Author: Jaybells
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This video includes Grossinger's Catskill Resort Hotel and The Pines. I went past Kutsher's Hotel and Country Club but at this point it was 95% demolished except for a old small out building that still had the name painted on the side. (April 2015) Still Images on http://www.FilmByAir.com Some info on the Borscht Belt from Wiki: Borscht Belt hotels, bungalow colonies, summer camps, and קאָך-אַליינס kokh-aleyns (a Yiddish name for self-catered boarding houses, literally, "cook-alones") were frequented by middle and working class Jewish New Yorkers, mostly Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants and their children and grandchildren, particularly in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s. Because of this, the area was also nicknamed the Jewish Alps and "Solomon County" (a modification of Sullivan County), by many who visited there. Well known resorts of the area included Brickman's, Brown's Hotel, The Concord, Friar Tuck Inn, Gibber's, Gilbert's, Grossinger's, Granit, the Woodbine Hotel, the Heiden Hotel, Irvington, Kutsher's Hotel and Country Club, Lansman's, the Nevele, The Laurels Hotel and Country Club, The Pines Resort, Raleigh, Silverman's River View Hotel, Stevensville, Stiers, the Tamarack Lodge, and the Windsor Regency. Two of the larger hotels in High View (north of Bloomingburg) were Shawanga Lodge and the Overlook. One of the high points of Shawanga Lodge's existence came in 1959, when it was the site of a conference of scientists researching laser beams. The conference marked the start of serious research into lasers.[2] The hotel burned to the ground in 1973.[3] The Overlook remains in a different form, no longer functioning as it was in its heyday. The Overlook had entertainment and summer lodging through the late 1960s and was operated by the Schrier family. It included a main building and about 50 other bungalows, plus a five-unit cottage just across the street. Some of these hotels originated from farms that were established by immigrant Jews in the early part of the 20th century. The New York, Ontario & Western Railway served the area with passenger service from Weehawken, New Jersey, until 1948. The railroad was abandoned in 1957. Despite the improvement of travel routes such as the original New York State Route 17, the area is no longer a major travel destination. The decline of the Catskills resorts was apparent as early as 1965. As ethnic barriers in the U.S. declined and air travel to distant resort locations became more convenient and affordable, Jewish American families in New York City reduced their patronage of Catskills resorts; by the early 1960s, between a quarter and a third of Grossinger's annual visitors were non-Jewish guests.[4] In the social and cultural upheavals of the 1960s, traditional resort vacations lost their appeal for many younger adults.[4] Smaller, more modest hotels such as Youngs Gap and the Ambassador found themselves in a niche with a vanishing clientele and closed by the end of the 1960s. The 1970s took a toll on more lavish establishments such as the Flagler and The Laurels.[5] In 1986 Grossinger's closed, and the property was abandoned by new owners midway through a demolition and rebuilding of the old resort. Any benefit gained by Grossinger's largest historic rival (and the largest of all the Borscht Belt resorts), the Concord, was ephemeral, as the latter filed for bankruptcy in 1997 and closed a year later. In 1987, New York's mayor Ed Koch proposed buying the Gibber Hotel in Kiamesha Lake to house the homeless. The idea was opposed by local officials.[6] The hotel instead became a religious school, like many old hotels in the Catskills.[7]