Mountain Home, February 2024

FEBRUARY ON ICE

M O U N T A I N

HOME Pennsylvania & the New York Finger Lakes

Field to Flask The Myer Brothers in Ovid Keep the Family Farm in Great Spirits

By Lilace Mellin Guignard

Wellsboro Goes Wonka Hard Water Times in Hammondsport Snot Your Usual Race in Lock Haven

EwEind R F the as

FEBRUARY 2024

2

Volume 19 Issue 2

18 Field Notes

Field to Flask

By David Nowacoski

By Lilace Mellin Guignard The Myer brothers in Ovid keep the family farm in great spirits.

A triple dog dare moment.

22 Sadism with a

Side of Bacon

By Linda Roller

Lock Haven’s Frozen Snot Race blazes a brutal trail.

26 The Iceboat Cometh

and It Stayeth

By Lilace Mellin Guignard

6 A Little Fortitude in Every Bottle

An old sport is alive and chill in the Finger Lakes.

28 All Shall Be Well

By Ann Duckett More than a dash of success at Fee Brothers in Rochester.

By Gayle Morrow

At Zen Den Yoga and Wellness Center in Sayre.

30 Glory Hill Diaries

By Maggie Barnes Kenya comes home.

34 Back of the Mountain

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By Bernadette Chiaramonte

Tioga County and the Chocolate Factory

Icy what you did there.

By Gayle Morrow Extraordinary candies by extraordinary people.

Cover photo and design by Wade Spencer. This page (top) Joe Myer by April Haviland; (middle) Fee Brothers Bitters courtesy Fee Brothers Bitters; Highland Chocolates by Wade Spencer.

20 3

An afternoon of Sunday, FEB 18 music featuring The HG Treble Choir 2:30PM The Gmeiner Open Mic Group Coolidge Theatre Chris Eckert, Pine Pitch, Wellsboro, PA and YOU!

Peter, Paul and Mary

m o u n ta i n h o m e m ag . co m Editors & Publishers Teresa Banik Capuzzo Michael Capuzzo Associate Editor & Publisher Lilace Mellin Guignard

HG Theatre Arts Camp for Kids

Associate Publishers George Bochetto, Esq.

AUDITION DATE: FEB 14, 3:45 - 5:30PM

Art Director Wade Spencer

MARCH 8 & 9 7:00PM Coolidge Theatre

Circulation Director Michael Banik

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Cover Photo and Design Wade Spencer

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S a l e s R ep r e s e n t a t i v e Shelly Moore

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Managing Editor Gayle Morrow

Accounting Amy Packard

Contributing Writers Maggie Barnes, Ann Duckett, David Nowacoski, Linda Roller C o n t r i b u t i n g P h o t o g r ap h e r s Maggie Barnes, Bernadette Chiaramonte, April Haviland, Bob McGee, Mike McNeil, David Nowacoski

D i s t r i b u t i o n T eam Amy Woodbury, Grapevine Distribution, Linda Roller T h e B ea g l e Nano Cosmo (1996-2014) • Yogi (2004-2018) ABOUT US: Mountain Home is the award-winning regional magazine of PA and NY with more than 100,000 readers. The magazine has been published monthly, since 2005, by Beagle Media, LLC, 39 Water Street, Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, 16901, and online at mountainhomemag.com. Copyright © 2024 Beagle Media, LLC. All rights reserved. E-mail story ideas to editorial@mountainhomemag.com, or call (570) 724-3838.

TO ADVERTISE: E-mail info@mountainhomemag.com, or call us at (570) 724-3838.

AWARDS: Mountain Home has won over 100 international and statewide journalism awards from the International Regional Magazine Association and the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association for excellence in writing, photography, and design.

DISTRIBUTION: Mountain Home is available “Free as the Wind” at hundreds of locations in Tioga, Potter, Bradford, Lycoming, Union, and Clinton counties in PA and Steuben, Chemung, Schuyler, Yates, Seneca, Tioga, and Ontario counties in NY. SUBSCRIPTIONS: For a one-year subscription (12 issues), send $24.95, payable to Beagle Media LLC, 39 Water Street, Wellsboro, PA 16901 or visit mountainhomemag.com.

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Field to Flask The Myer Brothers in Ovid Keep the Family Farm in Great Spirits

Wade Spencer

By Lilace Mellin Guignard

6

M

yer Farm Distillers sits on Route 89 overlooking the west side of Cayuga Lake—that is, if you can get above the trees for the view.

It was probably more visible in 1868 when John and Joe Myer’s great-grandfather bought the Grove Farm to stake his claim outside Ovid, an area their ancestors helped settle in 1789. John, a fifth-generation farmer, took over the 900-acre farm from his father, LeConte, and now it’s one of the largest and oldest currently operating organic farms in the northeast. In 2012, he and his brother Joe, who lives in the farmhouse their father grew up in, opened a distillery on site, working together to bring the family farm into the twenty-first century.

See Field on page 8

The long view: Myer Farm Distillers is on the family farm that’s been worked for five generations—and there’s no end in sight.

7

(2) Courtesy Myer Farm Distillers

Field continued from page 7

The tasting room attached to the distillery—designed to evoke the malt houses of Scotland, from where their ancestors emigrated—is inviting. A feeling of warmth comes from the amber and honey-colored bottles on the shelves and from old photographs. It emanates from the copper still. But there’s more to the feeling than clever interior decorating. There’s contentment, a rightness that hums below the surface of things. The room isn’t fancy or adorned, and it doesn’t try to evoke another time or place. It is unapologetically now and here, almost as if it’s not just whiskey, gin, vodka, and liqueur that are crafted in this spot but also something rare and artisanal in the human spirit.

On the surface, this all seems like a straightforward story of traditions kept, legacies honored, land stewarded, and spirits distilled. It is a story of all that, but it isn’t straightforward and was far from inevitable. Even with a bond to a place going back centuries, belonging isn’t always easy.

Wade Spencer

A Tale of Two Brothers

8

John and Joe are two of eight siblings. John is the eldest son and third-born, and Joe is number seven. They stay in touch, with all but one living within an hour or so of each other. But when John went off to college in the seventies, he had no intention of returning. The environmental movement was getting started. John studied plant ecology and natural resources, and dreamed of a life working in environmental science. He did not miss milking cows.

“Jobs were scarce in the seventies,” John says. During his time at Cornell, he’d come home weekends and help on the farm. When he graduated with his BS in general studies in agriculture, he saw a way to be his own boss and put his own stamp on the place. It’s not like it’d always been a dairy farm. His grandfather raised meat chickens. When his dad was sixteen, in 1935, he’d switched to cows.

