It took a lot of searching for Seth Benzel to find just the right house. A horse trainer by trade, he wanted a residence close to Saratoga Race Course, but had to find one to fit his budget.

Fledgling rider Leo “Pepper” Belouin of Schenectady, a 1952 graduate of Mont Pleasant High School, participated in exercise drills, cooled off horses and raked the shed row at Saratoga Race Track during the summer of 1954. Photos are by Gazette photographer Charles B. Sellers.

As far as Lovett Smith is concerned, the best way to see the country is by rail, and nowhere is the view any better than from the back of the New York Central 3. An elegant business car built in 1928 for executives of the New York Central Railroad, the NYC 3 is still transporting people to different places, although not nearly as often as when it was part of the Empire State Express during much of the 20th century. Smith, a former manager with Union Carbide and now retired, purchased the car in 1992 for $240,000 from a railroad repair yard in Florida after it had been abandoned by Conrail in Altoona, Pa.

Steve Gross and Susan Daley had already been making photographs in Schoharie County for 10 years when they brought their work to editor Jim Mairs at W.W. Norton in 1997 — and it would be another 10 years before Mairs declared the project ready for publication. But the true birth of “Time Wearing Out Memory: Schoharie County” (2008) came much earlier, in 1974, when Gross and Daley met while studying in the vaunted photography program at the University of New Mexico.

People have been camping out with coolers under pines, maples and elms since 1985, when space in back of the Saratoga Race Course grandstand was converted into a park to help accommodate Saratoga’s huge summer crowds. Visitors bring decks of cards and stacks of newspapers. Pizza, chicken wings and turkey sandwiches trimmed with lettuce and tomato slices are always on someone’s menu.

Sunglasses aren't just for summer; they're worn year-round and various styles achieve various looks. Employees Ilana Roth and Carl Phelps of Sunglasses Hut in Colonie Center model sunglass fashions, with comments from store manager Jacqueline Roland.

The Altamont Fair runs from Tuesday through Sunday at the fairgrounds off Route 146 in Altamont.

People have been riding the Ferris wheel over and over since 1893, when George Ferris — who studied engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy — showed off the first round giant at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

The Sunshine Fair runs from Tuesday through Sunday at the Cobleskill Fairgrounds on South Grand Street.

Brigette Zacharczenko is passionate about all things creepy-crawly. The 19-year-old Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake high school graduate turned college zoology major, in fact, can’t ever recall a time when the outdoors and its myriad inhabitants were not the focal point of her days and nights. She has gained international attention and has become a favorite among area insect enthusiasts for her ability to replicate a variety of critters by using crafting techniques her grandmother taught her as a child, including sewing, cross-stitch, knitting and crochet.

There are enough museums in Saratoga Springs to satisfy most history buffs, regardless of their particular interest, but if it’s the middle of summer and you’re in Saratoga, then the National Racing Museum and Hall of Fame is definitely the place to be.

Socialite Mary Lou Whitney hosted her annual gala Friday night in Saratoga Springs.

Vote on the car you like for the "Cool Car for Summer Contest" or...<br/> <div style="font-family:Verdana;"> <a href="/coolcars" style="text-decoration:none;">SUBMIT YOUR COOL CAR</a><br> <a href="/contests/results/?hotcarsaugust" style="text-decoration:none;">RESULTS FOR AUGUST SO FAR</a><br/> <a href="/photos/2008/jun/20/4174/" style="text-decoration:none;">JUNE'S WINNING CAR</a><br/> <a href="/photos/2008/jul/03/4437/" style="text-decoration:none;">JULY'S WINNING CAR</a> </div>

Four-time Olympian Jason Morris of Glenville is serving as head coach of the USA Judo Team at the Summer Olympics in Beijing.

