January 4, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 4, 1963

Fri. Cloudy very light snow.  I washed again, men cut wood in the a.m.  Gerald went to Mary Ann’s about 3 P.M.  Carol went home from school with Linda and I went to a ball game.  N.Y. conservation man came.  (Mr. Scubner(not sure of name hard to read) from Gloversville) sold mountain.  Dolores called and said Louise was sick in bed and the house at the camp was a mess with broken water pipes and paper falling.

Comment:

The "camp" is Ferris Camp that Claude Ferris developed for the "city people", mostly hunters, to come up to and stay.  There were several cabins and also an empty swimming pool where Claude & Louise's two-year old son had drowned in many years ago.  After the drowning, they never filled the pool again.  Ferris Camp was a "beer joint" and was one of the first places in the mountains that had a television.  It was small, black and white with about a 12" screen that set high up in the corner of the bar very close to the ceiling. 

 One of my first memories of television was when my Dad took me and the other kids, Marilyn & Laverne, to see the Billy Conn-Joe Louis fight on June 19th, 1946.  Joe Louis won.  I was 7 years old.  

Dad said that Legs Diamond had visited the camp once to encourage Claude to sell his bootleg liquor and that Claude had been very scared of the famous gangster and had quickly complied with the request.

 The camp later became a Christian bible camp after Claude died. 

 Claude was relatively well to do and I remember once when my dad went there with me when I was about fourteen to borrow some money from Claude.  I seem to remember that Claude loaned him $200.  I remember that Claude was in the barn milking cows when Dad was talking to him and Claude was very jovial and respectful.
Delores was Claude's daughter about a year younger than I.  She married  Donald Armlin and he was shot and killed by a friend after he climbed up a tree to dislodge a treed raccoon.  His friend shot at the raccoon and missed but hit Donald in the chest killing him.  I heard that he climbed down from the tree and died along side of the road.