“I was interested in organic farming and wanted to give it Still going strong: a try,” John remembers. “Dad said, ‘You’re crazy. You can’t do (Top to bottom) it without chemicals.’” John saw that the equipment was worn the hip-roofed and out. He knew they had good soil, and he enjoyed growing pagoda-topped things. So, instead of replacing the milking machines, he sold still-house finished the thirty cows and looked around for earlier-style equipment in hand-cut and used for organic weed control before the boom in chemical chiseled stone is a nod to their Scottish use. In 1981, when he started transitioning to organic, there wasn’t the abundance of Amish and Mennonite farmers the heritage; brothers area has today. John was a maverick. While his first planting Joe and John Myer of organic wheat yielded a bumper crop, “I sat on it, trying to (l to r) have a rare bond that produces find the market,” he explains. No one wanted to pay extra for rare spirits using organic. It was a tough start. their copper CARL The farm was mostly organic by 1984. He focused on hay still from Germany; for horses, and soybeans, which sold easily. Slowly he added their award-winning corn and smaller tracts of spelt, barley, rye, oats, clover, alfalgin is just the right fa, and triticale (a hybrid of wheat and rye). His dad watched tonic for cold winter from a quarter mile away, where he’d built his house and lived days. with his wife, Ruth, and raised their eight kids.

So, the farm was prospering, John had a family of his own, but something was off. His brother Joe was living again on the family land, helping here and there, but working in Ithaca. John says simply, “I didn’t think he was happy. Joe had a creative curiosity that could get bored.” Year after year he watched his kid brother, whom he knew to be a multi-talented man with depressive episodes since

childhood, go through the motions of life. John started thinking of ways to involve Joe’s gifts, wondering what project they could work on that would get Joe back on the farm fulltime.

And happy.

The Poet and the Plastic Doll Joe is the public face of the distillery, and likely to be working in the tasting room if he’s not busy distilling, bottling, or labeling.

His is a smiling face with blue eyes that actually twinkle. He’s a poet, so may abhor that cliché (though it’s true). There are thirteen years between the brothers, and one of John’s strongest memories of Joe as a little boy is him holding the violin at age three. All the kids learned piano from their mother, who was the organist and choir director at Interlaken Reformed Church. Many siblings went on to learn other instruments, though John admits he was the least musical of them all (but the most farmer). Why did Ruth start Joe on the violin so early? John says, “I think Mom just decided that’s what Joe needed.” She used the Suzuki method—it creates an environment for learning music which parallels the linguistic environment of native language acquisition.

Joe, an artist in everything he does, is proficient in words, music, and color. It appears his mother recognized his aptitude early.

Perhaps it was when she realized he was a synesthete—when he hears a C-sharp he sees a deep violet. He experiences several other tones simultaneously as color, including 440 Hz Concert A—it’s what orchestral instruments tune to—as a silvery white. Joe was told growing up that “you’ve got to develop your talents.” It was a message he took to heart.

“Childhood was at times beautiful and magical, but at times it was traumatic and painful,” he says. An innately sensitive person, those extremes coexisted as naturally for him as sound and color.

His dad wasn’t home much—up at 4 a.m., home for lunch, back to work and home for supper at 6:30 p.m., office work, and then bed. Joe didn’t spend much time with him until he was old enough to help herd cows and unload hay. Then he rode around in the truck with his dad, who would give the kids Mounds candy bars to keep them quiet. Joe was thirteen when they sold the herd.

“I missed the cows and the chores—the rhythm of that life— so bad,” he says.

He loved falling asleep hearing his mother practicing Chopin’s nocturnes. “And Bach, especially on Sundays.” He describes playing Bach as “like dancing inside a four-dimensional geometric orchid.” When Joe was in fifth grade, he won a Suzuki violin competition that would take him and a couple dozen other students on a performing tour to play at Carnegie Hall, Atlantic City’s Boardwalk, and Disney World. But Joe had started having depressive episodes, and refused to go because he’d be too homesick. “John offered to travel the country with me and the group,” Joe says, “and camp with his then-girlfriend so that at least some family would be there with me.” Even though he didn’t go, he never forgot his brother had cared enough to make that offer.

Joe graduated from Roberts Wesleyan University in 1989 with a degree in music performance for piano and violin. But he wouldn’t stick with just one art form. Or just art. He’d missed cows so much he went to work for Doc Mehling on his dairy farm in Interlaken. While there, he developed his drawing and painting. ProSee Field on page 10

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Field continued from page 9

fessional artists would tell him he needed to pick one thing, but Joe, remembering what he’d been told about talents, responded, “I don’t think so.”

From the 1990s through 2010, Joe published poetry in journals, played violin and piano on professional recordings, and gave private music lessons. For twenty years he exhibited and sold his visual art.

Joe started JMyer Holsteins, a pure-bred stud bull husbandry business. He ran it for seven years, generating nationally and internationally ranked stud bulls. He was also working for John on the farm some of this time. “I love to work,” he says, “so I’ve usually worked sixty to eighty hours a week for most of my adult life.” In one of his poems, “In Your Path,” he describes the worlds found along the forest path that most people never see, and writes “beneath the calm moss, the ants are always working—.”

There was a lot going on beneath Joe’s calm exterior, too. His Dad’s mom, Susie, whom he considered to be his best friend, had died in 1987. His grandma’s non-judgmental and unconditional love had been his touchstone while he was figuring out who he was as a young man. He says, “When she passed, just six weeks shy of turning ninety-seven, I was devastated. Even after I 10

moved into this house of hers in 1991, I was bereft. I wandered the woods and fields and streams calling for her.” Once when hiking across fields to a neighbor’s abandoned house and farmyard, checking out various outbuildings, he went into a hog shed. “Just inside the doorway was a naked doll with its eyes locked open. Very startling to see as you might imagine.” He wrote a poem capturing the moment, which concludes with: Nothing escapes those unclosed eyes.

Every fall I come back to ask what that gaze is good for when your mouth is always shut, when you stay in just one place.

He says, “I guess I identified with feeling abandoned. My parents were loving and supportive, but being gay was an issue and sorting out that aspect of myself was a challenge, as it is for anyone who doesn’t fit into the mold of what is accepted.” As an introvert and an artist, Joe was a great observer and analyzer of life but “had just started to open my mouth and speak back to the world what I saw.”

By this time Joe had completed his MFA in poetry while still living on the farm

Wade Spencer

Continuing the family line: Their selection of flavored liqueurs pays homage to parents and grandparents by using old photographs and matching them to flavors reminiscent of sweets they used to give the brothers or, in their mom’s case, the coffee she needed to run a house, work a job, and raise eight children.

and working at Cornell, where he’d settled into a position in 2007 as an administrative assistant in Human Development. But, “I didn’t feel like I’d found my ‘work home’ yet, my place in the world.”

