Cooperstown, New York is a touch of genteel elegance
Who’s on first, what’s on second, I don’t know is on third,” quips Abbot to Costello. I am in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York where one of the funniest baseball scenes in history is being shown on a small screen.
This summer I spent a week in this pastoral village that has become the heart and soul of baseball legend. It’s absolutely no surprise that America’s favourite pastime is honoured in this one-stoplight Americana town in central New York, known for its vibrant fall foliage. I grew up only an hour away from this idyllic setting, and decided to come back for a visit after decades in frenetic Los Angeles.
My companion and I stayed at the 135-room historic Otesaga Resort Hotel on the southern shore of Lake Otsego. This hotel has seen many notables—from Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Clintons, to John Travolta and Brad Pitt—walk through its lounge that is reminiscent of a grand room in the Scottish Highlands. Many of James Fenimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking tales were formed right here.
DREAM COME TRUE
When I was a little girl, I had gazed at the stately front portico of the hotel, with its massive columns, thinking some day I would be a guest within this storybook English manor. And here I was, enjoying refined accommodations and a peacefulness that prevails on the newly restored lakeside verandah.
The Otesaga dates back to 1909 when it was built with a style and grandeur befitting that era, yet is today dedicated to preserving and protecting “America’s most perfect village.”
Men must still wear a jacket for dinner in the formal dining room, a soaring, stately space renovated in 2010, “with wallpaper handcrafted in England,” says Robert Faller, director of sales in marketing. “All refreshed public spaces were envisioned by seeking to update the classic hotel while maintaining its traditional elegance. We have reduced our ecological footprint and incorporated environmental practices wherever we can.”
SAMPLE THE SUDS
Cooperstown was once the hops capital of America and the Ommegang Brewery, just outside the village, is the only Belgian-style brewery in the U.S. Receiving multiple awards for its winning ales, its amber “Rare Vos” won the World Beer Cup Gold award this year. Judging from the accolades of other visitors, Ommegang ales are not to be missed. Want to sample some? Faller suggests dropping in on October 6 for the brewery’s 15th birthday celebration that includes authentic Belgian waffles.
As integral to Cooperstown as the Baseball Hall of Fame is the Fenimore Art Museum that houses an extensive collection of folk and Native American art, considered by some to be the finest in the country, and memorabilia of James Fenimore Cooper. Out back, the lifestyle of native peoples is detailed and explained. Through December 31, the museum has an exhibit of William Matthew Prior, the first show devoted solely to this American folk artist who documented faces of middle-class Americans throughout his own lifetime.
As my Cooperstown visit proved, you really can go home. New memories can collide and blend with the old. A visit to this town serves to bring people together under happy circumstances, even if you can’t remember the next line of the famed Abbot and Costello routine.
