Mountain Home, March 2019

Our 1 Under 30 Wellsboro’s Jason Black Makes the List of the Forbes 30 Under 30

By Carrie Hagen

E E R F he wind

as t

Iron Flamingo Brewery Wades Into Corning March Do-It-Yourself Deck Dreams Mary Goes Celtic at Horseheads Mill Street Market

MARCH 20191

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Volume 14 Issue 3

12

Mother Earth

By Gayle Morrow Kitty TV.

Our 1 Under 30

By Carrie Hagen

14

Wellsboro’s Jason Black makes the list of the Forbes 30 Under 30.

Delivery Me from Deliver-It-Yourself

By Maggie Barnes

Trailers, tears, and home improvement.

6

28

Memories Are Made of...

Vegetables

What IF?

By Ann E. Duckett Unflappable success for the Iron Flamingo Brewery.

By Cornelius O’Donnell

Our columnist recalls food fun without the fighting.

34

Back of the Mountain

By Sarah Wagaman

20

Sleepy Screecher

An Emerald Aisle Cover by Tucker Worthington, photo courtesy Kate Black; top photo, Jason Black with his mother Kate, courtesy Kate Black; middle, courtesy Nadia Mauer; bottom, courtesy Mary’s Celtic Collectibles.

By Maggie Barnes Mary’s Celtic Collectibles brings a bit of the auld sod to the Horseheads Mill Street Market.

24 3

w w w. m o u n ta i n h o m e m ag . co m Editors & Publishers Teresa Banik Capuzzo Michael Capuzzo Associate Publisher George Bochetto, Esq. D i r e c t o r o f O pe r a t i o n s Gwen Button Managing Editor Gayle Morrow S a l e s R ep r e s e n t a t i v e s Robin Ingerick, Richard Trotta Gallery Manager/ Circulation Director Michael Banik Accounting Amy Packard D e s i g n & P h o t o g r ap h y Tucker Worthington, Cover Design Contributing Writers Maggie Barnes, Mike Cutillo, Ann E. Duckett, Elaine Farkas, Alison Fromme, Carrie Hagen, Paul Heimel, Lisa Howeler, Don Knaus, Nicole Landers, Janet McCue, Dave Milano, Cornelius O’Donnell, Brendan O’Meara, Peter Joffre Nye, Linda Roller, Karey Solomon, Beth Williams, Dave Wonderlich C o n t r i b u t i n g P h o t o g r ap h e r s Bernadette Chiaramonte, Diane Cobourn, Bill Crowell, Bruce Dart, Fausel Imagery, Jan Keck, Nigel P. Kent, LaCoe Photography, Roger Kingsley, Tim McBride, Heather Mee, Linda Stager, Mary Sweely, Sue Vogler, Sarah Wagaman, Curt Weinhold,

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D i s t r i b u t i o n T eam Layne Conrad, Grapevine Distribution, Duane Meixel, Linda Roller T h e B ea g l e Cosmo (1996-2014) • Yogi (2004-2018) ABOUT US: Mountain Home is the award-winning regional magazine of PA and NY with more than 100,000 readers. The magazine has been published monthly, since 2005, by Beagle Media, LLC, 871/2 Main Street, Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, 16901, and online at www.mountainhomemag.com. Copyright © 2019 Beagle Media, LLC. All rights reserved. E-mail story ideas to editorial@ mountainhomemag.com, or call (570) 724-3838.

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DISTRIBUTION: Mountain Home is available “Free as the Wind” at hundreds of locations in Tioga, Potter, Bradford, Lycoming, Union, and Clinton counties in PA and Steuben, Chemung, Schuyler, Yates, Seneca, Tioga, and Ontario counties in NY. SUBSCRIPTIONS: For a one-year subscription (12 issues), send $24.95, payable to Beagle Media LLC, 871/2 Main Street, Wellsboro, PA 16901 or visit www.mountainhomemag.com.

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Our 1 Under 30 Wellsboro’s Jason Black Makes the List of the Forbes 30 Under 30

By Carrie Hagen

J

ason Black started reading about technology in May of 2003 when he saw Jada PinkettSmith on the cover of a Wired magazine at Chicago’s O’Hare airport. Costumed as Niobe, a character in The Matrix Reloaded, Smith looked ready to ride a motorcycle off the pages and into the terminal. The tech magazine’s cover story—“Re-enter the Matrix: Inside the Sequel That’s Re-inventing Cinema”—featured the film’s revolutionary visual effects. The meshing of popular culture and technological possibility sparked the imagination of twelve-year-old Jason.

“That’s when I became a tech nerd,” he remembers.

See Black on page 8

6

7

Courtesy Jason Black

Celebrate

Black continued from page 6

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Nearly sixteen years later, Wellsboro born and raised Jason Black is a principal at RRE Ventures, a New York City-based venture capital firm that has raised $1.5 billion for new enterprises in fields including financial services and media: RRE’s portfolio includes Venmo (a mobile payment service owned by PayPal), The Huffington Post, Giphy (an online data base and search engine), and BuzzFeed. Jason analyzes companies interested in machine learning, business intelligence software and security; his contributions to RRE’s portfolio have led to his becoming the fastest-promoted employee in the firm’s nearly twenty-five-year history.