At a particularly low point in 2009, Joe experienced his dark night of the soul and heard a voice call to him, “Go see John!”

“Even though it was two or three in the morning, I got into my car and drove to John’s place,” he says. “He answered, thinking I was his dog at the door, and sat with me and let me get it all out.” Joe thinks this moment was the true start of them founding the distillery.

In 2010, Joe attended a distillers conference in Geneva. Unbeknownst to him, John went to a distillers conference in Rochester that same year. Joe came back with a clear message from the universe saying, “You must do this.”

John says, “I had no doubt that he could do it. He’s very organized and thorough—always has a good attitude.” Joe describes himself as an all-in guy when he’s doing something. Though he still plays piano and violin for himself, he doesn’t write or paint anymore. “Now,” John says proudly, “he’s making bourbon.”

See Field on page 12

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In the bleak midwinter: John Spencer and his daughter chat with Nikki Reese, tasting room manager and marketing assistant, as they stock up in preparation for making friends very happy over the holidays.

Field continued from page 10

From Planting to Pouring So, the brothers designed and built a facility. They bought a 650-liter copper pot still handcrafted by Germany’s oldest fabricator. Joe made his first wort—the base of whiskey—and distilled his first batch in June 2012. The tasting room opened its doors that October. First on the shelves was the John Myer Bourbon, which highlights John’s wheat. “It’s nice to be able to take some of the grain and keep it and see it get processed by my brother,” says John. It was quickly followed by corn whiskeys, ryes, gins, vodkas, and liqueurs.

Myer Farm Distillers is a New York State Farm Distillery, a designation showing they use at least 75 percent ingredients from within the state. More remarkable than that, it’s an estate distillery, a term indicating that all the grain comes from their own farm.

Most of the botanicals and fruits used are sourced within twenty miles. The ginger for the ginger vodka and ginger rye is grown in greenhouses five miles away at Good Life Farm (also the home of Finger Lakes Cider House). The organic grain is certified by Where Food Comes From Organic. “Being an artist, I like full control,” Joe admits. As they say, they plant the seed that produces the spirit.

And they honor those who planted the seed that produced the legacy they carry forward, though the parents and grandpar-

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ents whose faces grace the labels weren’t drinkers. Joe says of their late father “The man opened a bottle of wine at Thanksgiving and finished it at Christmas.”

Their parents tried some of their spirits, though, and “Mom did discover that she enjoyed the gin.” She also mentioned that she thought Joe’s beloved grandma “would be rolling in her grave if she knew I made the fig liqueur in her name,” Joe recalls. The photo on Electa Fig Liqueur (Electa was Susie’s middle name; she gave Joe Fig Newtons when he was little) is of her at age sixteen. He’d found the old negatives in the attic the year before they opened the distillery. That find, he believes, was something of a sign.

Their dad died in 2016 at age ninety-seven, and never got to taste LeConte’s Repair, a coconut liqueur reminiscent of the Mounds bars handed out from the glovebox. He did, however, come around to John’s farming methods, transitioning the 100 acres he still farmed in his seventies and eighties to organic. Ruth gave piano lessons up until she died two years ago at ninety-six.

“She always wanted to be called Ruthie,” Joe says, “but no one did.” So, he named the coffee liqueur Ruthie’s Music, both for her piano playing and the coffee she drank “from dawn ’til dusk.”

Her mother, Clara, also a church organist and piano teacher, has a chocolate liqueur in her name, made distinctive by the Vietnamese

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See Field on page 32 13

Courtesy Fee Brothers

Four generations of Fees: (l to r) John C. Fee IV as a baby, John C. Fee III, John C. Fee II, holding a photo of John C. Fee I.

A Little Fortitude in Every Bottle More Than a Dash of Success at Fee Brothers in Rochester

F

ailure is common among small businesses—nearly 65 percent close within the first ten years. Yet, through ingenuity and grit, Fee Brothers has navigated the financial hardships it’s met with a surplus of positivity. From Prohibition to the pandemic, perseverance has paid off for 160 years.

Founded in the heart of Rochester, the company established itself as a leader in the world of wine and spirits early on. Converting the original business started by patriarch Owen Fee in 1847 (it was a butcher shop, then turned saloon and delicatessen around 1863), widowed Margaret relied on eldest son James to assist with the daily operations. At the age of twenty-five, James opened a grocery-liquor store nearby, named James Fee & Company.

The year was 1864, and the cornerstone for success was placed. James soon began making wine, and then, within a decade, relocated to a larger space near the Genesee River.

Brothers Owen Jr., John, and Joseph joined him, assisting with the winery. Expanding into a liquor import business, they added California and European wines to their portfolio. In 1883 the name was officially changed to Fee Brothers. Each decade thereafter is capped with significant challenges and milestones.

Five generations later, brothers and 14

By Ann Duckett

owners Jon Spacher, CEO, and Benn Spacher, COO, are shaking things up in the cocktail industry. The archives provide a view of past paths taken. As a consumer-driven business, Jon emphasizes, “You need to keep reinventing yourself…What does the market want that we can legally provide to them?”

Fee Brothers has built a mighty empire distributed in four- and five-ounce bottles.

Its top-shelf bitters doled out in dashes and drops are stocked in the finest restaurants, cocktail lounges, and bars on every continent but Antarctica. From sophisticated cocktails to nuanced mocktails, it’s all about quality ingredients—the better the bitters, the better the beverage. These potent concentrates enhance the structure, add depth, and bring complexity to drinks (and food) across the board.

Regarding alcohol levels, the bitter truth is, Jon says, “A unique detail from the past that provides for an interesting present-day fact: most bitters are made with alcohol spirits as the base. Since the base for our bitters is vegetable glycerin, we were the only US bitters company to survive the Prohibition.

“As we kept to the same recipe, we are now the favorite bitters of those who enjoy non-alcohol drinks. There is a little bit of alcohol essence (not alcohol spirits) in the

flavorings, just like vanilla extract has alcohol essence.”

Not to muddle matters, but bitters were first used as digestive aides for various stomach ailments, a hangover cure, and added to wine or brandy to soothe aches and pains. Extracted from flowers, seeds, herbs, roots, bark, leaves, and more, you’ll find both digestive and cocktail bitters available today. And bitters are used as flavoring agents in dressings, marinades, and sauces.

Over the decades, Fee Brothers has diversified products to include cordial syrups (developed during Prohibition, it’s one of the most sustainable revenue producers, now with fifty-one to choose from) and cocktail mixes.