Many upstate New York villages and towns like to boast of a long and illustrious history, but in Fort Edward words such as freedom and liberty seem to ring a little bit louder. At the Old Fort House Museum on Broadway in the village, all of Fort Edward’s rich past is on display, and what quickly becomes evident is that freedom and liberty can mean slightly different things to different people. To the townsfolk of Fort Edward during the American Revolution, the words meant overthrowing the yoke of British tyranny, and to Patrick Smyth, who built the house in 1772, they meant skedaddling to Canada to find a new home. To Solomon Northup, a black man, they meant even more

Ahva Heyman floated in the water of the Windsor Motel, skimming stray bugs off the water with a large net. Ahva is not an official part of the staff at the compact motel at 51 Canada St., across the street from the Fort William Henry Resort and Conference Center. But the 4-year-old swimmer was happy to help her mother, Cory Heyman, evict nonpaying customers. “Business has been very good,” said Cory, who has owned the 19-unit Windsor with her husband, Elliott Heyman, for the past 10 years. “So far, it’s been our best year.”

Even if you’re not a “car person,” Ken Gross would invite you to take a look at the Saratoga Automobile Museum’s latest exhibition. Gross is guest curator for “Cadillac: A Century of Style,” which runs through Nov. 2. The exhibition celebrates the General Motors Centennial with a display of vehicles that come mostly from the company’s Heritage Collection, with a few from private collectors. From the earliest single-cylinder model to hot rods and hybrids, the exhibition takes visitors on a journey across a century of automotive history through the lens of this luxury brand.

The Saratoga Springs City Center was the sight for a boxing card Friday night.

When Alli Schweizer brings out-of-town guests to the office to show them around the workplace, things can easily get carried away. Schweizer, a New Jersey native, is the park naturalist at the Saratoga Spa State Park, 2,200 acres of natural and cultural beauty nestled between routes 9 and 50 in Saratoga Springs. Designated a National Landmark in 1987, the park has so much to offer, both in the way of outdoor and indoor activity.

More than 1,000 captive-bred Karner blue butterflies were released as chrysalis into the Albany Pine Bush and emerged as adult butterflies, nearly doubling the population of the endangered species in the preserve.

The annual summer season at Saratoga Race Course opened Wednesday.

When it comes to appreciating the simple things in life, Troy resident Alison Bates never passes up an opportunity to cozy up to one of summer’s most ephemeral creatures — dragonflies.

In 1966, plenty of 11-year-old kids knew what happened when Batman and Robin rushed through their secret headquarters. The costumed crime fighters always jumped into their car. “Atomic batteries to power,” Robin would say. “Turbines to speed.” The famous Batmobile ignited with a rumbling, rolling growl. Flames flickered from the exhaust and the sleek, black auto zoomed toward the fictional villains’ paradise of Gotham City.

There are dozens of great places to shop in the Spa city. If you are looking for something uniquely Saratoga, here are some ideas.

The backstretch area of the Saratoga Race Course is open for tours. Visitors will see what life is like behind the scenes for thoroughbreds and their companion animals, owners and workers.

The Saratoga County Fair runs through Sunday at the fairgrounds in Ballston Spa.

The Saratoga County Fair opened its annual six-day run Tuesday at the county fairgrounds in Ballston Spa.

It took 45 years, but Hancock Shaker Village has finally completed its end of an agreement to publish a catalog of the collection of Shaker collectors Edward Deming Andrews and his wife, Faith Young Andrews. The catalog has resulted in the museum’s latest exhibition, “Gather Up the Fragments: The Andrews Shaker Collection,” which runs through Oct. 31. Passion for all things Shaker, and the resultant issue of what to do with them, was the precursor to this exhibition.

Inhaling fresh air, gazing at mountains, stretching your legs on a woodland path. This is certainly not your typical art museum experience.

When it comes to face-washing, a surprising number of people fall into one of two categories, so say a sampling of skin experts — those who take their cleansing regimes to the extreme and those who give it little, if any, thought.

Electrical problems in the attic of a house at 33 Division St. sparked a fire early Wednesday that left nine people homeless.

