From the Editor’s Pen

ONE DAY LAST WINTER MY DAUGHTER texted me, “Check out this cool website! Is this where Grandpa worked?” I followed the link to pictures of the abandoned rug mill in Amsterdam, N.Y., where my father ran the boiler for more than a quarter century, and scrolled through photo after photo of the ruins. There were the stairs my father climbed on his way to work. Here was the control panel, now rusted, that regulated the mighty boilers. A photo hangs in my living room of my father standing in front of the same dials. My father died seven years before Katie was born, but now she — and I — could share his world in a way never before possible. I recognized the photographer’s name: Rob Yasinsac ’99 was one of our “40 Under 40” alumni from the Summer 2005 issue. The next morning I excitedly showed the website to Associate Editor Shane Liebler. Within moments he found photos of the East Town Theater in Detroit, where his father heard the J. Geils Band and saw Emerson, Lake and Palmer play their U. S. debut for $2 on “new band night.” We knew we had to share Yasinsac’s photos with all 77,000 Oswego alumni through the magazine. Only a handful of the images could be printed in these pages, but you can visit Rob’s website, www.hudsonvalleyruins.org, for a look at the lost factories, churches, theaters and homes of a bygone America. Maybe you’ll see a memory from your own past!