Brines like zesty deli dill pickle and olive, botanical waters (concentrated aromatics like elderberry, rose, lavender, jasmine, hibiscus, and orange designed to elevate cocktails), and a separate line of coffee flavoring (cordials) have been added, too.

Reflecting on the most recent global health crisis and how the pandemic affected business, Jon remarks, “We were lucky to keep our employees working, as we’re a food manufacturer. Home mixology became a big deal, so sales increased in that channel. Ready See Fortitude on page 16

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to drink—RTDs—and pre-made cocktail mixes became a thing, and we have been fortunate to be an ingredient in a number of them.”

Today’s market has been a slow evolution of consumer appreciation coupled with the education of consumer palates. When asked about the impact of the cocktail revival versus the bitters boom on sales, and which came first, Jon explains, “I think they feed on each other. Bitters are a part of the incredible mixology art that continues to evolve, but it’s so much more than bitters. The events that celebrate the art of mixology are so wonderful to spread education and enthusiasm.”

No matter your preferences, you can likely find them via a bottle of Fee Brothers—sweet, savory, herbal, citrusy are just a few options.

Jon says fan favorites among the twenty-two bitters offered include orange, aromatic, black walnut, and Aztec chocolate.

“Our new [2023] flavors are climbing the charts quickly, which include Turkish tobacco, habañero, and mole. One difference worth mentioning is that plum sells much more in Europe than it does in the US.” Should you have a surplus, get creative. Use them to the bitter end in myriad ways, depending on what you’ve got on hand. Fold into ice cream or milkshakes, whip into heavy cream, swirl into coffee or hot chocolate. Add a couple dashes to fruit salad, substitute for extracts like vanilla or almond in your baking recipes (frostings, too), or lavish liberally as you like to enhance dishes.

Remaining true to its city roots as it grew to meet shifting cultural and consumer trends, Fee Brothers stands in its fifth location in the downtown area, a historic hallmark honoring a 160-year-old spirits business. Production, distribution, offices, a small retail space, and a quirky museum are housed in a vast 25,000-square-foot building. “We produce millions of bottles of bitters annually,” says Jon. A notable verse, “The House of Fee by the Genesee since eighteen hundred and sixty-three,” reminds us that dreams do stand the test of time. By expanding and contracting to meet countless demands over the decades, Fee Brothers proudly honors its history and heritage as one of the country’s oldest family businesses. I’ll toast to that.

Visit Fee Brothers retail space (and museum) at 453 Portland Avenue, Rochester, or call (585) 544-9530. Hours are 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. Find them on Facebook and at feebrothers.com.

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Fortitude continued from page 14

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Ann Duckett, owner of Little Bleu Catering and Events, is a certified cheesemaker and recovering cheesemonger, who now devotes her time to educating and helping others find their cheese bliss through classes, presentations, and special events.

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David Nowacoski

Field Notes

A Triple Dog Dare Moment

By David Nowacoski

W

inter sure does create some weird situations, doesn’t it? Take the other morning for instance. I was up to feed the chickens slightly before dawn.

My eyes were not yet ready to be awake, and I was trying to coax them into working together so I could focus on the temperature gauge. That was a mistake. When they finally cooperated and saw that it was “freeze your nose hairs” degrees out, the rest of my body voted for a mutiny and tried to haul off back to bed. After some tense negotiations, we were bundled up and headed down to the barn with chicken feed and water in hand.

In the summer, our chickens run free in acres of pasture, but when there are no more grasshoppers hiding in that lush green grass, we move them inside a heated barn. It’s more like a chicken hotel than a barn. There are wrap-around windows to let in plenty of sunlight, yet they are completely protected from the wind and cold. It’s insulated, heated, and with ample roost space these are pretty bougie accommodations for our feathered friends.

As I got to work filling the feeders, the 18

chickens crowded around to be the first to grab those big kernels of corn. While they were busy eating, I gathered up their waterers. I stepped back outside and rinsed them out to make sure they were good and clean before refilling them with fresh water.

I set the water back in the barn and turned to close the door. Which is a steel door with your typical front door-style knob. Did I mention that it was cold out? I guess my hand was still a bit wet from cleaning out the waterer when I grasped the handle. I pulled the door shut and turned to head back to the house. But my hand stayed right there on the handle. My brain was confused...it had told my hand to let go. My hand immediately reassured my brain that it had, in fact, let go.

That scene from A Christmas Story flashed through my mind. You know the one: the Triple Dog Dare to touch your tongue to the flagpole. Yup, that’s me...my wet hand had immediately frozen to the metal handle.

A lot goes through your mind when you realize you are frozen to the outside of a door when it is really uncomfortably cold out. Is

this it? Certainly not the way I expected to go. I bet the life insurance company doesn’t even have a code for this one. Do I hear the chickens laughing in there?

Luckily, my hand warmed up the handle enough that the whole ordeal lasted less than a minute. I tucked my unfortunate appendage under my armpit until it returned to a normal temperature. As I gathered up the feed pail, I thought that you don’t get those kinds of issues happening in July. Farming in winter is another whole level of difficult here in the northeast.

David Nowacoski grew up on a farm in East Smithfield and lives just down the road a bit from it still, where he runs WindStone Landing Farms and Delivered Fresh (DeliveredFresh.

Store) with his wife (and high school sweetheart), Marla. He made his kids pick rocks from the garden and believes that sometimes a simple life is a more wise way to go.

19

Wade Spencer

We are the chocolate makers, we are the dreamers of dreams: Brett Harwick is coating tree stumps on the Selmi enrobing machine.

Tioga County and the Chocolate Factory Extraordinary Candies by Extraordinary People

By Gayle Morrow

A

long time ago, about thirty years, John Kravas was the administrator of what was then the Tioga County Human Services Agency. The agency was recognized nationally and internationally for its innovative service delivery system, and, thanks to the efforts of Emilia Martinez-Brawley, with the School of Social Work at Arizona State University, became involved with the United Kingdom in what was known as the International Exchange of Technology. What that meant was that social workers from the UK— the Scottish Highlands, specifically—came here, and social workers from here went there.

It was a wonderful opportunity to learn from each other—not only about new and different methods of providing human services, but about making chocolate confections.

Wait a minute. What?

John recalls meeting Garth Pattison during a castle tour and dinner in Scotland.

20

Garth was head of financial operations for the Highlands, and a chocolatier. Truffles were his specialty. He made them by hand, in his kitchen. John’s wheels were turning—why couldn’t some of the agency’s clients make chocolates to sell? Would Garth come to Wellsboro and show us how to do that?

He would and he did, and in 1994 Highland Chocolates—named for the Scottish Highlands—was born.