Gazette columnist Carl Strock takes in a Firebird car show at the Saratoga Auto Museum.

Ask a dancer who Jerome Robbins was and you’ll receive a multitude of answers: a perfectionist, a showman, a stylist and an outsider — along with a few words that are unprintable in this newspaper. But no matter what one thinks or feels about Robbins, he was undoubtedly one thing above all else — a hit maker.

Driving up Warren Street in Glens Falls, it’s impossible not to admire Hyde House. The Neo-Italian Renaissance villa is not only unusual architecture in upstate New York, it’s the heart of the Hyde Collection, an esteemed art museum and crown jewel of the city. But the roadside view was quite different in the 1920s and 1930s, when the Pruyn sisters lived on the seven-acre property and their three handsome gray stucco homes were embraced by one of the grandest gardens of the Adirondacks.

For people who love historic mansions as well as the state of Vermont and its history, it doesn’t get any better than the Park-McCullough House in North Bennington. A Victorian mansion built in 1865 by Trenor L. Park, the Park-McCullough House represents more than 200 years of Vermont history, beginning with future governor Hiland Hall, whose parents moved onto the land in the 1770s, to John G. McCullough II, the man who in 1968 donated the home to the newly formed Park-McCullough House Association.

John Van Alstine’s sculptures realize the impossible. Arcing steel forms teeter on their tips. Massive cuts of granite or slate hover above, floating weightless. Organic and strong, his works symbolize the fantastic. No wonder his sculpture was selected for the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. His “Ring of Unity — Circle of Inclusion” will loom over the Olympic Park this August. The chosen work, a Chinese rock buoyantly suspended in a steel circle, is an ideal metaphor for athletes who push to accomplish unending perfection.

The Norman Rockwell Museum’s latest exhibition, “Raw Nerve! The Political Art of Steve Brodner,” couldn’t be more timely. Through Oct. 26, visitors can get a look at recent political history up to the present through the lens of political illustrator Steve Brodner.

Ever wonder what some of the region's best known people looked like when they were in high school?

Ten stories about great fathers, some dramatic, some funny, some poignant, appeared in the newspaper on May 13. They also were posted at the Gazette’s online site. Readers were asked to choose one favorite, and vote with either an Internet or newsprint ballot. A total of 419 votes were counted. Sara Huzar's “Honeymoon at Midnight” was the clear top choice with 112 votes. Second place went to Lynne Petroski Fuchs of Glenville, who wrote about her father Carl Petroski’s solution to a family pet crisis. Fuchs’ story, “The Parakeet Paradox,” earned 71 votes. Joan Babcock of Schenectady, whose narrative about a father who hid clever poems for his daughters as they grew up, took third place. “Reading and Romans” received 40 votes.

Housing developers and builders in Saratoga County are always trying to tap into the magic and history of Saratoga Race Course. Now the developer of St. Ledger's Woods, a new high-end subdivision in Malta, which is just south of the Spa City, has upped the ante in the race to blend the thrill of Saratoga with the comfort of home. A group named Albany Partners recently hired a Hudson Valley artist to create a large sculpture of a steeplechase horse and jockey. The sculpture sits prominently at the entrance to the development, which so far has just a model home. The sculptor of the horse, Rita Dee of Tivoli, Dutchess County, has created quite a buzz with her artistry.

The pottery wheels are spinning in Madeline Gallo’s studio. In another room, Gallo’s strong feelings about the war in Iraq emerge in a provocative clay exhibit by her and Jim Best. Upstairs, Heather Leyh turns on a torch. In the super-hot blue flame, she melts and sculpts rods of glass, creating candy-colored jewelry beads.

The American flag is being celebrated around the region this weekend with a host of events wrapped around Saturday's observation of Flag Day.