Late last year, Forbes named Jason to its 2019 list of “30 Under 30” figures to watch in his field.

Now in its eighth year, Forbes “30 Under 30” listing in the United States and Canada recognizes 600 individuals identified by the media company as “the next generation of entrepreneurs, visionaries, and game-changers” in twenty professional categories ranging from manufacturing and industry to art and style. After culling thousands of names recommended through open nominations (this year’s online submissions numbered around 15,000), Forbes staff identified finalists for industry leaders selected in each category; these experts then selected thirty names to represent their fields. A member of the 2019 “Venture Capital” category, Jason’s class of thirty includes an engineer with a planet named after him, a former Department of Defense mathematician who graduated from Berkeley at age thirteen, and Arielle Zuckerberg—seasoned product manager, investor, and the younger sister of Facebook’s founder.

Jason graduated from Wellsboro Area High School and started Harvard University as a pre-med major. While taking requisite classes in chemistry, life sciences, economics, and psychology during his first two years, he practiced sketching and buried himself in “voracious tech reading.” He founded the Harvard College Tech Review, worked as a freelance graphic designer, and thought a lot about advertising.

“It took Jason awhile to figure out

See Black on page 10

Courtesy Kate Black

Rural roots: Jason (second from left) pictured with (from left) mom Kate, sister Rachel, younger brother Max, and father Richard, attributes his ambitions to his upbringing.

Courtesy Curt Schramm

Patience under pressure: Jason’s calm, collected, and attentive nature has placed him atop his current competitors, as well as earning the 2002 NASTAR (NAtional STAndard Race) national championship (setting the Par Time for the season among his national competitors).

Team trials: Raju Rishi (left) attributes part of his colleague Jason Black’s success to the athlete’s gifts of being simultaneously cooperative and competitive, and capable of calculating risk while managing stress.

Courtesy Kate Black

what he wanted to do,” recollects his mom, Kate Black.

During his junior year, Jason added computer science classes to his schedule and accepted a paid summer internship in Washington state with Microsoft’s Office division. He graduated from Harvard a year later with a degree in psychology (he minored in computer science) and returned to Microsoft to develop Office’s first dedicated startup analysis. Fresh out of college, Jason found himself presenting to a team that included Bill Gates, an empowering experience that “de-deified” the business magnate.

“I realized, ‘he’s a human too,’” Jason says. The encounter encouraged him to realize that a Wellsboro kid could have a place among industry titans simply because his perspective— as a digital native well read in tech trends—was unique.

“I’m not going to assume that everyone is smarter or that I have the best way forward,” he says, “but I can contribute and bring something new.”

When Jason arrived at Microsoft, there was no centralized person in his Office division to assess what startup tech companies could offer in terms of software and vision. His work helped the company improve by, among other things, broadening the user experience. After a year, he was ready for something different.

Kate says her son admires Microsoft and values the training it gave him. “I think for his own career, he was looking to work at a place where he would be exposed to the new edge of technology. And being a tech analyst for emerging companies was what he wanted to do.”

Jason returned to the East Coast nearly five years ago after beating out hundreds of applicants for the job at RRE Ventures, a small firm and one of the first of its kind when it began almost a quarter of a century ago. He realized right away that there wasn’t an instruction manual on how to become a successful venture capitalist. The job relies on educated instinct.

“Nobody tells you what to do. Any one thing can lead to a great deal,” Jason says. His professional world exists in a state of uncertainty, and until he began figuring out his work style, so did his days. “You can network with everyone or focus on industry details, going super deep in robotics, data infrastructure, or healthcare information technology. Nobody knows the right answer, or what is going to be a multi-billion dollar opportunity.” One of his most successful ventures is RRE’s investment in Latch, a smart lock access system that allows users to unlock doors from a smartphone. Targeted at enterprises with multi-unit buildings, Latch launched in 2016, raised $70 million in its Series B financing round, and found quick partners in Airbnb and JetBlue. Most startups are not so fortunate.

Every investment is a calculated risk, with analysts assessing emerging companies from an ever-evolving knowledge base of industry, marketplace, cultural trends, and consumer demand. The average start-up needs three to five years to prove itself, and the odds are overwhelmingly against its success, no matter how smart the plan or savvy the investment team.

“Exceptional entrepreneurs find a way to make their business successful,” Jason says, pointing to a businessman named Steward Butterfield as an example. Butterfield is the founder of Slack, a real-time team collaboration app and platform. Slack

9

welcome to

WELLSBORO Black continued from page 9

began with the failure of an online video game called Glitch Butterfield and his company developed; when Glitch folded, Butterfield focused on one successful piece of the game—its chat room. “Instead of seeing the loss, Butterfield noted that people loved the chat,� says Jason. Two years after it launched, Slack was valued at $2.8 billion dollars.