“Yes, it was naïve, but it’s wonderful to be naïve,” John says. “It wasn’t easy getting that candy factory started in the public sector.” He says the plan was to provide a new form of employment for the people with disabilities that the agency served. In the beginning, the workspace was a kitchen in one of the agency-operated apartments at the St. James complex in Mansfield. After a few years, operations moved to the little house on the corner of Shumway Hill and Route 6 in Wellsboro.

And, John adds, the plan was always that Partners in Progress, the Mansfield-based nonprofit vocational agency serving the “extraordinary people” who have ultimately made Highland Chocolates a success, would end up with the chocolate factory. But only “when it was ready.” That happened in 2012, says Erin Roupp, operations manager since 2022, when PIP took over the operations and all net proceeds returned to be reinvested in the program.

Truffles, while undeniably delectable as well as popular, proved to be extremely time-consuming and not particularly cost-effective. So, says Erin, “attention went to the next popular product, pretzel bark, which is still one of our top-selling items.” Since that decision, an abundance of chocolate creativity has led to an abundance of chocolate options, including fun yummies like Flatlanders (coconut-filled), Ridgerunners (coconut-filled

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with three almonds sticking up, like ridges), and Tree Stumps (peanut butter and caramel between two pretzels—guess what they look like).

Stop in for a free tour on Wednesdays, no reservation needed; for other days and for large groups, reservations are requested and payment may be required. While the chocolate factory is still on the corner of Route 6 and Shumway Hill, it’s in a new and improved building that contains the latest in chocolate-making equipment.

The first thing you might notice is the smell. Mmmmm. Jae Zugarek, production manager, says most of the folks working here don’t notice it anymore, but visitors can sure tell there is chocolate on the premises. The way the new building is designed, you can see into the production area from the gift shop, but, if you’re on the official tour, you’re invited inside to get the skinny on how things work.

In addition to actually making the candies, staff are packaging and labeling. There are two enrobing units—one for dark chocolate and one for milk—providing the “waterfall” of chocolate over the fillings.

There is an adjustable speed conveyer belt which, of course, brings to mind the famous I Love Lucy episode (it’s out there—just Google it), a blower to ensure all the chocolates have the same amount of chocolate on them, computerized tempering units to keep the chocolate at the proper temperature throughout the workday, a shaker table to jiggle the bubbles out of the molded candies, and, most important, a capable work force with an impressive amount of longevity. Luella Miller, for instance, working at the end of the conveyer belt where the finished candies are exiting, notes with a big grin that, “I will be here twenty-nine years this year.”

“We currently serve thirteen individuals, and, on any given day, there are six [working],” says Jae. “They all have different skills and talents, and they all do it better than you or I could. We try to match their strengths with their tasks. We want productivity, and for them to be happy with what they’re doing.”

“Some of their talents would blow your mind,” says Erin. “We’re very lucky to have them. Everyone has an amazing amount of pride in what they do. They really want to be here, and that’s refreshing in today’s workplace.”

Highland Chocolates are available locally at retail locations throughout the Twin Tiers, including the factory and the new (open just two years) downtown location on Main Street in Wellsboro. They have wholesale and corporate customers throughout the country.

“Over the years, we have worked to create custom-molded chocolates for many corporations, and we also do custom wedding, birthday, showers, or other special event favors,” Erin says.

Last year, Highland Chocolates won the Champion of the Pennsylvania Wilds 2023 Business of the Year award. The year before, Highland Chocolates was named the 2022 Artisan of the Year by the Route 6 Alliance.

“We are coming off a very successful year,” says Erin, adding that between October 2022 and October 2023, “we sold 29,267 Tree Stumps in 7,153 packages.”

And to think it all started with a trip to Scotland and a truffle.

The 82 Main Street store is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday, and from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. The factory is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Phone numbers are (570) 724-6777 and (570) 724-9334, respectively, or visit highlandchocolates.org.

WELLSBORO

21

Mike McNeil

’Snot as easy as it looks: Unidentified

participants scramble their way up boulders, squeeze down between boulders, and balance across freezing creeks in past events.

Sadism with a Side of Bacon Lock Haven’s Frozen Snot Race Blazes a Brutal Trail

By Linda Roller

“T

hey look like hills, they climb like mountains,” says Jeff Stover, creator of the Frozen Snot.

The Trails Collective, an organization of trails and trail lovers in fourteen states, agree, naming the Frozen Snot the most difficult event in the northeastern United States in 2021. It is described in a variety of colorful terms, but characterized officially as “a frigid adventure race, a mountain epic, 8.3 to 13.5 miles of frozen insanity.”

To create this level of difficulty Jeff Stover became a sadist. No, seriously. It’s even one of his formal titles. And for good reason. Jeff is a serious hiker who also does mountaineering—he started the Megatransect race, now known as the Boulder Beast, twenty years ago. But after he turned that event over to Dave Hunter, he asked himself: “How difficult a race could we make,

22

given our terrain, at the worst time of the year?” As the designer of some of the toughest races run in this region, Jeff knew the terrain. And the time of the year was easy— the coldest and snowiest. To run a race in late January or early February meant the course needed to be compact, to accommodate the minimal daylight. Jeff knew the extreme inclines and drops available on the Bald Eagle Mountain chain and concentrated on Zindel Park, near McElhattan, and the surrounding area.

These mountains have varied elevations, and the rock patches contribute to both the difficulty and the beauty.

Some of this race is on existing trail, used by the aptly-named Boulder Beast, but some of the trails are available only in the winter, as they’re overgrown during summer.

And since there isn’t much else happening with trail runner/hiker events until April…

To create something this crazy, it helps to have lots of like-minded hiking and mountaineering friends. Jeff had that, and the first Frozen Snot, in 2013, was wellattended and well-received. Many of the original runners became volunteers, working throughout the year on behalf of the event. Both Jeff and Luke Ebeling, who took over as race director in 2017, credit Tiadaghton State Forest personnel, all the emergency services folks in the area, and the city of Lock Haven. “Without [the city’s] approval, this couldn’t happen,” Jeff says.

The course is primarily on reservoir land owned by Lock Haven and in Tiadaghton State Forest. Today, over eighty See Sadism on page 24

23

(3) Mike McNeil

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WILLIAMSPORT Sadism continued from page 22

January 16 – February 29 reception

Tuesday, January 30, 4:30-6 p.m.

Gallery Talk 5 p.m.

TUES – THUR 2-8 p.m.

FRI 11 a.m.-4 p.m.

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volunteers work this course, providing aid stations, cheering participants, and serving as sweepers. Originally, the beginning of the course was the Army Reserve Center on Pine Mountain Road in McElhattan. When that location was no longer available, Jim and Lori Maguire stepped up and provided a base station at their nearby Restless Oaks restaurant.

