EDITORIAL
The Downtown That Was,
And The Downtown That
Might Be In The Future
In the midst of the back-and-forth about the future of the former CVS property at 100 Main St., Cooperstown’s Rena Lull shared a copy of the December 1984 edition of Town & Country magazine, which featured a shopping tour of the downtown by the former Mary “Cissie” Busch Hager, who was also featured in the cover photo and a feature story on the Hager family of Cooperstown. The variety of shops downtown was impressive. Clockwise from upper left are The
Gazebo gift shop; The Market Place deli; Around the House, doll house miniatures, antique toy replicas and Christmas ornaments; Augur’s Bookstore; Terrace Café; Church & Scott pharmacy; the Baseball Hall of Fame; Bland’s Sporting Goods; The Short Stop coffee shop; Straws & Sweets, handmade candles, wicker baskets and party decorations; Schneider’s Bakery, and the Red Nugget Ice Cream Saloon. It HAS been 35 years, but only the Hall of Fame and Schneider’s remain downtown, and Church & Scott at the south end of town. (AllOTSEGO.com photo)
First and foremost, welcome back!
The half-million or so visitors who will be coming to Greater Cooperstown over the next 13 weeks – for Dreams Park and Cooperstown All-Star Village, for the Baseball Hall of Fame, for The Fenimore Art Museum, The Farmers’ Museum and Hyde Hall, for Glimmerglass Opera, for fishing and boating and summering on Otsego Lake, for hiking and canoeing.
While our visitors are here, pretty much everybody prospers – the restaurants, stores, the rental and hospital business, banks, the hospitals and urgi-cares, every form of entertainment.
Because of you, our visitors, the rest of us get to experience things a rural area generally wouldn’t, from rock and roll (Herb Ritts at The Fenimore and Ommegang’s offerings) to chamber music and opera, baseball stars, to dozens of restaurants, many attractions, lots of golf courses and, of course, more fireworks per thousand population than any community in the country.
Thank you, and let’s all enjoy.