years or so.)  As they said, “Service” was their middle name. They did a lot of things in aviation, and one of them was to build airplanes.

*In 1922 they built two racing airplanes for the navy, plus a monoplane for an exhibition pilot.  All of these were designed by another Hammondsport firm, the Aerial Engineering Corporation, which hired Aerial Service to do the construction.

*In 1925 came the Aerial Mercury, designed for a competition to create a new air mail plane.  The post office liked it, bought it, and used it for years, but never made any follow-up orders.  It made enough of a splash, though, that its name soon became the company name.

*Also in 1925 they bought a number of surplus Model J biplanes made by Standard Aircraft and rebuilt them extensively.  We can argue about whether to count these as airplanes manufactured by Mercury, but at any rate we don’t know how many there were, although the Argentine government bought five to use as trainers.

*Also in 1925 came the single Mercury Junior, which led to the larger Aerial Mercury retroactively being called the Mercury Senior. The single Mercury Kitten appeared in 1927, and an innovative airplane designed for a safety competition came two years later.

*None of these resulted in production contracts, but the 1929 Mercury Chic DID.  This was a two-seater parasol-wing open-cockpit monoplane, and the Curtiss flying school in Chicago took five of them as part of a special package… learn to fly and take home the Chic you trained on, all for a single price.

*The Chic was a well thought-of airplane, and the future looked bright, but 1929 was the year of the stock market crash.  With the Great Depression under way, not too many people were signing up for the lessons-plus-airplane deal.  About 16 or 18 Chics were manufactured (one source says as many as 30), but a number of them were never actually assembled.  Instead, the components were crated to wait (mostly vainly) for a buyer.

*(By the way, in 1930 Harvey Mummert put Billy Mummert and Joe Meade, Jr. into the front cockpit of a Chic, and piloted the aircraft as the boys tossed flowers out onto the crowd at Glenn Curtiss’s burial.)

*Otto Kohl and Harvey Mummert created the Red Racer in 1929, and the White Racer followed in 1931.  Mercury squeaked through the Depression and boomed during the war, but made no more airplanes until 1976, when Joe Meade, Jr. and a team of Mercury men reproduced the 1908 June Bug originally designed and flown by Glenn Curtiss.  (Joe had planned a static reproduction, but Cole Palen of Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome told him, “It isn’t an airplane unless it flies.”)  Fly it did, at Hammondsport, Dansville, and Oskosh, piloted by Joe, by Cole, by Dave Fox, and by Harry Saltsman, all of whom are now gone.

*How many Mercury aircraft are left today? Two or three Chics, including one at Curtiss Museum, and the White Racer, also at Curtiss. The June Bug II is at Curtiss as well, and the remnants of the Red Racer still theoretically existed around the year 2000, though it would be too generous to have called it a basket case. So to see the wings of Mercury – Curtiss is where you have to go!

Treasures in Silk and Fabric at Curtiss Museum

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Sad to say, Curtiss Museum is not offering its traditional holiday miniatures show this year. But on Friday the 18th, the museum did open another perennial favorite, the biennial embroidery show. Some of the pieces are over a hundred years old, and others were finished, I imagine, under the lowering pressure of the Friday deadline.

*A crazy quilt (c. 1900) on loan from Schuyler County Historical Society belies the commonplace idea of crazy quilts as patchwork folk-art primitives. Certainly odd patches are pieced together, but artistic embroidery adorns the work. This is, in fact a work of art on a different level than the usual crazy quilt.

*And it spotlights the definition of embroidery as work with an eyed needle, embellishing a fabric surface. The three 1905 pieces by Clara and Olivia Schumacher use silk thread, worked onto linen with a flat satin stitch. It took a lot of labor and a lot of patience to work the baskets in these works, capturing the weaving of slats, with alternating warp and woof slats oriented differently. I didn’t touch, (of course!) but I didn’t need to to. I could “feel” the texture of the silk, and I could “feel” the texture of the baskets.

*A brightly-colored bird approaches one basket from the upper corner, with marvelous clear space between. Sometimes successful embellishment includes recognizing when NOT to embellish.

*Now having waxed on about these historic pieces, I confess that I’m usually pretty ho-hum about historic samplers and the like. But my eye was seized by the REPRODUCTION Mary Starker 1760 sampler (embroidered by Pat Bennett), and by the REPRODUCTION Dorothy Walpole 1774 sampler (embroidered by Patty Kahl).

*What I loved about these is the fact that they’re so vivid. Now I get a sense of what it might have been like, in the 1700s, to see their just-finished originals, in all their vivid unfaded glory. The colors pop out; so do the birds, the deer, the vases, the tree. Even the “white space” seems to leap from the surface.

*The deer and the rabbit connect, in my mind, with a deer, a rabbit, a squirrel and a peacock on Barbara Heytmeijer’s counted-thread piece, Sanctuary. The layout reminds me of one of those boxwood hedge gardens in England, with each creature in its own quadrant and a space in the center.

