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If you’re a regular visitor, you may have noticed this advertisement for Ithaca’s ‘Light in Winter’ festival:
The Light in Winter staff has kindly offered two free tickets to one lucky mental_floss reader. First, a little more info on the festival:
“Join us in Ithaca this month as science and art intersect to explore the many facets of ‘Identity.’ Where else will you see superheroes, robots, world explorers, cosmic gardens, a musical dim sum and one of South Africa’s greatest musicians, all in one weekend? Get your ticket and hotel packages now, and make sure to visit Ithaca for Light in Winter, Ithaca’s unique festival of science and the arts.”
If you’re going to be in upstate New York next weekend – or you’d be willing to make the trip – here’s how you can win free tickets:
Leave a comment with the most interesting trivia tidbit about upstate New York. We’ll pick a winner on Tuesday.
Rather not leave it to chance? Book your tickets at LightInWinter.com.
(And if any other festivals want to allocate part of their marketing budget to mental_floss, e-mail me.)
Comments (23)
Comment
Rod Sterling, the creator of the Twilight show, used to teach at Ithaca College.
posted by Kate on 1-13-2008 at 1:53 pm
The above was a typo– I meant Rod Serling.
posted by Kate on 1-13-2008 at 1:58 pm
Beside the fact that I live only 45 minutes away from Ithaca, (and that they are one of my hometowns football rivals) many great authors have lived in Ithaca or have included it in their novels, here is a short list:
Alex Haley, Author of “Roots: and American Family” -Native
E.B. White, Author of the classic “Charolett’s Web”
Many books of Kurt Vonnegut, including Slaughter House Five (one of the best books of the 20th century, in my opinion) are set in Ithaca
Also it a gorgeous place not far from the Adirondacks.
And just to plug my own homestead:
Ilion, NY is home to the Remington Arms, one of the biggest places of gun and rifle manufacturing, and manugactured the first type writer, invented by Christopher Natham Sholes.
There is a little plaque with him name on it in our town square.
One more fact, most places in uppstate New York are named after places in classical greek literature (as in ITHACA *wink wink*). Ilion is a bastardization of Iliad, the Most famous work by Homer.
I hope thats enough to win, because I would REALLY REALLY like to go….
If not, hope you had fun learning a little…
posted by Alicia on 1-13-2008 at 3:28 pm
When I visited New York last year I was very (pleasantly)surprised to hear that there was a Wine Country in Upstate New York that puts out some very nice award winning wines.
posted by CropTillDawn on 1-13-2008 at 3:57 pm
Rochester NY, Home and/or birth place of Kodak, Xerox, Bauch & Lomb, George Eastman, great Universities and Colleges and many many beautiful places also has the distinction of (probably) more serial killers ( from here) per capita than anywhere!! I don’t know the numbers but we have had more than our share! Some killed here and some went elsewhere. We even have ties to Jack the Ripper!! look it up.
posted by Jude on 1-13-2008 at 3:58 pm
The Hancock International Airport in Syracuse, New York is home to the world’s largest snow plow.
I don’t want the tickets, I just wanted to share my favorite upstate New York fact. I moved away from Syracuse this past August. I now live in Texas and I never plan on seeing snow again in my life.
posted by Sandy on 1-13-2008 at 4:38 pm
The Baseball Hall of Fame was started by a walthy resident of Cooperstown, who wanted the place to survive the depression without dirty and distasteful industry lowering the status of ‘his’ village. He figured that tourism was the answer, so he had some of his lawyes contact the big leagues with the offer — I’ll build and staff the museum if you’ll stock it with exhibits.
By the way, Kurt Vonnegut’s early novels, such as ‘Player Piano’ were set in the Mohawk Valley because he worked for General Electric in Schenectady when he was writing them.
posted by Fiddlenshim on 1-13-2008 at 5:03 pm
Here are a couple of fun facts:
In Ontario County, Hill Cumorah and Palmyra are celebrated as the birthplaces of the Mormon religion.
Ontario County also has a unique natural phenomenon know as a “burning spring”. Sometimes it’s water, sometimes it’s fireballs…it’s caused by natural gases that build up under the surface.
posted by rebecca on 1-13-2008 at 6:09 pm
Those little tree air fresheners that a lot of people have in their cars are made in Watertown, NY. Wes Craven taught at Clarkson University in Potsdam. Peter Ostrum, who played Charlie in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is now a large animal vet in upstate New York. Aaaand you can get the most delicious hot dogs in northern New York, called Glazier hot dogs.
posted by Kristen on 1-13-2008 at 7:05 pm
While in Glens Falls, NY, James Fennimore Cooper saw a cave which in spired “The Last Of The Mohican’s” This was a segment of the Leatherstocking Tales, which are otherwise set in the Mohawk Valley. The book later inspired the movie “Drums Along the Mohawk”. The original movie stared Randolph Scott and is shown daily at Fort William Henry, in Lakr George, NY. The fort was the site of the Battle of Lake George in which the French took the fort and then burned it. The current incarnation was also burnt, in the 1960’s, and rebuilt once more.
By the way, Ithaca is gorges (inside joke).
posted by gus on 1-13-2008 at 7:23 pm
Rachel Ray worked at an IHOP in Lake George, NY
posted by Jessica on 1-13-2008 at 11:24 pm
Millard Fillmore, thirteenth president of the US was born in Summerhill with a nice replica of his log cabin in Moravia. We also have the Auburn Doubledays, 2007 champions of the New York-Penn League in Class A baseball.
posted by Matthew Baildon on 1-14-2008 at 2:33 am
George Fairchild, the founder of what later became IBM, was born in Oneonta, NY
Lucille Ball was from Jamestown, NY
Elmira, NY was the site of a notoriously horrible Civil War prison camp. Mark Twain lived there for a time and is buried there.
