Lisa’s Love of the Lake

If you spend any time at Duck Harbor, you might begin to wonder about the rich history, great stories, immeasurable memories everybody shares. Standing around chatting someone starts to tell a story, someone in the group chimes in and adds to it, another clarifies details and you are all suddenly laughing at this wonderful historic tale. You can’t but wonder, are all these people related? If you wonder if they are related… they probably are.

I have spent all my life, short of 4 years, here at Duck Harbor (and I ain’t a spring chick). I’m not the only one, there are a bunch of us that have been here decades, and then some. There are pockets of families here at Duck Harbor. I can speak to mine.

It started with John VonOhlson. He was from Rockland County and found his true love here in Lookout, Pennsylvania. Ann Breeden grew up on a farm near Lookout General Store. John and Ann got married at the litle white church on Callicoon Road (once you make the turn), and purchased a cottage on Duck Harbor. It might be the oldest cottage on the lake. Yes, that cute white one with green shutters and the white Adirondack chairs in a circle on the front lawn. That adorable place is now owned by their daughter, Wendy and husband, Brendan.

My mom, Betty (Elizabeth) was John’s cousin. They invited my parents, Cliff and Betty Faist and their 3 girls to visit back in 1960. I can recall it being a very rainy, muddy time (can you imagine). My parents fell in love with the lake and reached out to Dick Holloway to purchase the very small hunting cabin next to Aunt Ann and Uncle John’s. At that time people would come to the lake to fish and hunt extensively, there were no cottages to purchase, only hunting cabins.

If my memory serves me, they purchased the hunting cabin for $3,800 in 1960. At that time, it was the last building on the lake, with the exception of a hunting hut further down the lake, deep in the woods, near the State Access. The hunting cabin became our cottage. It had a little porch, two bedrooms, a tiny kitchen and sitting area. Everything we needed.

Bathrooms came later so the two-seater outhouse was positioned a significant distance from the house, for obvious reasons. From a little girl’s perspective, it was far, especially in the dark. John and Ann also invited his sister, Dorethy, and her family of 4 children to visit. Before you knew it, they purchased property, yes, that tiny little hunting hut (and it was tiny) deep in the woods close to the State Access. That is how Dorethy’s children, Terri Crambo, Rick Jersey, Pat Harrison, and Bob Jersey all got to Duck Harbor.

This is how it happened, year after year. The day school ended in June, we loaded in the car and drove to the lake. We stayed for the whole summer. Packed up the day before school started in the Fall, and went home. All the moms stayed at the lake with the children during the week while dads were at home working. By calculation, that was about 8 weeks of single parenting! The procession, so it seemed, of dads would arrive Friday night, stay for the weekend and head home Sunday night or early Monday morning to repeat the week of work.

Our families weren’t the only ones; the Crambos, Yurkovicks, McMyne, Skull’s, Howarths, Schotts, were all doing the same thing. And so, we became close extended friends and sometimes more. There were these summer pockets of families growing up at Duck Harbor. As we grew, we each shared this place and our rich history with our friends, loved ones, and partners who came along for a piece of the wonder.

I now reside in Virginia, and come back every summer. It has taken me awhile to realize this is the place of my roots. It is difficult sometimes to try to explain to someone how special our youth was, all due in part to Duck Harbor. How blessed to have this experience. I need not look anywhere else.

So, it is no wonder when you seem to be in conversation at Duck Harbor and you wonder why the people all seem related, it’s because they are! Stay long enough and you might be too!

~ Lisa Faist

More, oh so much more , to come on the outhouse!