Patti reports her father spent the next 20 years telling stories of his life in the Catskills. "We will make new traditions," he told his family. The SYDA Foundation, a not-for-profit tied to promoting Sidda Yoga ideas, purchased the resort and converted it into an ashram. In 1986, Patti's father, Benjamin, was 72, and Hotel Brickman like many other Catskill resorts, was dwindling in popularity. "The compassion this man had for this poor person taught me how to be a better person." When Patti told the employee that he had to leave, he responded, "When he is finishing eating, I will ask him to leave." Patti said that that encounter taught her humility. One evening, Patti walked into the kitchen and realized that one of the kitchen staff was feeding a homeless man. Patti recalls fondly the diversity of the staff, which included college students and seasonal workers from the Southern states and from Central and South America. When she was 26, she took over running the kitchen, supervising at times over 200 staff members. In 1965, 15-year old Patti Posner Daboosh began working in the resort's office. Along with adult activities, the hotel had a nursery, a day camp for children, and a teen program. ![]() Hotel Brickman had 300 rooms that accommodated over 600 adults and children. ![]() The Brickman's daughter Anna and her husband Joseph Posner and their sons eventually took over the ownership. Soon friends and relatives were coming up to the Brickman to escape the city's summers, and the farm took on boarders. As Abraham had worked on the farms for the czars, they purchased farmland in South Fallsburg. Soon after emigrating from Russia in 1908, Abraham and Molly Brickman realized that New York City, with its tenements, crowded streets, and poor air, was not for them. Sullivan, Ulster, and nearby counties offered working class Jewish New Yorkers, mostly Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants, cheap land on which to build farms, bungalows, and hotels. Because of anti-Semitism, particularly in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s, such choices were few. Like many New York City dwellers before the advent of air conditioning, Jews looked for places that would provide a respite from the summer heat. The popularity of the Catskills starts at the beginning of the 20th century. But there were many smaller resorts and cottages too. Famous hotels of the area included The Concord, Grossinger's, and Kutshers. Borscht, a soup associated with immigrants from Eastern Europe, was a colloquialism for Jewish. She and others have many a story to share of their time in the Catskills, often called the Borscht Belt. "This was our Camelot, a place that has vanished but still has a place in the hearts and minds by the thousands whose life were shaped by this shared experienced," said Patty Beardley Roker, a former staff member at the Concord. The heyday of the Catskills have ended, but the memories of those resorts remain with those who shared those summers as staff and guests. ![]() You think kids want to come with their parents and take fox-trot lessons? Trips to Europe, that's what the kids want. In the classic movie "Dirty Dancing," Jack Weston's character Max Kellerman, the owner of the fictional Catskill resort, laments the changes down the road.
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