BETTER THAN HEARSAY - Purple Mountain Press: Peter Pan Takes Literary Flight

“Peter Pan in the Catskills” is simultaneously the latest and first original title issued by Purple Mountain Press and its new ownership team.

Bill Birns is a renowned writer and the editor for “Peter Pan in the Catskills,” saying the stories in the new book “tickle the imagination” while being “extensively researched” for historical trueness.

MOUNTAINTOP - Familiar local names, legendary figures and a few nefarious characters have been blended to make “Peter Pan in the Catskills, a Beautifully Illustrated Collection of Essays.”

The 240-plus page tome is the first original title issued by the revitalized Purple Mountain Press, a consequential presence in its own right.

But it must be asked; what do a Neverland adventurer, Tinker Bell, the Lost Boys and Captain Hook have to do with the homeland of Rip Van Winkle?

That question is answered in a piece written by Elisabeth Henry, from which the new publication takes its title, and the book’s Introduction, eloquently penned by Bill Birns.

“The essays in this book present historical views that tickle the imagination and nourish curiosity,” says Birns, a renowned Catskills writer.

“Each essay reflects the writer’s observations, questions and myriad “I-wonders”. So. What tickles your imagination?

“Catskills in the Ice Age? Here. Revolutionary hero? Here. Crime and justice? Here. Railroad?  Here, Might we nourish your curiosity? About the forest? Here. About birds? Here. Politics? Here. Wildflowers? Here.

“[Thirty-three] essays, each responding to “I wonder”. Each a Catskill Mountain historical view, an observation and perception of the writer, extensively researched, footnoted to assure accuracy, an invitation to know, more fully, this fascinating region,” says Birns, also the book’s editor.

“Each of the essays stands alone. Together, they present a cultural collage of place. As a kid, I saw Mary Martin, my generation’s Peter Pan, fly magically over a Broadway stage.

“That role, and that flight, was created at the very beginning of the twentieth century by Maude Adams, a Tannersville resident and star of Broadway. To those of us who love the Catskills, there is magic in the mountains. Never-Neverland?  Who needs it? Peter Pan is in the Catskills,” Birns writes.

Peter Pan shares the literary stage with the likes of mythically real Buffalo Bill, unrecognized inventor Levi Hill, foiled bank robber Max Shinburn and Revolutionary War hero Timothy Murphy, among many others:

—“Buntline, Buffalo Bill & the Wild West Show in Stamford,” is written by 

T. M. Bradshaw, telling the tale of zealous and apparently not always above-board wild west showman/promoter Ned Buntline.

Buntline assembled a ragtag cast in response to the “craze for all things western,” Bradshaw writes, describing behind-the-scenes details of the performers coming to rural Delaware County.

In the summer of 1873, “Buntline presented this show in Stamford on August 30,” Bradshaw writes. “The Windham Journal reported: “Ned Buntline” exhibited his Real Red Men in Stamford Saturday afternoon

and evening, under canvas, near the depot.

“They were accompanied by Dashing Charlie, and Arizona Frank, two famous characters in Buntline’s N. Y. Weekly stories.

“A much later retrospective article in Stamford’s Mirror-Recorder reported that: “In about the year 1873 he [Buntline] came back to Stamford with Bill Cody, later known as “Buffalo Bill,” and gave an exhibition on land back of what was then known as Churchill Hall,” Bradshaw writes.

“Martin Fisher of Stamford still has the revolver used by Buffalo Bill, and Arthur Rogers, also of Stamford, has a picture of the noted show man together with a ticket to the first exhibition given in Stamford.”

—“The Redemption of Levi Hill, Inventor of Color Photography,” is offered by longtime Prattsville town historian Carolyn Bennett.

—“Between 1847 and 1850, we find the Reverend Levi L. Hill in his studio in the peaceful hamlet of West Kill, N.Y., an out-of-work minister turned daguerreotypist-chemist-inventor, pursuing his dream of color photography as if he were “studying arithmetic on the battlefield,” Bennett writes.

Crossing paths with Prattsville founder Zadock Pratt, “by the spring of 1847, he had become the butt of family jokes, and his pursuit likened to the search for “perpetual motion,” Bennett writes.

But eventually, “Hill’s first real success in color photography in 1850 was a copy of a large colored lithograph of Prattsville village. 

“Giddy with the discovery of his long-sought-after Beulah Land, the self-taught chemist suddenly realized that he had paid no attention to the chemical composition of his plates and, in a fit of temporary “insanity,” he’d forgotten to write the formula down,” Bennett writes.

Hill’s discovery was discounted until the 1980’s when, “finally, Hill was found to be neither fake, nor phony but he was proven to be the first to permanently capture natural colors on photographic plates,” Bennett writes, weaving a multi-layered tale on the coming of his just due.

—“Max Shinburn, King of Crooks Foiled in Middleburgh Bank Job,” comes from Mark Sullivan who writes that in the post-Civil War period, “Max had worldwide renown for his cunning ability to swindle and rob, get arrested, and then escape his captors.

“A thick burglar-safe vault at the Middleburgh bank led to his eventual downfall,” Sullivan writes, recounting the evening of April 15, 1895 which was “perfect for a robbery.”

The night was “dark, no moon, with a light drizzle, which kept people indoors. Shinburn found it easy to enter the bank building through a side window while his partner remained outside on guard,” Sullivan writes.

“It was the first job in which he used nitroglycerine, carried in a small flask, with some cotton, detonating caps, and fuse. He thought it was a simple process,” Sullivan writes. It wasn’t.

Wakening nearby residents with the blasts, Shinburn made a hasty retreat from the scene on the railways where he and a partner in crime stole a handcar and pumped their way to a patch of woods some six miles down the tracks with Pinkerton detectives in pursuit.

He was later caught and put on trial in Schoharie where, during the court proceedings, “he was housed in the county jail in the village. And of course,

he made a vain attempt to escape,” Sullivan writes.

“The sheriff’s wife, Mrs. Loveland, prepared his dinners each night. On one particular night, she had forgotten to add a piece of pie to the dinner and had to bring a slice back to the jail. 

“Just outside the entrance door, she met Shinburn making his escape. He had sawed through the iron bars of his cell. Mrs. Loveland dropped her pie and threw her arms around Shinburn’s neck.” Sullivan writes….unfolding the rest of the story in the bank robber’s own words.

“Peter Pan in the Catskills” is “Timothy Murphy: Schoharie’s [Revolutionary War] Hero,” by Mountain Eagle newspaper owner Matthew Avitabile; “FDR And The Catskills,” by Bill Birns;

“Modern Dianas: Wild Women of the Catskills,” by Kelli Huggins; “The World’s Oldest Forest: Gilboa, Conesville, and Cairo,” by William Stein; “The Smell of Electricity” by Ed Nichols Jr. and much more.

Purple Mountain Press specializes in books about the Catskills, Hudson Valley, Adirondacks, Lake George, and Mohawk and Champlain Valleys.

For more information go to the their website or your local bookseller.