You might find yourself perusing the ice cream aisle of the supermarket with a new appreciation after taking in the Farmers’ Museum’s exhibition “Ice Cream: Our Cool Obsession,” on view through Oct. 31. History through the lens of this delectable, frozen treat that Americans consume to the tune of 1 billion gallons annually incorporates lessons in sociology, technology, early American social customs, health, business, and global culture. Not to worry, though, as the lessons are so subtle that they go down just as easily as a cool scoop of ice cream on a hot day.

The New York National Guard's 27th Brigade Combat Team is currently serving at Camp Phoenix in Kabul, Afghanistan.

Artist Leigh Wen delves into the natural — rugged snow-capped mountains, raging infernos and swirling winds. Yet she is most at home in the water — both raging and calm, icy and inviting. She is submerged in the element. And her massive canvases, as well as her small square porcelain reliefs, convey the expanse and fickleness of oceans, rivers and streams. Her renderings of water are currently on show at the Beacon Institute through July 8. And on June 13, her waves will be illuminated in the windows of the Albany Center Gallery

Students this week are learning about plants, animals and ecology this week as part of 4-H Field Days in Schenectady's Central Park.

The Ukrainian Genocide of 1932-33 was remembered last week with a local commemoration in Watervliet.

Gazette columnist Carl Strock took some photographs on his recent trip to Istanbul, Turkey, and as a no-cost addition to his blog he posted a selection of them so that you, the reader, can view them.

Gazette columnist Carl Strock took some photographs on his recent trip to Istanbul, Turkey, and as a no-cost addition to his blog he posted a selection of them so that you, the reader, can view them.

Schenectady native Donn Sweet was an Army lieutenant who was killed in Vietnam on July 25, 1968, at age 26.

Edith Wharton didn’t like parties, at least not those big formal affairs with hundreds of people milling around the house and grounds enjoying tea, crumpets and their place in polite society. But, after visiting The Mount, Wharton’s home for nine years from 1902 to 1911 and the place where she wrote “Ethan Frome” and “The House of Mirth,” it seems almost a shame she wasn’t more predisposed to entertain. The three-story home, designed by Wharton herself in the fashion of a 17th century Palladian-style English Country home, would have been a great place to host parties during the last days of the Gilded Age, but Wharton wasn’t so inclined. She was much more concerned about writing.

Six women were arrested Thursday morning during a prostitution sweep in the Hamilton Hill neighborhood of Schenectady.

Extra history photos of Liaquat Ali Khan from his 1950 visit to Schenectady.

When author Gail Fraser created Lumby, the small town populated by quirky residents was a destination only in her novels. Today, she and her husband, Art Poulin — the folk artist who depicts Lumby on the books’ covers — own 40 acres in Greenwich, Washington County.

Gallery of the photo's that were submitted by local students for The Student Gazette.

If you close your eyes on the Galway corner where Ralph and Nancy Caparulo’s home, Wyndbourne, sits, you’ll hear just what the Scottish settlers who likely built the homestead heard — birdsong and the breeze. And when you open your eyes, the view is probably much as it was back then as well: a fusion of forest and farmland, the Helderbergs and Green Mountains in the distance.

The annual St. Clement's Saratoga Horse Show kicked off its 49th year today at the Yaddo. The competition, which runs over two weeks, is billed as the oldest and one of the largest volunteer-operated horse shows in the country. Competition continues through Sunday, then resumes from May 14-18. Proceeds from the annual event benefit St. Clement's Regional Catholic School, an elementary school in the city that serves students from preschool through sixth grade.

Earthworms, starlings and honeybees. Oh my. Perhaps they’re not as threatening as lions, tigers and bears, but at the New York State Museum they’re three of the more than 50 invasive, nonnative species — bugs and plants included — that make up a new exhibit called “The Invaders.” In many ways they make things a bit tougher for the natives, but that doesn’t mean Cliff Siegfried and his staff at the New York State Museum are out to get all of them.

With the Beijing Olympics just 100 days away, activists brought the Human Rights Torch Relay to the steps of the Capitol on Wednesday to remind people of China’s crackdown in Tibet and its record on human rights.