About halfway through the first loop, after incredible climbs, just as you descend into the gorge, you smell it. It’s bacon! The world-renowned (of course it is!) Bacon Station is the brainchild of Mike Haffley, who did the race for five years. As a volunteer, he chose to man the aid station in the gorge, as this was a turn that was sometimes missed. Just for fun, he would build a fire for people to hang out and cheer the racers on.

“One of my buddies, Pat Vilella, is a butcher. So, I said— bring some bacon,” Mike recalls. The next thing you know, it’s “bacon for everyone.” Joanne Heimer, volunteer coordinator, now lists the supplies required for this station as a tent, fire, and thirty pounds of bacon. (Mike says there were thirty-two pounds fried over the open fire last year.) Mike also does breakfast sandwiches for his volunteers—“I treat them right”—and he ensures that the sweepers, the people who make certain no one is left behind on the course, get their piece of bacon, too. A dedicated worker planning on their bacon can get mighty grumpy if Mike runs out.

The smell alone brings the runners down the mountain, and Mike is recognized for his pork prowess. “I was doing a race in Thurmont, Maryland, where someone saw me and remembered me as the bacon guy at Frozen Snot,” he says.

But this is a grueling course in the dead of winter. It’s Joanne and the safety volunteers who make certain that folks on the Frozen Snot are safe.

“This race is run in ice, foot deep snow, and gales,” she says, so injuries are always possible. “Most sign up for the 13.5 mile race, but racers can drop back to the first loop [8.3 miles]. It’s a hard climb if you decide to continue.” The volunteers on ATVs can transport to medical care. Randy “Gorge Guy” Gillen and Scott “Gorge Hawk” Heimer ferry volunteers and supplies into the many aid stations along the course. If a runner has not made the Bacon Station by 10:30 a.m. (the race starts at 7:30), one of the ATV volunteers will transport them off the course. Runners must make the Zindel Park aid station, which is the link between the first loop (the shorter course) and the second loop (the longer course) by 12:30 p.m.

Central Region Trail Friends now administers the race instead of the city of Lock Haven, and it’s listed as an event in the Rocksylvania series, one of dozens of such events, most within an hour drive of Frozen Snot. And the warmth and passion from volunteers and event coordinators are making Central Pennsylvania a mecca for those who love roaming the mountains. Jeff sums it up this way: “When I moved here in 1979, everyone talked about fishing and hunting. Now mountain sports are big here. And Megatransect started it all.”

This year’s Frozen Snot—it’s the twelfth annual—is on February 3. Find out more at thefrozensnot.com.

Mountain Home contributor Linda Roller is a bookseller and writer in Avis, Pennsylvania.

Wellsboro Winter Celebration Downtown Wellsboro FEBRUARY 10, 2024

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25

Bob McGee

Do northern sailors dream of hard water: Blade runners allow iceboats to glide over lakes, including Waneta and Keuka, either leisurely or while racing. Joe Meade IV of Hammondsport likes racing his DN with the same number his grandfather sailed under.

The Iceboat Cometh and It Stayeth An Old Sport Is Alive and Chill in the Finger Lakes

By Lilace Mellin Guignard

T

he sailing community in the Finger Lakes is like a large family. So, what happens in winter when the spontaneous gatherings on the water stop, temperatures turn chilly, and bathing suits get moved to the back of the underwear drawer? Some just can’t wait till spring to feel the wind pull them along on the water.

These people trade keels for metal runners, and soft water for hard.

Hard water sailing, more commonly called iceboating, was a common form of winter transport in the Netherland canals and Gulf of Riga in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. According to Britannica, the first iceboat appeared on the Hudson River in 1790. Ice yacht clubs came about in the mid-nineteenth century, and soon people with extra money and time were racing each other in boats with crews of six or seven, reaching speeds faster than

26

any other vehicle at that time—breaking 100 miles per hour in 1885.

Joseph Meade IV, president of Mercury Integrated Manufacturing of Hammondsport, grew up a part of the Keuka Lake sailing community. In January 2010, Joe was at his grandfather’s memorial service at the Glenn H. Curtiss Museum where his grandfather’s iceboat was on display. Joe’s Dad (they’re all named Joseph Meade) had done some iceboating, but skiing took over wintertime recreation, and he hadn’t yet introduced his kids to it. But as he stood looking at the iceboat that day, Joe says, “David Farmer walks up to me and says, ‘What’s a perfectly good iceboat doing in a museum?

We were up on Waneta Lake sailing all day.

Would you like to come up with us tomorrow?’”

Iceboating is something you love or hate, Joe explains. “No one walks away

and says, ‘That was okay.’” He loved it, and thought, “How come nobody else is doing this?” Even though the local club— KEWASA (named for the lakes Keuka, Waneta, and Salubria)—began in 1957, it wasn’t very active then. Even five years ago, it was common to show up on a lake when conditions are good and see two other boats. Now it’s more like fifteen to twenty.

In 2013, Joe took his friend Rick Gordon—an avid boater and water-skier—for his first ride on ice. Joe had already built his own iceboat with a wooden mast. “It was a pretty windy afternoon,” Rick says of that first day on Lake Waneta, “and a couple of cones placed on the ice indicated windward and leeward marks to sail around. I remember going pretty darn fast and looking at how much that wooden mast was bending under load. I couldn’t believe it was not breaking. I took about three laps and gave

the boat back to Joe.” Within two weeks, Rick had his own ice boat and the two have been traveling and racing together ever since.

The boats they have are International DN boats, the largest and most popular class. It was the winner of a contest held by the Detroit News in 1937 for a design that people could affordably make at home and would be easily portable. According to DNiceboat.org, where you can download boat specifications and plans, the DN class “has embraced technical advances while keeping the home builder in mind.”

DN boats are single seaters used for racing. There are many classes, which can be more expensive, seat more than one, and are more comfortable. There’s nothing wrong with cruising, and Joe emphasizes that you don’t have to go fast for a perfectly nice tour of the lake. But Joe likes speed.

The DN has a long narrow hull, with a plank that crosses near the stern and sticks out for support. There are three steel blades, one front (attached to the tiller), and one at the end of each plank.

It’s light—around forty pounds.

Boats need a running start in order to break the friction of the ice. It looks like someone jumping into the window of a sports car when the doors don’t open—Dukes of Hazard-style—except they’re pushing the sports car and it’s inches off the pavement.

When you watch a video of a race from above (there are many online), there is something graceful and insect-like about the boats.

Joe has a sidecar for his and has taken his wife and kids out.

His thirteen-year-old son shares his fascination and now has a youth-sized iceboat of his own. Is it safe? Nothing about ice is safe, Joe often reminds people, but “It’s safer than golf,” he always adds.