*Speaking of England, Joyce House’s counted cross-stitch English village, overflowing with flowers, is also overflowing with colors. It took first prize at the New York State Fair. Mary Clarkson’s crewel piece, Country Cottage 1967, holds forth in paler colors. I couldn’t tell whether this was worked in 1967, or whether it was supposed to represent 1967, but it surely has a ’67 feel.

*And in keeping with the season there are also numerous Christmas pieces. Joyce House’s cross-stitch Snow Family Christmas whimsically shows a snow father and snow mother out pulling their little snow boy on a sled, with a little snow dog along for the adventure. Kristine Garner’s Home for Christmas (in beads and cross-stitch) pictures a closed but welcoming front door, surrounded by lights and next to a Christmas tree. It’s the door we all can’t wait to open… in memory if not today, in the mind if not in reality.

A Hundred Quilts

There’s an impressive quilt show going on at Curtiss Museum in Hammondsport.

Why quilts, you might ask? Well, you might be interested to know that a very young Glenn Curtiss, fascinated by the process, once sat on his mother’s lap and pieced a quilt while she operated the treadle sewing machine. (Wish we had THAT quilt to see on exhibit!)

But more aptly, Curtiss Museum was originally founded to cover local history, as well as the pioneer aviator. It’s also the only real exhibit space in the central part of the county, so it’s the venue for many topics, which is part of the fun of the place. When I was director there I knew a Canadian couple who planned their visit every two years so that he could spend his time with the machinery, while she enjoyed the biennial embroidery show.

My wife is an enthusiast for all things needlearts, but I am no specialist in quilting. That being said, though, I know what I like, and enjoy visiting shows like this.

One of the quilts that really grabbed my eye was a large piece by Marie B. Peek of Bath, entitled “One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish,” which she cheerfully confesses to having lifted from Dr. Seuss. (I especially like the barracuda that stretches over two blocks in the upper left.)

Besides just the fun of looking at all the varied fish, I was intrigued at her written description explaining that she had never been to the Caribbean, but enjoyed seeing pictures of the colorful fish in their sun-drenched habitat. This really resonated with me because back in the 1960s my parents used to take my sister and me to Audubon Society lectures in Providence. I’m still overwhelmed by the films of life on Caribbean reefs… and just like Ms. Peek, I’ve never been there.

Interestingly, at the other end of the room, and the other end of the spectrum, Marie Peek also created what was perhaps the next most visually arresting piece, “Carpenter’s Square”… an austere traditional design in blue, which just bursts from the sea of white onto which it’s been worked.

Also bright and vivid was “Billiards,” by Pat Clayton of Hammondsport – each block a large billiard ball in its own glorious color.

I’ve long known that Mary Shipp is a whiz with a needle, and I really enjoyed two of her small pieces… one a flock of goldfinches on a thistle, and one an elephant with her baby. We can’t help but be touched by such an image. Apart from us, elephants are about the only beings that spend years caring for their young. There’s real fellow-feeling there.

“Building Blocks,” by Wendy Baker of Dundee, bore 11 blocks with variations of traditional designs, and the quilt had very attractive October colors. Similarly muted was “Sprigs & Twigs,” by Fran Stoughton of Trumansburg. As a historian I was interested in the “Variation on Whig Rose” quilt by Maureen Johnson of Bath, but if you like a more modern, whimsical, and seasonal approach you should look up “The Ghastlies Family Reunion,” by Shirley Ann Fleet of Bath.

It may be Halloween season now, but Christmas season is coming up. Mary Ellen Westlake of Almond used Christmas fabric and traditional designs to create “Merry Christmas Quilt,” while Pat Clayton dedicated a block apiece to each of the “12 Days of Christmas.”

Liz Scott created a couple of quilts using a process I’d never seen or heard of before, ice dyeing. My wife tells me that you set dyes and ice cubes onto the fabric, and let nature take its course. It has a very ‘sixties feel. Also on the unusual side (and VERY interesting) were hand-hooked art pieces created by Diane Philips.

Just for fun I went around and did a count, and somebody else might get a slightly different figure, but I came up with exactly 100 pieces in this exhibit, which is a number worth seeing if you’re at all interested. The show runs through Saturday, November 1.

