Karen and I were taking a constitutional up Warren St this past Easter Sunday and noticed that despite the lack of the over the top decorations that seem to accompany every holiday in our country, Easter was not lost on Warren St. Merchants and residents just do up Easter here with more restraint, even delicacy.
Apologies for all of the reflections from the glass. I am not that much of a photographer.
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The city has been busy with its Spring cleaning. On a recent jaunt up Warren St. I was pleasantly surprised to see two eyesores in the Sixth St. Park at least brought upright and cleaned. The map of the city (mislabeled “directory” earlier) looked so much better that I first thought that it is new. But, on examining the photo from a year ago I have concluded that the glass and map have simply been cleaned.
Amazing what a little housekeeping can accomplish. I now am dropping my muttering about the need to tear down these as a sad commentary on our sense of civic pride. They may not be the most graceful public amenities but at least now they look as though someone cares.
Kudos to the folks at DPW!
| before | after |
 April 2, 2010 |
 April 21, 2011 |
 April 2, 2010 |
 April 24, 2011 |
The rumors about etsy.com locating a new office in Hudson have been floating about for some time. Yesterday, Rob Kalin, the founder of etsy.com, placed this notice on our local business listserv.
Hi all,
Please allow me to humbly introduce myself. I know many people here already, and hope to know many more. I’m the founder & CEO of Etsy (www.etsy.com), which I started 6 years ago in my apartment in Brooklyn. My family is from New York (from Tarrytown up to Syracuse), and I’ve spent many a night in a lean-to amongst the Catskills.
Etsy currently employs 175 people, most of them in our Brooklyn office. As we continue to grow, it makes a lot of sense to me to open up an office in Hudson. I love the town, we found an incredible building (thank you Chris at the Cannonball Factory, and Theresa at Keystone for helping), and as everyone here knows — better than I do, I’m sure — there are so many great people. Denis at 711 is helping us with desks, too.
I started Etsy to create opportunities in the world — for myself, for small business owners, for people who make things, people who find things, and more. I love that we are be able to bring jobs to Hudson. Right now we’re working to get things setup. (As of this email, the building doesn’t even have heat! But that’s happening quickly.) Our plan is to start with customer support positions, and grow from there.
Etsy HQ will remain in Brooklyn, and I hope to grow our Hudson office to 50 employees or more. Jobs at Etsy come with a salary, benefits (medical, dental, vision) paid for in full by the company (including family plans). We’ll be posting actual job descriptions soon. If someone you now is interested, feel free to email me directly.
Our plan is to grow things at a measured pace, so we’re not really broadcasting anything yet. This email is probably the most public statement I’ve made so far. I’m happy to answer any q’s via email, and thanks for reading.
I hope to see you ’round,
Rob
This is great news for Hudson. How do we get the word out to more entrepreneurs in Brooklyn about the opportunities for them in Hudson?
Conversation with Actinica. They continue to get more sales, but still need to develop better commercial sensibilities. Prompted them about acting on cash flow by asking a customer for an early payment. Then pointed out that they need to be ready to outline how they want to do business with a new possible vendor who has a track record as a rain maker. Still and all, a tremendous change in their sales and their self-confidence as business people instead of just engineers.
Finished up avageyer.com. What a strange world it is that parents are so hands on in working with their children to get into college. Obviously not unusual, but still strange. I don’t remember even a teacher at Taft reviewing my college essays let alone parents!
Second significant snow of the season.
Woke up to snow flurries. Noticed the clear outlines of the heating coil in the sidewalk of the house across the street. Where is some plain common sense about energy and $? Even rich people should have some sense of embarrassment over such behavior.
Stop at the library to put up labels next to art that John Davis donated to the library. Here are two of the six pieces.
Off to The Spotty Dog this evening for Trivia Night – new player showed up:
Esther Hanig’s friend wrote this book. Sánchez-Jankowski, Martín. Cracks in the Pavement: Social Change and Resilience in Poor Neighborhoods. 1st ed. University of California Press, 2008. It has a wonderful introduction and theoretical discussion at the beginning. Based on years of on site investigations. Wonderful observations of poor neighborhoods and how they function. Despite being an academic’s work, the writing is accessible to a lay reader.
Waiting for mini-glacier to calve off our roof.
Brunch in Claverack with London-Gilstrap mob. Nyla received instruction from Karen on the use of her Christmas sewing machine. Cousin Jackson supervised.
Noah and I discussed iPod Touches, iPhones and various other technology items. He showed me a shoot ’em up game on his iPod Touch.
Then home to cook for tomorrow’s lunch. Karen made a storm in the kitchen making carrot mushroom loaf.
Nine people expected.
Made leg riser blocks for the card table to bring it flush with the dining room table.
The main feature for me was watching one of the cats attacking the turkey carcass.
This book brings to light the extent to which the Jim Crow laws were in fact part of a totalitarian system of government that ruled the South for more than seventy five years. How these laws came to be called Jim Crow by historians instead of “a system of racist oppression and exploitation” is a mystery. The fact that historians and school textbook writers adopted this term,which is derogatory in its basis, points to a shameful lack of focus on the facts of life in the South during the period between 1876 and roughly 1965. Worse it aided the systematic cover up of the actual functions of these laws and their impact on African-Americans. If the word Apartheid had been invented earlier this would also be a useful term.
The research and the writing is compelling. Blackmon has a website devoted to the book and the production of a documentary movie on PBS that will air in 2011.
Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black People in America from the Civil War to World War II
Author: Douglas A. Blackmon Publisher: Doubleday, $29.95 (512p) ISBN 978-0-385-50625-0