As with any other recreational hobby, it’s important to know the safety procedures and etiquette, have the proper gear, gage ice conditions, and build your skill—and speed—incrementally.

Due to a phenomenon called apparent wind, boats can go forty miles per hour in ten miles per hour wind. Just like on a bicycle, as you start going faster you produce your own wind. An iceboat can go from zero to fifty in mere seconds. There is no brake; just turn upwind and let the sail out.

Though we don’t often hear about iceboating, Joe says anywhere lakes regularly freeze a group can be found. KEWASA has a Facebook group, and members watch the weather and plan where they’ll meet. The season starts on Lake Waneta, which is smaller and freezes first, then moves to the north end of Keuka near the college. “There has not been a year when we couldn’t sail locally,” Joe says, though admitting, “A few times it was just one day.” The last time Keuka froze completely was 2015.

If it sounds finnicky, it is. But this uncertainty seems to increase the anticipation and camaraderie amongst enthusiasts. For Joe, chasing ice means traveling to places he’d never have had a reason to go, meeting other iceboaters. He’ll never forget one night under a full moon on a glass-smooth lake in Vermont. “You could sail forever.”

For information about DN racing or sailing, check out the International DN Ice Yacht Racing Association at idniyra.org, watch the Finger Lakes Boating Museum events at flbm.org to see when Joe will give another lecture or workshop, or find the KEWASA Ice Boat Club on Facebook. Heck, if you see iceboaters on a lake, walk up and ask if anyone will give you a ride. They may be crazy, but they’re friendly.

Open Tues-Sat 10:00-5:00 Sunday 10:00-3:00

Preserving, Educating, & Celebrating Boating in the Finger Lakes

OPEN DAILY 10am - 5pm

www.flbm.org 27

Gayle Morrow

Self-care-uary: Join the rural yoga tribe at Kelly McElhaney’s studio, where there are lots of ways to lighten your spirit during the dark days of winter.

All Shall Be Well

At Zen Den Yoga and Wellness Center in Sayre

By Gayle Morrow

W

hat do you do in your “spare” time if you’re a critical care nurse at Robert Packer Hospital? If you’re Kelly McElhaney, you open a yoga studio/wellness center.

“We all have this reason for being in Sayre,” says Kelly, the owner and proprietor of Zen Den. “We do have a civic duty to each other to be well.” It’s a kind of cosmic/ karma thing, if you’re inclined to look at it that way. And she does. She says she loves the studio—it’s the welcoming place where she offers yoga and other kinds of wellness encouragements and opportunities—but adds that it’s what’s happening all around it that is also very wonderful, that being something of a resurgence of downtown Sayre.

“The studio is just one little piece of that,” she says.

Communities and the buildings and people in them do share some characteristics.

They have histories and stories to tell. They need attention, maintenance, purpose—and each other. The building at 204 Desmond Street, which is now home to Zen Den, has 28

been, among other things, a mercantile/ boarding house in the 1880s, offices for a newspaper, and studio space for a radio station. It’s had three fires. The last one, in the 1980s, left the building “pretty much a shell,” Kelly says. She and her family had been living in Baltimore, then moved to Sayre seven years ago (she is originally from upstate New York) for her husband’s job at Robert Packer. She explains that she “discovered my yoga practice” while living in California, and “realized if I wanted to stay in a high stress career, I needed an outlet.”

“Then my husband said, ‘Hey, why don’t you open a yoga studio?’”

“We bought the building in 2019,” she continues. “But no one had any idea the world was going to come to a screeching halt.”

With over 100 years of previous interior renovations—“God only knows what was in the air here!” Kelly laughs—it proved to be a good time for a family project that required wearing masks.

The repurposed studio space includes

a large room for yoga practice, pilates, chair yoga, and hot yoga. There is a dry salt therapy booth—think of it as a mini vacation at the beach, plus, as Kelly notes, “It is good for your respiratory tract and your skin,” an infrared sauna, rooms for massage, and opportunities for individual instruction.

There is some locally made merchandise for sale, the signage comes from local artisans, and even the yoga mats come from a Pennsylvania-based company.

“The space we’ve created here—it’s not so much my studio, but people have created a sense of community here with their wellness practice,” Kelly says. “I’ve never lived someplace where you have the beautiful sense of everyone trying to lift everyone up. Getting the community to believe in it all is really where we’re at.”

Hours and class schedules/class offerings vary. To find out more, call (570) 731-0920, or visit ruralyogatribe.com to book a time.

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Maggie Barnes

Glory Hill Diaries

Kenya Comes Home

By Maggie Barnes

“A

re you sure about this?”

I nodded at Bob as I released my seatbelt.

“Yes, it’s time.”

We had moved to the Southern Tier with three feline companions but had lost two in the span of a year. Now, in the depths of winter, I had decided my heart had healed enough to jump back into the kitty pool, so to speak.

It took more than an hour at the animal rescue to decide on the cats we wanted to interact with. There was a pair of brothers, Bruce and Benson, who made a great impression on us, and we loved the idea of keeping siblings together. Two for the two lost—perfect. But for some reason, I walked further back and found a low, square cage with a few smaller cats in it. Some of them rushed forward, meowing for attention, and I petted and cooed through the bars.

There was movement in the corner, and I saw a calico, very small and curled into the tightest ball she could manage. Her coloring

30

was gorgeous, swirls of rust and black with splashes of white, and I wanted to see her face, so I moved down the side and made those silly noises that humans make to get a cat’s attention. She raised her head and my heart leapt. She was beautiful, but her right eye had discharge and there seemed to be something wrong with the pupil.

“Oh, that’s Kenya. Isn’t she pretty?” The cat attendant stood behind me.

“Gorgeous,” I agreed, “but what’s with her eye?”

The rescue worker set down the stack of towels she was carrying and shook her head as she folded them.

“She was dumped. The eye was already infected, and they probably decided not to breed her. By the time we got her, it was too late to stop the damage. And the kennel setting is very tough on her, she catches every germ that comes in here.”

We had already settled on the brothers, I reminded myself. Two out, two in. But the pull of this kitty was not to be denied,

and I asked to hold her. I sat on the floor in the meeting room, and they set her down.

Kenya blinked and angled her head to see me out of her left eye. I fought the rising tears.

She moved into my lap and made the most extraordinary sound—not a meow, but more like a chirp, melodic like a mourning dove. I cuddled with her until Bob appeared in the doorway. I turned her to face him.

“Isn’t she sweet?”

“She’s beautiful.”

I handed her back to the attendant and got to my feet.