Holiday Miniatures Show Returns to Curtiss Museum

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Twenty-four. The number of Christmas Eve. The number of days “until,” once December starts. The number of little windows on the Advent calendar, until the big one is opened.
Twenty-four. The number of miniatures shows at the Curtiss Museum, ushering in the holiday season. It’s part of our regional holiday. People who were not year born when the first show opened (in the “old” museum) can now bring their children.
That original show was a dollhouse show, but now the exhibit also includes models, miniatures, and antique toys and dolls.
Roll into the lobby, for instance, and you’re seized by Lanny Wensch’s large sawmill operation, circled (ovaled?) by a garden-scale railroad. To its left is Jim Sladish’s little Christmas village, with its two tracks of trains and Santa sleigh circling overhead. To the sawmill’s right is one of the late Carroll Burdick’s miniature carousels, music and all.
Each of these is operational; the trains run, the carousel circles, Santa’s sleigh flies, the sawmill equipment does its thing. They also show some of the range of this exhibit. The little stores and houses of the Christmas village are mostly available commercially, as of course are the trains. Likewise the sawmill’s big train and tiny engines are commercial products, but the sawmill and its setting are home-built. There’s also some repurposing. The burly millworkers started out in life as action figures of the “He-Man” type. The carousel, at the other end of the range, was largely constructed from scratch.
Range and variety are hallmarks of the show. Still in the lobby a case of large electric trains sits next to a case of paper dolls from the 1920s. A few steps away are a fleet of die-cast airplanes, and an enthralling n-gauge model railroad layout.
Out of the lobby into the main museum are case after case of dollhouses – some commercially made, some scratch-built, some assembled from kits, and some “kit-bashed” – using the kits as starting points, and going wild from there. Some are actually toys, others are works of artisanship, some are perpetual-motion hobbies, always improving but never quite finished. Many are homes, some are farms, some are stores.
And some are not true dollhouses. These are the room boxes, about the size of the proverbial breadbox. Room boxes are artisinal creations, usually in fact focusing on a single room, be it hat shop, colonial kitchen, or comfy living room.
Some of the doll houses and miniatures go back to the 19th century. Others were being finished just as the exhibit case was closed.
Running the gamut from mid-19th century to mid-20th century is a substantial exhibit of toys and dolls (see if you can find Donald Duck, and Charlie McCarthy). Our family exhibits a pressed-board toy store – a gift to my father, in the Great Depression. There are the inevitable war toys, the toy airplanes, the blocks and bowling pins. Take a look at Eva Stickler’s 19th-century doll collection. She cut material from her own dresses to make dresses for her dolls.
Of course you can always wander away to look at the airplanes, motorcycles, workshop, and other permanent museum features. But before you can do that, see if you can find:
*Will Parker’s crystal-laden railroad layout.
*Two cardstock cathedrals.
*Several dollhouses from Marie Rockwell’s collection.
*Miniatures made from toothpicks.
*Toy cars from famous movies and TV shows.
*Creations by Mickie Vollmer, who’s also operating the museum’s upcoming dollhouse and miniatures vendor show.
*A antique-Buick kiddie car, lent by Guy Bennett Jr.
*An original Studebaker sleigh – just waiting for Santa Claus!

“A Passion for Color”

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Curtiss Museum currently has a major exhibition of quilts.
On our visit a couple of weeks ago, as we entered the museum we entered a Stonehenge of quilts hanging from free-standing racks — in addition to those hanging on walls, exhibited in cases, or otherwise being shown.
Just to give you some perspective… I started counting up quilts that could at least qualify as lap quilts. (Most were full-size.) I came up with a figure of 73.
PLUS a few dozen smaller items, articles of quilted clothing, and more. I don’t quilt, though my wife and my sister have each made a few. Being as historically interested as I am, and enthusiastic about folk tales and folk music as I am, you can guess that I enjoy looking at traditional quilts. But I ALSO have fun seeing newer approaches — tradition’s great, but so’s innovation.
“A Day in Lake Country,” by Jennie Peck of Alexander, springs to life in bright untraditional yellows and oranges. Happy fish swim in and out of underwater scenes. The small quilt “Mardi Gras” (Joyce Swackhammer, Bath) is very dark, shot through with bright metallic thread — to me, they suggested fireworks. “Let’s Build a Snowman” (Maureen Johnson, Bath) jumps right out with big white snowflakes on bright blue bands.
Maureen Johnson also created the “Carolina Lily” quilt tossed onto the gleaming black Studebaker sleigh, courtesy of John Wickes in Prattsburgh.
Virginia Gleason’s “Civil War Sampler” abounds in traditional geometric forms. Katherine Baumgardner (Thurston) created several quilts, including “Mama Says,” with redwork outlined scenes and quotes from mother.
Baumgardner is also exhibiting “Quilts in the Garden,” three outlined scenes of quilts on the clothesline, done in redwork outline embroidery. The scenes are set vertically, mounted in an old window sash.
“Needles & Notions” (Shirley Fleet, Bath) is a long hanging, picturing shears, needle, thread, measuring tape, sewing machine, and other quilting necessities. It’s her first adventure in paper piecing.
Several quilts had holiday designs, including three or four Halloween quilts that I wouldn’t want on MY bed, but to each his own. On the other hand I very much enjoyed “Over the River and Through the Woods,” with flying goose borders, traditional squares on the dividers, and a warm wintry scene.
One quilt is not only traditional but historic — perhaps 150 years old. It’s a spoke quilt, often done for fundraising, with 540 names stitched in. We’d love to know what community it’s from, but we’ve only identified one or two names with confidence. Take a look, and see if you can help.
Why Curtiss Museum? For one thing, it’s probably the biggest year-round exhibit space in the central part of the county. But for another, the very young Glenn Curtiss, already mechanically enthralled, was fascinated by his mother’s sewing machine — perhaps the most complex piece of machinery in most households back in the early 1880s. So she sat him on her lap and worked the treadle with her feet while a very small Glenn Curtiss pieced a quilt for her. Too bad we don’t have THAT to show today.