Does anyone know what happened to mainlynorfolk? I really hope it’s not dead for good, it is an incredible site.

This is how I remember one day at Pete Seeger's house when I was a tween, with a little artistry in the telling.

I don't want to imply that Pete and my dad were close friends. They were more like casual friends who had also been colleagues on some community projects. From my child's perspective, I remember Pete as a nice, regular sort of guy.

I thought y'all in this group might find it interesting.

...

Making Maple Syrup with Pete Seeger

When Dad stopped by Pete’s cabin to chat, I was usually in for extreme boredom. Not this time, though.

The skinny old graybeard came down the hill, careful of the patchy snow, lugging a sloshy 5-gallon pail.

Crap! I thought—maybe not that exact word, but the sentiment was there. Now I’m stuck.

The old graybeard wasn’t the problem. My dad was. Dad was a talker. Loved to talk to anyone and everyone, and seemed to know people everywhere. And he definitely knew this graybeard, Pete Seeger. Old friends. Dressed alike, too, in flannels, knit caps, and heavy boots. Dad’s beard wasn’t gray yet, though.

You might have heard of Pete. He was famous at one time. Some still remember him, I’m sure. A folk singer and political activist from the post-WWII era, a member of the Weavers. Dad said he was the one who sang “This Land Is Your Land.” I’ve since learned it was a Woody Guthrie song, but Pete performed it often and helped make it popular.

Of course, I only knew that song because Dad sang it when we hiked. And it’s not like Pete was in Van Halen or KISS.

Not sure how long he and Pete had known each other, or how they met. But Beacon, New York, Dad’s hometown and Pete’s adopted home, was a small town, only around 13,000 folks. Also, Pete lived at the foot of Beacon Mountain, and Dad had been scrambling up and down those mountain trails since he was a kid. I’d be surprised if they hadn’t met.

...

Many’s the time Dad and I had parked on Pete’s road, a convenient spot for accessing the hiking trails on the mountain. And sometimes, coming or going, we’d see Pete in the yard, and he and Dad would chat. Forever, it seemed. Yak, yak, yak, their bearded jaws flapping. With me standing there bored to tears and ready to go.

Used to be, Pete had a dog I’d play with—Rex? Tigger? I can’t remember. A husky or something, though. Real friendly. He had a teepee for a doghouse! I’d had an inflatable play teepee when I was six or so, so the dog and I were practically blood brothers. But the dog and the teepee weren’t there anymore.

The only thing still cool about Pete was that he lived in a log cabin—made of real logs! Not some so-called cabin that was just a weekend house in the woods, or even one that faked it with log-look siding. Nope, real logs stacked on top of one another, like Lincoln Logs!

But this wasn’t like every other time I’d had to wait and suffer.

“Whatchya up to, Pete?” said Dad.

“Making maple syrup.”

...

Next thing you know, we were up the hill. Pete pulled a sap-filled pail off the tap. He told me the sap runs in spring, when it thaws. It didn’t taste like much, barely sweet at all. I admired the tap and the sap dripping out. But the pail absolutely fascinated me. It was a Dunkin’ Donuts bucket, labeled “lemon filling” on the side. Pete said they gave it to him free. I approved of free.

Down by Pete’s cabin, he had sap boiling down and steaming. We added the new pail to the basin. It was a long steel box, blackened on the outside, perched on some rocks over a hardwood fire.

Toshi came out and invited us in for breakfast. That was his wife. She was making buckwheat pancakes topped with Pete’s first batch of maple syrup. He apologized because he’d burned the sap a little. It was good, though, just kind of toasty. But then, I’ve always preferred a darkly flavorful Grade B syrup.

She served home-canned quinces with the pancakes. Wasn’t sure then what a quince was (still not), but they reminded me of pears, only purple.

...

Pete and Dad and Toshi talked, of course. And talked, and talked, and talked. They talked some about Little Stony Point, an environmental project they worked on together. Pete was the frontman and Dad one of the community organizers. Boring adult stuff.

The only talk that interested me was about the building of the cabin. Pete said he and Toshi had to do it by the seat of their pants, a bag of cement or a window at a time, as they had time and money.

They built the cabin between 1949 and 1952, when Pete and the Weavers were getting famous and touring nationally and, I suspect, money was coming in. Good thing they finished in ‘52, because Pete got blacklisted in ‘53. Things must’ve been tight for a few years after that.

The adults talked for hours, it seemed, but I was considerably more at ease, what with the pancakes and all. Plus, Pete had tons of folk instruments hung up on the wall. Even maracas! I wanted desperately to play with them, but I knew better. Pete answered a few of my questions about the instruments, though. I had a lot of questions.

There was no guitar and folk singing after breakfast, by the way.

I vaguely remember a fire going in a stone fireplace, and me watching the flames. Always fascinating, flames. But I won’t swear to it, the fire or the fireplace. They might have had a woodstove instead. It was hot in the cabin, that much I’m sure of.

...

What I clearly do remember was getting stuffed on pancakes—too stuffed. My eyes had been bigger than my stomach. That hike up the mountain later was painful.

Though I’d run into Pete with Dad on many hikes, that’s the only time I was ever invited in.

Dad passed in ‘87. I never hiked by Pete’s cabin again.

...

CC BY 4.0

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