Cooperstown

Cooperstown, the town named for one family and run by another. Aside from the Main Street tourist trade, baseball really has very little to do with it. Founded by, or rather owned by James Fenimore Cooper's father, William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic is a good book that goes into the details both about the father and the son's involvement with the town. Then along about the 1880s came the Clarks. Not content with running the Singer Sewing Machine Company, and the Dakota as well as founding the Met and a number of other significant museums the The Clarks of Cooperstown have run their little vacation town for four successive generations.

It is a sweet little town, close to perfect, nestled on the South Shore of Otsego Lake. We set up camp at Glimmerglass State Park and made plans for a ride around the Lake on Wednesday. Our guide this time was Cranks from Cooperstown: 50 Bike Rides in Upstate New York, a very thorough guidebook to the area, and my daughter.

We had dinner at a dockside restaurant, admiring the Lake and what Amy felt was truly unusual, a lovely, cloud free evening.