“Are we ready to take the Brothers Catamazov home?” I forced myself to leave the room without a look back, despite the ache in my chest.

We found the coordinator and informed her we would like to adopt Bruce and Benson.

“And that little calico,” Bob added.

I spun around.

“What?”

“You think I didn’t see how you looked

at her?” he laughed. “If we left without her, you’d be miserable.”

“But that’s two out and three in! We still have Leila. Four cats? We’re outnumbered.

They could mutiny! Besides, she’ll get adopted soon, she’s too sweet not to. The next lap she sits in will be her person.”

Bob nodded. “Yes, it was.”

An hour later, we had three cat carriers lined up in the middle of the living room and called our old girl Leila out of the bedroom.

She rounded the corner and stopped in her tracks, looking from the boxes to us with a glare of increasing betrayal. She had barely peeked inside the first carrier before she whirled and stomped back to the bedroom.

“Okay!” I said triumphantly. “That could have gone worse.”

When we opened the carriers, the boys stepped out in unison, tentative, but willing to explore. Kenya, on the other paw, rocketed out the moment she saw the door move. She launched across the room, banked a left turn into the kitchen, and was gone. I had never seen an animal move that fast. There was no sign of her. We looked everywhere.

“How did she get out of here? And

where did she go?” Bob headed down the hallway, though we had not seen her exit the kitchen.

Twenty minutes of searching produced nothing, and I started to worry. I called her, shook the treat box, crawled around on all fours. I sat on the floor with my back against the dishwasher and tried to think logically, which my mother, a series of unfortunate boyfriends, and my high school English teacher would tell you is not my greatest talent.

“She never left this room,” I said out loud. “Therefore, she is in this room.” I had already checked all the cabinets and the pantry. “What is available for her without opening anything?” My eyes fell on the upright freezer. There was a gap between it and the floor, but good Lord, there’s no way she could have fit under there. She’s small, yes, but your average slice of pizza could barely clear that slot.

I got the flashlight out of the kitchen desk and flopped on my belly before the freezer. Sweeping the light back and forth I found a tribe of dust bunnies living peacefully, enough crumbs to build a bakery, and…

wait! Was that? Yep. One shining eye. An infected eye that couldn’t absorb light anymore.

Kenya today? Well, our herd is back to three—Lelia and Bruce have both left us, and we added our first dog. It is a herd that Kenya rules as princess. Though the dog outweighs her by a multiplier of eight, if she deems that he should not leave the bedroom, she needs only to station herself in the doorway and he does not pass. To add insult to injury, she doesn’t even look at him, just cleans her face contentedly while he whines to be rescued.

She demands lap time with both of us each day, and emits her happy chirping while being told how pretty she is. The lack of vision in her right eye does not affect her at all.

As she purrs like a motorboat and slow blinks at me, I often wonder what would have happened if we had left that day without her. Then I realize that’s silly. She only had one home waiting for her…ours.

Maggie Barnes has won several IRMA and Keystone Press awards. She lives in Waverly, NY.

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Field continued from page 13

cacao roasted by Rue Claire in Lodi, who also grows the lavender for their lavender vodka.

Nikki Reese, the tasting room manager and marketing assistant, is behind the counter when John Spencer, a regular, walks in and starts stacking bottles by the register. He and his daughter are buying for friends they’ll see over the holidays. Having introduced these friends to Myer Farm spirits, he jokes, “We’re like mules now.” His favorite is the single malt bourbon. Nikki—whose favorites are the coffee vodka, wheat whiskey, and Cinnamon Lake flavored whiskey—rings them up. She’s also the mixologist and shares her original recipes online. On the counter is a display of stainless steel and copper jewelry for sale, featuring Cayuga Lake stones, designed and made by John and Joe’s sister, Denise. Their sister Cindy works in the tasting room as well.

Myer Farm spirits have won many awards since 2012, with their most prestigious ones in 2019 from the American Distilling Institute at the crafts spirits conference in Denver. Their Cayuga Gold Barrel Aged Gin won double gold and best in category. The Myer Farm Gin, Joe’s favorite, also won a gold. After the pandemic, Joe says he stopped sending products out to compete. He’s happy with where the business is now and has not had a depressive episode since they opened.

“When I was younger,” says Joe, “I abhorred business and people who cared about money in any way. I was an artist, and focusing on making art was all that mattered to me.” But now he realizes how much creativity goes into starting a business, “right down to what the building looks like and smells like.” His goal is not to grow bigger, but to keep evoking a specific reaction in customers. He likes to hear them say, “This is the best spirit I’ve ever had. It’s a work of art.”

As for John, “I’d like to see the farm prosper.” He turns seventy next year and has ideas about who might carry on after him, but adds it’s at least fifteen years down the road before he hands anything over. John thinks that being on the Cayuga Wine Trail is a great spot for their distillery. “Thirty years ago, the Finger Lakes couldn’t make a red wine to save their lives. But now!”

Both think their parents liked seeing their sons working together in the place they grew up. Terroir, the environmental and geologic factors that winemakers credit for the distinctive taste of their grapes, is harder to detect in spirits because of the distilling and aging. But since they grow their grain organically, Joe says there certainly is an aspect of that to what they produce. “The soil nurtures the grain in a different way. The soil is a living thing.” He credits the importance of place in other ways, too. “I tried to move away and missed the fields so much,” Joe says. “I had to move back and accept that sometimes staying in one place is just fine if you know how to move around the spheres and circles of life in a way that draws the people to you who you want to interact with.”

You can interact with Joe, the staff, and the spirits at Myer Farm Distillers at 7350 State Route 89 in Ovid. Winter hours are 1 to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday. Find out more at myerfarmdistillers.com, on Facebook, or give them a call at (607) 532-4800.

Their spirits are also sold throughout Ithaca and the central Finger Lakes, but, given that estate distilleries are few and far between, you might as well go right to the source. It’s worth the drive.

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B A C K O F T H E M O U N TA I N

Icy What You Did There

T

By Bernadette Chiaramonte

he beauty of Seneca Lake is worth seeking out any time of the year. As I battled the wind this frigid day, I was stopped in my tracks by the pier house in Watkins Glen.

Its cheeriness was highlighted by the sculptural display of ice on the ropes, clinking and gleaming in the wind and sun.

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Beth, an experienced trail runner and hiker, suffered life-threatening injuries in 2022 after losing her balance and falling down a hill. She was rushed to UPMC Williamsport’s Level II Trauma Center and treated for multiple broken vertebrae, ribs, and bones, as well as a concussion, lacerations, and hypothermia. “The UPMC team responded in amazing ways,” Beth said. “I felt like I had the entire hospital ready for me.” To learn more, visit UPMC.com/ChooseNCPA.

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