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Old School Week: Mohawk School
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Because I don’t have any good photographs of the outside of my elementary school, I’ll start with this charming photograph of my kindergarten class inside the gym. This was the Mohawk School on Ten Broeck Street between Riverside and Sanders avenues. We’re shown here in the gymnasium/auditorium, on the risers we would also use…
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Old School Week: Scotia High School
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Hoxsie’s going old school this week. Real old school. Scotia, New York was a booming village in 1905 when it built its first high school, on First Street just two blocks up from the main street, Mohawk Avenue. It served as the high school until a new one was built on Sacandaga Road just…
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World-Changers: Charles Proteus Steinmetz
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If for any reason we ever felt the stirring need to rename Schenectady, the name of Steinmetz wouldn’t be a bad choice. There was hardly anyone who figured more in its industrial success, or who provided more groundbreaking research, academic enlightenment, or civic leadership. He was the paradigm of immigrant success, and a striking…
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World-Changers: John Wesley Hyatt
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John Wesley Hyatt was born in Starkey, New York, on the west side of Seneca Lake on November 28, 1837. When he was sixteen, he went to Illinois and became a journeyman printer. He (and later, his brother Isaiah) came to Albany and worked in printing. His interest in invention is shown by his…
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World-Changers: Thurlow Weed
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English: Black-and-white bust portrait of Thurlow Weed, Republican political boss (Photo credit: Wikipedia) He should be remembered just for his name: Thurlow Weed. He should be remembered just for the politicians he advised, backed, or helped get elected: DeWitt Clinton, John Quincy Adams, William H. Seward, William Henry Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Winfield Scott, and…
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World Changers: Joseph Henry
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I suppose that Albany residents could be forgiven for not knowing that the man who figured out how to create an electromagnet, by winding wire around a magnet and running a current through it, figured this all out in Albany. I guess it could have escaped our attention that the man who created this…
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World-Changers: Herman Melville
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He may have written one of the most famous novels in history (if a novel much more talked about than read, at this moment). Okay, Herman Melville was born in New York City, but after a series of business reverses, his father brought the family to Albany and entered the fur trade just in…
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World-changers: Prologue
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President Arthur’s Grave (Photo credit: carljohnson) Last week Marc McGuire at the Times-Union posted an article titled “Our Rich and Famous,” which included a poll for voting on the biggest “celebrity” to come from the Capital District. While the very word “celebrity” steers my mind toward vapid denizens of the entertainment world, his initial…
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