07-09 Bath Houses

Today I went into Bath to see an optometrist to order replacement glasses. I’ve been needing to do this since we left Columbia where I had my annual eye check-up. My Doctor there does not take the new insurance now provided to AT&T retirees. The Doctor’s office in Bath is in the house below on the right. It is just a mile or so from the campground.

We have been admiring all the lovely old homes in the area so I took a few quick photos to show you what they look like.

I love these bright colors.

This is a dentist’s office:

This house is near the campground entrance:

Speaking of being in Bath, that reminds me of a couple of my recent senior moments. Traveling like we do, I sometimes forget what town we are in – especially in the first few days after we arrive. So one day we are in our favorite local restaurant, Chat-a-Whyle, where I see some ads for local businesses. One was called Bath Rugs. I thought, boy that is a niche market. Then I remembered the name of the town. The bad thing is I had already done something similar a day or so earlier when I saw a sign for Bath Plumbing. What about kitchens and the rest of the house? Oh yeah, we are in Bath, NY. Duh!

07-09 First Presbyterian Church in Bath, NY

Today we toured the sanctuary of the First Presbyterian Church here in Bath, NY. It is one of five churches whose sanctuary was designed by Lewis Comfort Tiffany. Ladies in the church conduct tours on Wednesdays in July and August. It is a favorite for local brides because of its beauty and this long aisle.

The congregation was formed in 1808. The first church was built in 1825. When this church was outgrown, it was torn down and a new church built in the same location in 1877. It was built of locally quarried sandstone in a style called Victorian Gothic.

In 1895 a church member, Ira Davenport, hired Lewis Comfort Tiffany to redecorate the interior as a memorial to his brother, John, who had been a very active member of the church.

Tiffany is best know for his glass work, especially glass lamps. The church still has three Tiffany lamps. Two “acorn” shaped lights hang in the front of the sanctuary. These were originally gas lighted.

There is also a beautiful crown shaped chandelier in the narthex, which won a prize at a large exhibition before coming to the church.

Here is one of the Tiffany Glass side windows.

Here is the central Rose window made with Tiffany’s iridescent favrile glass. Its circular shape, used throughout the interior, represents eternity with no beginning or end.

The pulpit, the chancel rail, and supporting columns are made of white mahogany imported from India. The rails on each side of the pulpit are supported by 12 columns representing the 12 apostles.

On the front of the pulpit is a glass mosaic in a vine motif with leaves, tendrils and fruit referring to Christ’s words “I am the Vine”. There are 4776 glass pieces in the design.

Almost 30,000 glass pieces were used in the mosaics on the two railings.

There are seven pointed-arch niches behind the pulpit.

The panels in the niches appear to be more glass mosaics but are in fact delicately painted.

From 07-09 First Presbyterian Church Bath, NY

On the wall above the niches are metal panels beautifully painted to look like rich jewels.

We thoroughly enjoyed our tour and our time with the nice lady who showed us through the church. This is another place you will want to visit when in the NY Finger Lakes Region.

07-09 Glenn Curtiss Museum

Various people had told us the Glenn Curtiss Museum is one of the best attractions in the area, and they were right! Glenn Curtiss was an aviation pioneer. Click this link for more about him.

He started making bicycles as a teenager and became very successful with three stores in local towns. He advanced to making motorized cycles, designing and building the engines in his workshops.

On January 27, 1907 he became known as the “Fastest Man in the World” by riding the motorcycle seen below at a speed of 136.3 MPH at Ormond Beach, Florida.

A balloonist asked him to build an engine to power his balloon and that introduced Curtiss to aviation. He later joined a group, including Alexander Graham Bell, trying to build one of the first airplanes. That lead to the first public flight of an airplane in America with Curtiss at the controls of the “June Bug” on 7/4/1908. Here is a link to a video of a reenactment of that flight. The Wright Brothers had the first flight five years earlier. However they were very leery of the press and only a select few had every seen their plane fly. Below is a model of the “June Bug”. A full size replica is also in the museum.

He continued to make advancements in airplane design. Among many prizes he won was for the first flight from NYC to Albany over the Hudson River. Local volunteers restore Curtiss planes and build replicas in a workshop at the museum.

They are working on this replica of the plane that made the Hudson River flight. They plan to reenact this in the fall of this year.

Among his titles is “Father of Naval Aviation”. He was the inventor of the seaplane.

The museum workshop volunteers built and have flown this replica of one of Curtiss’s seaplanes called the “America”.

Curtiss developed the Curtiss JN-4D called the “Jenny”. Such pilots as Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart learned to fly in a Jenny. In WWI, 95% of American and Canadian pilots learned to fly in a Jenny.

The Wright-Curtiss P-40 was made famous in WWII by the Flying Tigers, a volunteer group of American pilots fighting in China.

After WWI, Curtiss branched out into other areas and became less directly involved in aviation. He became a Florida land developer. With friends he developed the communities of Hialeah, Miami Springs, and Opa-Locka.

He also was an early pioneer in the RV industry building the Curtiss Aerocar.

One of the aircraft companies he was associated with was Mercury Aviation. During slow times in the economy, the company added other products. I was surprised to see that they built this baby stroller. I’m pretty sure this is the kind my parents used when I was a baby. You could take off the handles and the foot rest on the bottom, and it became a walker.

There were other period things on display such as this organ which is similar to one my Grandmother played.

As I said earlier, this is a wonderful museum and well worth a visit. Allow several hours and use the headsets. They give a great explanation of the major exhibits.