Lake Placid, NY 7/4/14

We drove through the morning mist of the Adirondack Mountains...

to Lake Placid, home of the 1980 Winter Olympics.

and nearby Mirror Lake.

In 1849 the abolitionist John Brown and his family moved to this farmhouse outside the village of North Elba, which is close to Lake Placid. 

Over the course of the next several years, Brown and his supporters were actively engaged in abolitionist activities.  In 1859, after several of Brown's followers were killed or captured at Harper's Ferry, WV, and Brown was executed, he was buried at this farmstead.  An 1859 sketch of Brown's burial.

His grave...

was located close to this huge boulder at his request.  Legend holds that he would often take a chair to the top of the boulder and sit.

A large bronze statue of Brown and an African American youth was placed nearby in 1935.  It was commissioned by the John Brown Memorial Association, whose members were primarily African Americans from the Philadelphia area.

We continued through the Adirondacks...

to Elmira, NY, to pay homage to one of our favorite authors.

Mark Twain's son-in-law asked to be buried at Twain's feet; he was.

A section of the large national cemetery in Elmira.

A young robin entangled in nylon string, which we freed.

The damn ingrate never thanked us.