Thaddeus Kosciuszko, the Polish engineer they named the Northway’s twin bridges after, knew how to build things to make them last. Take the earthworks at Peebles Island, for instance, more than 230 years old. “Where else in the area can you see the original remains of earthworks from the American Revolution?” asked Paul Huey, an archaeologist with the State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation whose headquarters are on Peebles Island. “They haven’t been restored, enhanced or improved for interpretation. They’re unchanged, just the way they left them. That’s pretty unique.”

Four buildings were destroyed and several others damaged by a massive fire along West State Street in Johnstown on Thursday.

Four people have been charged with the armed invasion of a home at 59 University St. in Selkirk early Wednesday.

Volunteers throughout the Capital Region took time out on Earth Day to participate in a host of activities designed to help take care of our natural resources.

What used to be the fringe of the industry, reserved only for the wealthy, has started to come into the mainstream. Helped along by new programs from the National Association of Home Builders, more builders and remodelers are offering their customers the option to build and improve environmentally friendly homes, better for Earth and for those who live in them.

There’s no question that the name “Stickley” is synonymous with furniture. If asked the question, “Who is Gustav Stickley?” the majority of people would most likely respond, “A furniture maker.” While that is true, there was much more to this man. The Fenimore Art Museum’s latest exhibition, “Gustav Stickley: The Enlightened Home,” which runs through Aug. 10, explores this icon of American decorative arts in the context of how he profoundly influenced American lives and culture in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Children and their families were invited to help release 600 brown trout and 300 brook trout into Geyser Creek. Technicians from the Van Hornesville Fish Hatchery operated by the Department of Environmental Protection stock the streams each year with volunteers' help. The day also included live wildlife presentations by Beth Bidwell and the Wildlife Institute of Eastern New York, Demonstrations by Eastern Mountain Sports and Capital District Flyfishers Association,Clearwater Chapter of Trout Unlimited.

Members of the Army National Guard, including local troops are training at Fort Drum this week as they prepare deploy to Iraq in June.

Adults in their Sunday best, teenagers in sweat shirts, law enforcement officers in dress uniform and elected officials in dark business suits filled the sanctuary at the Presbyterian New England Congregational Church on Sunday to share stories, offer support and rally for rights of crime victims. Launching National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, the gathering was the first in a series of local events that will include a rose garden remembrance, a memorial brick dedication ceremony and Take Back the Night walk.

The famous fedora and bullwhip return to movie screens next month. Harrison Ford will be wearing them as rough-and-tumble archaeologist Indiana Jones. The fictional explorer and veteran of three previous big-budget films is back in cinema action for the first time since 1989 in “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” Adventure fans will get the usual close calls and witty dialogue in a story big on mayhem and mysticism. Fashion, too: Jones just about always wears that brown hat. Fedora experts say the return of the character, who hasn’t been at the movies since “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade,” could boost sales of men’s headgear. “First, history always repeats itself,” said Vince Rua, owner of Christopher’s mens’ clothing store in Colonie Center. “Second, when the fashion role models, which are basically actors, start wearing different items such as hats, younger people take notice and start to emulate those idols.”

If you want to create something new, dare to be different and learn from your mistakes. “Free yourself to withstand rejection and humiliation,” advises Douglas Trumbull, special-effects wizard for “2001: A Space Odyssey,” “Star Wars” and “Blade Runner.” A Hollywood legend with a lifetime achievement Oscar, Trumbull now lives and works in the Berkshires. In the 1800s, novelist Herman Melville lived on Arrowhead Farm in Pittsfield, Mass. He struggled to support his wife and four children, but never stopped writing. Trumbull and Melville are just two of the Berkshire brains who share their secrets to success in the Feigenbaum Hall of Innovations, a new $1.2 million exhibit space at the Berkshire Museum. The 3,000-square-foot, interactive attraction was the brainchild of museum benefactors Donald S. and Armand V. Feigenbaum, founders of General Systems Co., a world-renowned pioneer in systems management and technology. Although Pittsfield is their hometown, the Feigenbaum brothers graduated from Union College in the 1940s and have a lifelong connection to Schenectady.

