Memories of Cohasset

I remember taking walks to Cohasset during my childhood, after dinner, to buy candy from the little store in that charming inn on Fourth Lake. Now, Cohasset has become what so many other of the old, great hotels of the Adirondacks have become - private homes. The old hotel was demolished, killed, really. Now there are a bunch of small and unremarkable houses on the point where the majestic old hotel once stood.

An article from the Syracuse newspaper from June 1929:

COHASSET ON FOURTH LAKE, BEAUTY SPOT
Consists of Hotel and Group of Small Cottages

Old Forge, June 1 - High on a wooded knoll overlooking the beautiful south shore of Fourth Lake stands Cohasset. Surrounded by towering pines and birches, the cool depths of the forest are brought to the very verandas. Below the grove surrounding the hotel, a wide sand beach circles the point jutting out into the lake, offering a romp or lounging place where one is enchanted by the sparkle of the crystal water in the sunlight.

Cohasset consists of a main hotel and a number of modern cottages all placed within communicating distance and connected by enticing paths through the woods and along the shore of the lake. The lower floor of the main building is flanked by broad verandas whereon one may find quiet seclusion in a shaded nook or join the happy family of guests bound together through the mutual enjoyment of the inspiring natural beauties.

Cottage life at Cohasset offers an ideal vacation for a family with children or a group wishing to stay by themselves. The buildings are clean and attractive, with big open fireplaces and the conveniences of the main hotel.

Cohasset is reached by two trains daily from Utica and two trains daily from Montreal to Thendara, then taking either a train or a taxicab to Old Forge, which makes connections with the steamboat up the lake. Motorists may go by State road from Utica to Old Forge with a good shore road leading from there to the camp, seven miles distance.

The Snow Train!

This is a postcard of the "Snow Train" arriving in Thendara, New York, with skiers ready for a festive day on the slopes. We have not yet ventured out to McCauley Mountain in Old Forge to enjoy a little skiing, but it used to be, and perhaps still is, a popular winter activity. The trains, of course, are long gone. The Adirondack Scenic Railroad still runs, mostly as a tourist attraction, stopping in Thendara near Van Aukens Inne. We've never had any guests arrive on trains, and yet trains were the catalyst for the development and increasing popularity of the Adirondacks. Railroad barons had great camps built and private railcars to shuttle them to the woods. And in the beginning, the railroads were the best, fastest, easiest route to the wilderness. Roads had not been built and developed. Railroad history is everywhere in the Adirondacks, but unfortunately today it is mostly just that - history.