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photo courtesy of Dion Ogust - copies
845-679-4135
Alf Evers
Each year the New York State Historical Association, the New York State Department of Education, the New York State Regional Publishers Association, and the New York State Library Association spotlight and foster History Events throughout the State in celebration of the designation of November as New York History Month by the New York State Legislature.
EVENT PRESS RELEASE:
To begin this year's New York History Month events, Ulster County Historian, Karlyn Knaust Elia, announces a Celebration in Recognition of Alf Evers' Contributions to the Furthering of New York History
DATE: Sunday, October 21, 2001
TIME: 2:00 p.m. - 4 p.m.
PLACE: Senate House Historic Site, 296 Fair Street, Kingston, New York (The Senate House is located in the Stockade Historic District at the
corner of North Front Street and Clinton Avenue, Kingston, NY)
CONTACT: Karlyn Knaust Elia karlynelia@aol.com
or Richard Frisbie hopefarm@hopefarm.com
PROGRAM: Brief speeches by the friends of Alf Evers (those listed below and others), a few songs
by Jay Ungar & Molly Mason, and Happy Traum, with some
surprises.
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FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC!
JOINING US
Ward Todd, Chairman, &
members of the Ulster County Legislature
Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, Two of America's best
known folk musicians
Ed Sanders, Author and Poet
Dr. Carleton Mabee, Pulitzer Prize winning author
Edward T. Chase, Former Editor-in-Chief of the NY Times Books
Bob Steuding, Author and Poet
Robert Thurman, Buddhist Scholar, Columbia University, author.
Maurice Hinchey, US Congressman
Geddy Sveikauskas, Publisher, Ulster Publishing Company
Vernon Benjamin, Historian
Nathan Koenig, Film Maker
Len Tantillo, Artist, created poster for NYS History Month 2001
Richard Frisbie, New York State Regional Publishers Association
Carla Smith, Director of The Woodstock Guild (Byrdcliffe)
Happy Traum, Musician and President: Homespun Tapes
and many more.
It is free and open to the public.
Rain or shine. Refreshments will be served.
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ALF EVERS BIO:
Alf Evers, pre-eminent historian of the Catskills, is renowned for his definitive 800-page
histories, "The Catskills: From Wilderness to Woodstock" and "Woodstock: History of an American Town". Alf was born February 2, 1905 in
Williamsbridge in the Bronx. In 1914, his parents moved the family out of New York City to a 54-acre
farm in Tillson, within sight of the Catskills.
He went to New Paltz High School and then attended
Hamilton College and the Art Students League. At the League, Alf met fellow student Helen Baker and
the two soon married. With the onset of the Depression, he was compelled to take a job as an
insurance company investigator, and, later, Fuller Brush salesman to support himself and Helen.
Helen was an artist with Norcross greeting cards,
and Alf began putting his writing faculties to work by composing captions and verses for the cards. The couple began to collaborate on children's books and produced over fifty books
between 1931 and the 1950s.
Alf continued as author and journalist, becoming
associate editor of the New York Folklore Quarterly and writing articles for the New York
Conservationist. His many newspaper articles on regional history caught the eye of a senior editor
at Doubleday; with her encouragement he undertook to write the famous Catskills history, published
in 1972 by Doubleday and in 1982 by Overlook Press. His history of Woodstock followed in 1987;
other books include "In Catskill Country: Collected Essays on Mountain History, Life and
Lore", as well as the children's titles, "The Deer Jackers" and "The House the Pecks Built", a
storybook with a thread of gentle satire about adult acquisitiveness, published in 1940 and
recently reissued. Alf is completing a history of Kingston, an effort of twelve years'
duration, to be published by Overlook Press.
Evers has served as Vice-President of the New York
State Folklore Society, President of both the Woodstock Historical Society and the Woodstock
Library, and town historian of Woodstock. He has been an active preservationist over the years,
writing frequently in area newspapers to encourage preservation of the landscape and character of
Woodstock and its environs. He lives in Shady and has three children and "a great many
grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
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