Honoring Patti Morrow - Local History by Dede Terns-Thorpe

This week I’d like to pay tribute to fellow historian Patti Morrow. Officially she was the Windham Historian, but she was more than that. She had a love and thirst to learn all she could of Greene County, possibly even beyond Greene Country.

Since my 2012 appointment as Town of Hunter Historian, I’ve had the privilege of meeting some amazing historians, some with titles but many without. There’s a thirst for our county’s history which, assisted by technology, has aided younger historians in their ability to learn. The Town of Hunter is fortunate to have had an amazing history. From native Americans, tanneries, the Hudson River Artists, railroads, hotels and boarding houses, the Great Depression, to skiing, seeing our history evolve in numerous ways.

Justine Hommel, a past 30-year Town of Hunter Historian, was an incredible historian, one I would love to emulate.  Justine, like Patti Morrow, walked the walk, retained and shared the information along the way.

I never had the opportunity to thank Patti in person, I didn’t realize she was no longer in Maplecrest, her beloved hometown. From the day I took over from Justine I often relied on other local historians, Samerna Rion, Cyndi LaPierre, Dave Dorfelt, and Jon Palmer, but my first reaction was to ask Patti, and Patti was almost always the right person to ask.

Our town has been fortunate to have had 50+ years of the Mountain Top Historical Society (thanks to Justine Hommel) , but we’ve also had Bunny Showers, Leah Wiltse, Shirley Dunn, with Judy Legg keeping her eyes on the Rip Van Winkle Lake and working with Karen Terns shared a mutual affection for Tannersville Village. We have the Hunter Foundation showing a love for Tannersville in numerous ways. And fortunately, we have knowledgeable historians in the three parks who have played important roles within the MTHS.

Hunter Village has a busy Hunter Mt. Ski Bowl (no longer owned by the local Slutzky family, but by Colorado’s Vail), the Catskill Mt. Foundation, giving us the theater and the arts, an antique shop, and a few busy restaurants and retail shops. (See below on Hunter Mt.)

I’d like to thank Mike Ryan, writer for the Mountain Eagle Newspaper, and Connor Greco from the Overlook paper, for bringing Patti Morrow’s passing to our attention in such a beautiful way.

Patti is a great loss to WRIP Radio, Windham Township, and the entire Mountain Top Community.

Around 2029 or 2030 a fascinating book titled, “HUNTER MOUNTAIN SKI BOWL: A MOUNTAIN OF HISTORY,” will be published and available by a Tannersville author, James Prendergast. This historical narrative will show how Hunter Mt. became one of the top tourist ski resort destinations in the Northeast. He’ll cover skiing locally in the 1930s to the Hammerstein family connection, the teaching of skiing to numerous celebrities, the respect and privacy protection for the numerous politicians that skied at Hunter Mt.  He will cover Paul Pepe’s informative 1995, “THE SLEEPING GIANT.”

Good luck, it should add greatly to the history of Hunter Mt. Ski Bowl, as well as the history of the town,

Thanks for reading, be well and stay safe.

Dede Terns-Thorpe/Hunterhistorian@gmail.com