Living In TheAdirondacks

By Lauren Yates

The Lake Placid-North Elba Historical Society’s new director and collections manager, Sophie Morelli, has his tory with Lake Placid. Morelli is only 24, but her list of achievements in Lake Placid runs deep: an adjunct English professor at Paul Smith’s College, a boat steward for the Adirondack Watershed Institute, a published poet, a playwright, a former varsity tennis and volleyball player, a former Lake Placid Middle-High School Student Council vice president and LPHS Winter Carnival queen. Her interests seem boundless. Morelli says her new position with the historical society is “a little bit out of my wheelhouse,” but as someone who has a master’s degree in education from SUNY Potsdam, her own history shows that she’s equally adept at learning new things as she is teaching. While Morelli said that her relationship with history in general hasn’t been at the forefront of her academic career, the history of Lake Placid has always interested her. “Definitely, growing up here led me to just always have an inherent interest in the history of Lake Placid,” she said. Morelli the third generation of women in her family who have made their home in Lake Placid and graduated from LPHS. She’s been learning about the history of the area her entire life, shuffling through her own family archives that have photos of her grandmother who sat on the LPHS Winter Carnival court two generations before her. Those Nordic sweaters, like a uniform for the carnival court, were worn by both women. “It’s really cool seeing how strong tradition runs in this town,” she said.

Since starting the full-time job with the historical society on Jan. 3, Morelli’s learned a lot more about Lake Placid.

While the museum is closed for the winter, she’s working with former Director and Collections Manager Courtney Bastian on some administrative work, like getting the society’s newsletter together, sending out thank you letters, sending emails and updates, and coordinating the society’s winter lecture series. Morelli said she’s also learning how to detail and store artifacts. She said a lot of people who live or have lived in Lake Placid send their old photos and other items to the society for archiving. Once the society’s museum on Station Street opens this summer, Morelli said her job will be like a “whole different position.” She’ll shift her office at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts Annex to the museum, where she’ll be working on a new exhibit about the Northville-Placid Trail centennial that will feature some photos and a history of the trail. Her enthusiasm for the work was visible in her smile. Morelli’s new position has brought her own history full circle in a way. As she sat in her office at the LPCA and music flowed in from a class outside her door, she said she’s spent her whole life doing theater in that building. She keeps in touch with those roots, too, often volunteering with the LPHS theater program.