A Friday morning fire caused significant damage to a home at 543 Mumford St. in Schenectady and sent three people, including a baby, to the hospital.

Five people were left homeless Tuesday afternoon after fire ripped through a two-family house less than a block away from the Schenectady Christian School off Second Avenue in Scotia.

A circle of women slowly sidestep. As they move in rhythmic unison, their hips pulse — to the right, to the center, to the left. With each flick of the hip, copper coins that dangle from colorful hip scarves jangle to the beat.

New and improved air bags, superstrong metals, higher-voltages and batteries located in different places in vehicles are among changes that make cars safer, but at the same time complicate the task of removing passengers when crashes occur. Teams of firefighters from the Amsterdam Fire Department spent hours during the past two weeks training both in a classroom and in a vehicle graveyard to tune up their skills, which can help save not only the lives of victims, but also their own.

Two men were taken into custody Monday after a standoff at the Southgate Apartments that followed a morning shooting on Frank Street.

There hasn’t been a whole lot of excitement lately at Kelly’s Station, a now-defunct hamlet in the town of Princetown about halfway between Schenectady and Duanesburg. The only noise you might hear is the running water of the Bonny Brook and the nearby Normanskill, the traffic speeding along Route 7, and perhaps the occasional blaring horn as motorists cautiously enter the Kelly’s Station Road tunnel.

The Bouck family of Perth a year ago purchased what remained of Bojud Knitting Mills and continues to make lace under a new name: Willow Street Lace. While some textile mills in the area have survived, Willow Street Lace is the only mill in New York and one of only a handful in the country that make lace.

Seven fifth-graders at Schenectady's Paige Elementary School presented a dress rehearsal Wednesday of the skit they will perform Saturday during the state Odyssey of the Mind competition at Binghamton University. The team had to create a scenario responding to the question "What might have happened to the dinosaurs that lived years ago?"

Unlike blacks, American Indians good enough to earn a spot on Major League Baseball rosters early in the 20th century weren’t told they couldn’t play. That’s the good news. The bad news is that despite an unofficial policy that worked something like “don’t ask, don’t tell,” American Indians were often targets of the same racially based vitriol that marked Jackie Robinson’s entry into the game in 1947. Keeping a low profile may have worked for some, but for men like Louis Francis Sockalexis, prejudice was very much a part of the game and their lives.

The walls of the Saratoga Springs History Museum are now decorated with more than 30 different varieties of wallpaper: a whimsical landscape neighbors a bold geometric print; fair maidens share a wall with pensive cherubs. A vine of periwinkle posies climbs alongside a dazzling damask design. Is this curious assemblage the brainchild of some off-the-wall interior designer? Absolutely.

When Pat Goodale returns from a trip, her friends don’t ask to see the photos she took. They want to see her sketchbook journal — a diary of people, places and memorable moments that she compiles while on the road.

Schenectady's annual public Stations of the Cross procession traveled through the Hamilton Hill and Vale neighborhoods on Good Friday.

If you want to wow your Easter guests — or any special-occasion invitees, for that matter — before they even put a fork to their lips, start with your table setting.

Glens Falls celebrates its 100th anniversary as an incorporated city today — March 13, 2008. The city’s Chapman Historical Museum will observe the milestone with the exhibition “Building Blocks of a Community: 100 Years of Commerce in Glens Falls.” The Chapman recently allowed The Gazette to view photos in its electronic scrapbook; here are some of our favorites.

The Siena Saints celebrate after a 74-53 victory over Rider in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference championship game at the Times Union Center in Albany Monday. With the win, the Saints clinched their first NCAA tournament berth since 2002, and the fourth since the school went to Division I.

