Today the Borscht Belt is recalled through the nostalgic lens of summer swims, Saturday night dances, and comedy performances. But its current state, like that of many other formerly glorious regions, is nothing like its earlier status. Forgotten about and exhausted, much of its structural environment has been left to decay. This illustrated lecture features Marisa Scheinfeld’s photographs of abandoned sites where resorts, hotels and bungalow colonies once boomed in the Catskill Mountain region of upstate New York. The images were shot inside and outside locations that once buzzed with life as year-round havens for generations of people. In her illustrated talk, Scheinfeld will discuss the rise, fall, and impact of the Borscht Belt along with the deeper, more layered meaning she finds in the series. Her book, The Borscht Belt: Revisiting the Remains of America's Jewish Vacationland, presents a contemporary view of more than forty hotel and bungalow sites. From entire expanses of abandoned properties to small lots containing drained swimming pools, the remains of the Borscht Belt era now lie forgotten, overgrown, and vacant.
Marisa is also Founder and Project Director of the Borscht Belt Historical Marker Project, an organizations that aims to interpret and designate places important to the Borscht Belt’s vibrant history and to consider its impact on American Jewish life, the legacy of the Catskills, New York State history, American culture and entertainment, and the ways in which the era’s rich history is enduringly present and woven into the very fiber of the region.
Following Marisa’s presentation, she will be joined in conversation by Emily Kahn, Executive Director of the New York Preservation Archive Project.
Marisa Scheinfeld was born in Brooklyn, NY in 1980 and raised in the Catskills. She received a B.A. from the State University at Albany in 2002, and a MFA from San Diego State University in 2011. Her work is motivated by an interest in the landscape and its embedded histories, both apparent and hidden. Marisa’s photographic projects and books are among the collections of the Library of Congress, The New York Public Library, Yeshiva University Museum, The National Yiddish Book Center, The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art & Life at UC Berkeley, The Simon Wiesenthal Center, The International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation and The Edmund and Nancy K. Dubois Library at the Museum of Photographic Arts. Marisa is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Photography at SUNY Purchase and working on her second book.
Emily Kahn is a historic preservationist, public historian, and experienced nonprofit leader who started as the Executive Director of the New York Preservation Archive Project in July 2023. She previously worked at the National Trust for Historic Preservation as well as numerous small preservation advocacy organizations, where she developed interdisciplinary skills in archival research, storytelling, museum interpretation, grantmaking, public programming, and fundraising. Passionate about increasing equity in the preservation field, she also serves as the Board President of Columbia’s Preservation Alumni. Emily holds a Master’s degree in Historic Preservation from Columbia University and a Bachelor’s degree in History from Colgate University. Her Jewish heritage plays a core role in her research and practice; she co-published Repression, Re-Invention, and Rugelach: A History of Jews at Colgate in 2018 and wrote her Master's thesis on commemorating Holocaust refugees in Upper Manhattan in 2021