Page 8 - Cortland County Convention & Visitors Bureau

DISCOVER THE PAST IN CORTLAND COUNTY

LET’S GO ON A GEOTOUR!

© Katie Keyser, Cortland Standard
Experience the history and beauty of Cortland County
NEW YORK STATE by taking the Experience Cortland GeoTour!
COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME
W hen you think of country music, the first thing that might come County to the secret (and not-so-secret) hideaways
This tour will take you along the byways of Cortland
where we’ve stashed caches for you to discover. Learn
to mind is Nashville, home of the National Country Music Hall
of Fame. But fans of country music in New York need not travel
about a Civil War encampment, Cortland’s connection
any further than Cortland to get a taste of its rich history. Visit
the New York State Country Music Hall of Fame and browse to major league baseball, the most unusual grave marker
you’ll ever see, and more.
the array of memorabilia from the many Nashville and local entertainers.
There is Tammy Wynette’s $10,000 sequined dress, Kenny Rogers’ famous If you like to solve puzzles, we’ve incorporated one into
white suit, Ernest Tubbs suit, Jeannie C. Riley’s dress, Jack Greene’s suit our tour. Each geocache site contains a three-letter code.
and more, as well as memorabilia from local NYS musicians and singers.
Visit all 20 sites, record all the code letters, decipher the
NYS COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME correct message, and claim your prize at our office!
1824 NY-13, Cortland • (607) 334-8109 We hope you’ll explore Cortland County, have some fun,
www.cortlandmusicpark.org/nys-country-fall-of-fame
learn a bit of history, and enjoy the great outdoors. Grab
your favorite GPS-enabled device, print a map from our
website, and get started on your geocaching adventure!
geocaching.com/play/geotours/experiencecortland

FUN LOCAL HISTORY FACTS
CORTLAND RURAL CEMETERY
Amelia Jenks Bloomer, a pioneer in women’s
Established in 1853, this open-air museum is a beautiful rights and the temperance movement, was
19th-century Victorian garden cemetery that sits on born in Homer, NY. She popularized women’s
apparel that came to be known as “bloomers.”
50 acres and is the final resting place for 18,000 people.
A fine example of the rural cemetery (as a solution to the problem Francis B. Carpenter, painter of Lincoln’s
portrait, Willian Osborn Stoddard, Lincoln’s
of overcrowding urban cemeteries), the Cortland Rural Cemetery
private secretary, and Eli Devoe, foiler of an
is a carefully-planned garden cemetery with a deliberate focus on
assassination plot, all hailed from Homer, NY.
architectural and landscape design. Walk the cemetery with an
interactive “cemetrail tour” and admire the beauty of the headstones and the The Lamont Memorial Free Library was
diverse species of trees to discover those who helped shaped Cortland history. the former home of Daniel Lamont,
the Secretary of War during one of Grover
Visitors may see the graves of the last Upstate Governor of New York, Cleveland’s presidential terms.
Nathan Miller; the graves of veterans of all American wars, including that
of Brigadier-General Joseph Reynolds, who served in the War of 1812 and Truxton, NY was the home of John McGraw,
Colonel Andrew J. Grover, who died at Gettysburg; and the grave of a 30-year manager of the New York Giants.
Dr. Julia Spalding, who arrived in Cortland in 1883 as one of the nation’s He was inducted into the Hall-of-Fame in 1937
earliest women doctors. after compiling 2,763 victories and
THE CORTLAND RURAL CEMETERY leading the Giants to 10 National League
110 Tompkins Street, Cortland • (607) 756-6022 pennants and three World Series titles.
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www.cortland-rural-cemetery.com