It may seem an unlikely time to be talking about a building boom, but that’s what’s happening, thanks in part to the New Urbanist credo of live where you work and work where you live. In downtown Glens Falls, developers are pouring millions into new high-end condominiums and refurbished apartments. In the city’s various bucolic neighborhoods, homes are selling relatively well because, real estate agents say, they’re reasonably priced. And new jobs are coming into town by the hundreds.

Several chiefs put a half-dozen Johnstown firefighters through drills Friday in an abandoned city-owned house on Hoosac Street, teaching firefighter survival, rapid intervention and simulating the rescue of a downed firefighter.

For the longest time, Stacy DeMeo peppered her husband, Mark, with one question: “Can we look at the plans again?” The “plans” were the blueprints, the drawings, the pages ripped out of catalogues detailing their dream house.

Today, tentlike maternity dresses and cutesy patterns for pregnant women are a thing of the past. Just because you are pregnant doesn’t mean your stylish days are over.Today, tentlike maternity dresses and cutesy patterns for pregnant women are a thing of the past. Just because you are pregnant doesn’t mean your stylish days are over.

Dormitory living was something of a novel idea in the first half of the 19th century, and Union College president Eliphalet Nott decided to take things a step further: He and his family would share living quarters with the student body. What the students thought of it we can only guess, but his third wife, Urania Eleanor Sheldon Nott, definitely had her own ideas on the subject. In 1857, with her husband in his eighties, Urania finally put her foot down and Eliphalet relented. Four years later, in July 1861, the Notts moved out of the South Colonnade and into the President’s House, a beautiful two-story structure near the Blue Gate entrance on the southern side of the campus near Union Street.

Jeff Mirel sees genuine potential where there is, quite frankly, urban decay. On a recent tour of the former St. Joseph’s Academy in the Arbor Hill neighborhood here, the 29-year-old Mirel seems to see beyond the broken windows, the water dripping through ceilings, the pigeons flying about or the piles of bird dung that litter the floor of this former, long-vacant school. For the past two years, Mirel has had the vision of turning an unused urban space into a breathing, multifaceted arts venue with affordable live/work space for artists. His mission has led him to form a nonprofit called Albany Barn. Besides the organization’s other efforts to support the region’s arts scene, its most ambitious objective by far is to create an arts incubator out of the ashes of the old St. Joseph’s Academy.

Former Schenectady resident Antonio Ferrera did much of the film work for “The Gates,” an 89-minute documentary about the decorating of New York City’s Central Park in bright saffron orange-yellow during the winter of 2005. The show will premiere for a national audience next Tuesday at 10 p.m. on cable television network Home Box Office and will air several more times this month and March.

Phil and Bunny Savino are collectors, and like many people who are interested in a variety of things, the stuff they’ve accumulated over the years is vast and varied. When it comes to hoarding hitching posts, however, particularly the cast-iron type that was so prevalent throughout much of the second half of the 19th century, the Savinos and their friends at the Albany Institute of History & Art are in a class by themselves.

When Kim and Ray Faiola are expecting guests at their Greenfield home, you won’t find them hastily straightening up a spare room, throwing a set of sheets on a sofa sleeper or inflating an air mattress. Instead, when guests arrive, Rudy greets them and shows the way to the always-ready guest quarters — a tiny cottage that mirrors the design of their main house, which Faiola built in 1984.

A massive Monday night fire destroyed three buildings on Main Street in Corinth.

One hundred years ago this week, magnificent men and their driving machines visited the Capital Region. An endurance competition that matched autos and men from the United States, France, Germany and Italy departed New York City's Times Square on Wenesday, Feb. 12, 1908. Their destination was Paris, their adventure was destined for the history book. Six cars, featuring the best technology of the day, would be on the road for months, 22,000 miles through Albany, Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle, Alaska, Japan, Russia, Berlin and finally Paris.

From Portland, Maine, to Pasadena, Calif., art nights have popped up in downtowns across America. While the concept is the same, with people taking to the streets on a special evening each month to see local art in galleries, coffee shops, boutiques and bistros, each city’s event has its own unique personality.

