And Then, They Rested...

Seeking Exemplars of Activist Ancestors Resting Pt. 2

Peg Leg Bates’ Resort. May 2021.

Driving through Ulster County, New York, is like taking a DeLorean up curvy roads and homes with patches of marsh, wood, and grass between them. The Borscht Belt, also known as the Jewish Alps, was once a thriving bungalow colony where NYC’s Jewish families primarily found respite.

The now decaying hotels, once vibrant spaces adorned with neon spaces and freshly painted signs, are defunct principally, but some still stand. Vines pour out from the cracks of walls that once surrounded families who’d gathered for summer reunions, ping-pong matches, and dips in the pool. 

The Borscht Belt was not an isolated phenomenon; during the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, the Catskills hosted a variety of ethnic vacation enclaves with colloquial names, such as the Bocce Belt and the Irish Catskills, where Italian and Irish families spent their summers. Standalone resorts catering to German and Greek families also emerged among the lush mountains. While these insulated vacation communities provided a haven and allowed for cultural preservation for many immigrant families facing anti-Semitism and classism, there were also instances of internalized segregationist values. This was reflected in sentiments commonly found on storefront signs in the South and whispered in the North: “Whites only.”

The same notion of insulation can be said about Peg Leg Bates’ Country Club, with a notable difference: while many of the hotels and motels in the Borscht Belt closed, were demolished, or fell into disrepair from the 1950s to the 1980s, Peg Leg Bates’ Country Club continuously adapted and evolved into the millennium and it was open to anyone who could find it.