Another pair of postcards from the Boston Public Library collection. These depict Olendorf’s Tourist Home on Route 9 in Cohoes (but really, Latham). The tourist home was a standard fixture of the major routes in those days, and back before the highways came through Route 9 was the only road north to the Adirondacks from these parts, so it was lined with these little cabin colonies. This one was run by Oscar and Lillian Nicholson Olendorf for more than thirty years until they retired in 1967. I don’t know much about Oscar, but Lillian was a nurse who was trained at the Brady Infant Home in Albany, and then worked for Dr. John Phelen as a baby nurse. She died in 1991 but her obituary didn’t give her age.
If anyone knows just exactly where Olendorf’s was located, I’d be glad to hear from you. Email me through the link or just tweet me, @HoxsieAlbany.
A friend of the site was good enough to send along the back of an Olendorf’s Motel postcard, which helps locate it a little bit anyway. The directions are:
On Northway Route #87 going North Exit Route 9 R Going South turn left on Route 7 to Route 9 Proceed 1 mile North.
Seems like that would put it about a mile north of Latham Circle.
This gives the owners’ names as Dupre (not Oscar) and Lillian. It promises not only heat and air conditioning in each unit, but summer stock theatre with name casts, and a bowling alley!