Candace Wheeler and her brother Francis Thurber founded Onteora Club in 1887. Wheeler, an important figure in the American Arts and Crafts movement and a partner of Louis C. Tiffany in the decorating firm of Associated Artists, invited many prominent artists, writers and philosophers to come visit for weeks at a time to take part in what was considered a novel “experiment in plain living with high thinking.”
Since then, the Onteora Club has drawn people interested in the arts, the beauty of nature, and in a congenial community. Early visitors included Mark Twain, conservationist John Burroughs and painter George Bellows. Some of the first residents included writers Mary Mapes Dodge and Elizabeth Custer, actress Maude Adams, as well as painters John White Alexander and Carroll Beckwith.
Local lore attributes the name Onteora, "Hills of the Sky," to indigenous people who once inhabited the area. To this day it embraces the same vistas that first attracted its founder “… a view of mountain-tops with blue wavering mists lying in the valleys, and sun-struck patches of forest above them.”
Onteora culture has continued to flourish, growing to include an expanding art collection, live theater productions, an active library and historic archive with annual programs, as well as vast sporting and social events and opportunities.
** Banner Image is a modern view taken from Artist Seat. George H Lewis instagram; @georgehlewis website georgehlewis.com**
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