Sallie Way hands me two photos of a charred center-hall colonial — glossy 4x6 glimpses of a nightmare — now smudged with fingerprints, curling slightly at the edges. The once-stately home pictured there, she tells me, is the Kalinkewicz farm, which stood for close to a century here in Galway.

Firefighters from Fulton and Montgomery counties battled a huge blaze at Fiber Conversion along Route 29 in Broadalbin on Thursday afternoon.

For the past decade, Leiah Bowden, largely a self-taught artist, has concentrated on creating what she calls energy portraits or soul portraits.

Seven men face gambling charges after the completion of a four-month investigation by state police and the Fulton County District Attorney's office.

The state of New York celebrated the federal holiday honoring noted civil rights leader Martin Luther King with an event Monday morning at the Empire State Convention Center in downtown Albany.

These images tell the story of a tumultuous 2007, from a massacre on a college campus and the collapse of a major metropolitan bridge to the beginning of the 2008 presidential campaign.

A record crowd was expected Monday night at the 12th annual First Night Saratoga, which included 80 musical and other performances at more than 35 locations in and near downtown Saratoga. Saratoga's even was the only First Night celebration held in the Capital Region this year.

Three Schenectady teenagers have been charged with robbing a Domino's pizza deliveryman Sunday night on Linden Street.

Longtime Adirondack guide Paul Gibaldi has published "Spirit of the Adirondacks: A Photographic Journey," which chronicles the natural beauty he has been showing the public for the last 20 years.

Movie stars, parade balloons, teenagers, musicians, familiar faces in strange places — they were all part of The Daily Gazette’s history page in 2007. As the year ends, the newspaper’s history department decided some favorite photos deserve encore appearances. So here they are, back in black and white.

The fast-moving winter storm that dumped 1 to 3 inches of snow on the region Thursday afternoon caused a host of traffic problems as roads quickly became slippery.

Every year, Daily Gazette photojournalists shoot thousands of photos in their pursuit of the images that will inform, entertain, and educate readers. These images represent their favorites from a year of news, features, sports and the myriad unpredictable events that make news in the Capital Region. Each photo includes comments from the photojournalist.

The Melodies of Christmas performance is celebrating its 28th year with performances by the Empire State Youth Orchestra and Chorale at Proctors in Schenectady from Thursday, Dec. 13, through Sunday, Dec. 16. Funds raised from these performances support the Center for Childhood Cancer & Blood Disorders at the Children's Hospital at Albany Medical Center. CBS 6 will broadcast Melodies of Christmas at 7:30 p.m. on Christmas Eve and noon on Christmas Day, and the Capital Region's CW will broadcast Melodies of Christmas at 3 a.m. on Christmas Eve and 5 a.m. and 10 p.m. on Christmas Day.

Gazette Life & Arts writer Jeff Wilkin has portrayed Mother Ginger for 10 years in Northeast Ballet's annual production of "The Nutcracker" at Proctors in Schenectady.

The village of Broadalbin hosted its annual holiday parade Monday night, with people braving cold temperatures and lingering snow from the weekend's storm.

The neighboring Schenectady County Historical Society and YWCA of Schenectady are hosting the annual Festival of Trees through Dec. 9. Organizations from around Schenectady County have decorated a variety of trees for display, with 10 fully decorated trees up for silent auction. The festival is open weekdays from 1 to 5 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is $6 for adults, $3 for children ages 6-12 and free for children younger than age 6. Proceeds benefit both the historical society and the local YWCA.

Concern For the Hungry distributed its' annual Thanksgiving dinners and pet food for area residents on Tuesday.

Thousands flocked to downtown Schenectady on Saturday evening to watch the annual Gazette Holiday Parade. This year's parade theme was classic television.

The annual Johnstown Holiday Parade brought out hundreds of marchers and spectators along the city's Main Street on a cold and snowy Friday night.