James Fenimore Cooper enjoyed the first wide- spread popularity in the country as an author of popular fiction.
Otsego Lake in Cooperstown is the headwaters of the longest canoe regatta in the world - 70+ miles every Memorial Day weekend.
Rod Serling was born in Binghamton, NY and attended Cornell Univ.
Carl Sagan was a professor there, of course.
If I win please give my tickets to Alicia. She sounds like she really wants to go!
posted by karen on 1-14-2008 at 3:30 am
This quip from A Chorus Line has always stuck with me. It isn’t about Ithaca, but it’s kinda upstate New York, and that’s enough for me!
“I thought about committing suicide. But then I realized, to commit suicide in Buffalo is redundant.”
posted by Liz on 1-14-2008 at 5:21 am
Ithaca is where the the toothbrush was invented. (Had it been invented elsewhere, it would have been called the teethbrush)
Just kidding, Ithaca rocks, I live about 30 mins from there. Interesting tidbit: The 2nd highest waterfall in NY is located in Taughannock State park, interestingly only a short drive through wine country to the highest waterfall located on Seneca Lake. Both eclipse the height of Niagara Falls.
posted by Dan on 1-14-2008 at 6:52 am
Writer Gregory Maguire’s first books were set in the Adirondacks around the Lake Placid region. He went to college at Albany State.
Ironically, the only place in the Adirondacks that receives cell coverage going up I87 is near the exit for “Paradox Lake”. (No. I’m not kidding. Although, they are planning on putting up another cell tower….)
The Adirondacks region was not only big during the 1800s for sanitariums (Many of their ruins can still be seen today), but there are a number of “company towns,” towns whose sole existance is due to mines throughout the area.
Northern New York played a number of important roles during the War for Independance, the French - Indian War, and the War of 1812.
Until the base was decommissioned in the mid ’90s, the Plattsburgh Air Force base was number 3 on the list of possible space shuttle landing sites, being one of the largest flightlines in North America. (Far larger, actually than the commercial flightlines just north in Montreal’s Trudeau and Mirabel airports….)
I’m not really looking for the tickets. Unfortunately, I no longer live up that way. I just wanted to share a few things.
posted by ACute Angle on 1-14-2008 at 8:34 am
Oh, and I forgot my favorite: A fort (nicknamed Fort Blunder, I forget it’s real name) that was built on the wrong side of the Canadian border to supposedly keep the US safe from invading Canadians. No one realized that it was in the wrong place until after it was built and was summarily abandoned. It didn’t actually fall on US soil until after the boundary line along the parallel was agreed upon, so it was never able to be used. If you go up Lake Champlain just north of Rouses Point, you can see the derelect ruin jutting out into the lake. It’s actually kind of cool, a strange reminder of a time when we were at war with out neighbors to the north.
posted by ACute Angle on 1-14-2008 at 8:40 am
The fingerlakes region is home to one of the purest freshwater lakes– Lake Skaneateles, so pure that the water is not even filtered before being delivered to the surrounding towns for drinking.
We also have one of the most polluted lakes in the world– Onondaga Lake. Thanks to industrial dumping it’s full of mercury and salt (some people tell me there’s like four inches of mercury on the bottom) and stinks to high heaven on a warm summer day. For some reason people still fish out of it (I’m almost sure no one eats what they catch.) No word yet on if anyone’s caught Blinky.
posted by Andie on 1-14-2008 at 10:44 am
The Finger Lakes Wine Region, as we know it now, was once the world’s largest producers of Hops. It out produced any other region in the world in the last quarter of the 1800s. Alas to all of us beer lovers, prohibition and the realization that the land was more valuable for its vistas and for growing grapes led to the abandonment of growing hops here. The hops industry was also responsible for major innovations in the railroad industry to get those hops up (and down) large gradients and into the cities for processing.
Upstate NY is also the home of Glenn Cutris, who’s early works included the world’s fastest motorcycle and was one of the only federally contracted aircraft fabricator other than those guys from OH. The Curtis Ginny was one of the work horses for the armed forces during and after WW1.
And also, don’t forget about the albino deer at the Seneca Army Munitions Depot. The only herd of white deer maintained to warn of radiation and cemical leaks of our nation’s ammunition supply.
Ditto on the tikets to Alicia if I win. 2 small kids and a 2.5 hour drive both ways do NOT mix.
posted by BrewmasterJ on 1-14-2008 at 12:56 pm
An interesting eccentric, Eleazer Williams , died in 1858 at Hogansburg, NY. His was an interesting life, too ziggity-zagged to justly relate here, but he’s probably most famous now as a lost dauphin claimant despite the fact that he was Native American and looked very little like the Bourbon family. A house in Hogansburg is known as The Lost Dauphin’s House and has been renovated as a hostel. Hogansburg is also known as Akwasasne which means “pheasants drumming.” Pheasants drum their wings against their breasts.
posted by Vorple on 1-14-2008 at 3:36 pm
Just my personal nit-pick: Upstate New York is not everything north of NYC. Where I come from (Western New York), upstate is the area north of Albany (the Adirondacks/Lake Champlain region). For the curious, Ithaca is technically in Central New York.
Carry on.
posted by Heather on 1-16-2008 at 9:04 am
To Heather (#21):
In light of an article I read today about announcements made by NY’s very own governor Spitzer, I think the Governor may need to revisit his own remarks. I agree with you on where “Upstate” lies, having lived there myself for many years, but it would seem that the esteemed govenor may believe something else entirely.
See the attached website for the article.
posted by ACute Angle on 1-16-2008 at 1:07 pm
Ooo… darnit….
www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/stories/2008/01/14/daily29.html
posted by ACute Angle on 1-16-2008 at 1:07 pm