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For decades, Sherm Warner taught his math students at Wellsboro Area High School how to tackle problems like visionaries such as Butterfield do. Jason studied AP calculus for two years with Warner and calls the man his most influential teacher. On one of his first days in AP calculus, Jason and his small in number yet large in enthusiasm classmates took out graph paper to work through an exercise. “[Warner] said, ‘What are you doing?’ and handed us regular composition paper,� Jason laughs.

From day one, Sherm Warner used class procedures to mirror real world problem solving. Instead of relying on textbooks, he would present a mini-lesson and have students exercise a concept on scenarios he contemplated outside of the classroom. “He would teach us one lesson, and then bring in one problem at a time to work on until it was time for a new concept,� Jason recalls, commenting on some of the theoretical applications Warner presented more than a decade ago. One was “something about calculating the optimal position on the soccer field to take a shot if you are running ten yards from the sideline.� Another concerned the derivation of railroad angles.

Sherm Warner retired in 2013 after decades of teaching across three different school districts. His colleagues speak to his ability to reach and teach any type of student. Today, Warner and his wife, a retired elementary school teacher, have a farm on a couple of hundred acres in nearby Millerton, where they oversee a sawmill, tend to twenty-seven beef cattle, and watch some combination of eleven grandchildren every day.

Warner loved teaching, and he loved teaching calculus. “One of my big things,â€? he reflects, “was that I wanted to make students aware that there was a bigger world out there and to take responsibility for what they were learning. You can talk about the ‘how’ and the ‘this’ and the ‘that’ for them to learn the material, but they need to internalize it.â€? He pauses when considering his classroom philosophy. “I would try to give them something to relate the ideas to‌something to connect them to.â€?

It Helps to Know Your Roots Jason constantly relates the ideas of entrepreneurs to the interests and habits of his hometown. Growing up in Wellsboro gave him an understanding of consumer space different than that of his peers in the city. “Very few people here have grown up in a town of 3,000 people,� says Jason. When discussing non-essential goods and services with team members, he always thinks about Wellsboro. “I ask myself, ‘Is this something my high school classmates would buy?’ People are claiming they know middle America, but would anybody in Wellsboro buy a $150 T-shirt? How many people would pay $300 for luggage?�

welcome to

WELLSBORO

Raju Rishi, a partner at RRE Ventures, has watched analysts and investors jump on flashy ideas that generate buzz but ultimately fail. “There’s a little bit of a herd mentality. People see something, and they all run to the ball,” Raju says. “Not every idea is a billion-dollar idea. Few have billion-dollar potential.”

When hiring or considering promotions on its small team, RRE evaluates the intellectual horsepower, intellectual curiosity, and work ethic of team members. Raju attributes these characteristics to Jason, along with one other: patience under pressure.

Some of the savviest employees in the business, Raju has found, are former athletes. Under intense pressure, such individuals are competitive but also collaborative, and capable of calculating risk while managing stress.

It’s All Downhill Around the same time that Jada Pinkett-Smith’s character in The Matrix graced Wired magazine’s cover, Curt Schramm, owner of CS Sports in Wellsboro, noticed the name “Jason Black” appearing often in youth ski racing results. Curt, a lifelong skier, had become a coach when his son was a toddler. He left his native Williamsport for Wellsboro in the early 1990s to manage Country Ski and Sports (the precursor to CS Sports); on weekends and evenings, he coached at Ski Denton and later Ski Sawmill. It didn’t take long for Curt to realize that one of his customers—a Dr. Richard Black—shared the same last name as the kid ski racer he’d been reading about.

A bit of a backstory: Dr. Richard and Kate Black have lived in Wellsboro since 1987. The two met in Boston when Kate, a respiratory therapist from Michigan, needed a dentist and found Richard, then a graduate student at the Harvard University School of Dental Medicine. After specializing in oral and maxillofacial surgery at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City, Richard took over a dental practice in Wellsboro and the two settled nearby. In addition to Jason, they have a thirty-yearold daughter, Rachel, a dentist outside of Indianapolis, and Max, a twenty-three-year-old legal analyst at Wayfair Corporate Headquarters in Boston. All three siblings attended Harvard.

“The Harvard expectation was pretty much set the first day of kindergarten,” Jason laughs.

Kate attributes her children’s academic success to a shared internal motivation. Jason, she says, was a “meticulous” kid with organized notebooks and neat handwriting. He did scare her though.

“He has always been a risk taker, physically and mentally,” she laughs. “I don’t think we’re surprised that he is where he is.”

Max Black describes his older brother as having a “knack for walking on the edge.” Literally. “Growing up, whenever we were anywhere dangerous, by the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon or on a ledge by the sea, Jason would always try and walk as close to the edge as possible (much to my mother’s vocal protestations),” he says. “I think he likes the thrill of the void. Jason’s someone who does not feel fear in the face of uncertainty or danger, but joy. I think this is one thing that makes Jason such a successful person: he feels exhilaration where others feel fear.”

Anyway, after making the Richard/Jason connection, Curt began coaching Jason. Under his tutelage, the teenage skier became a Pennsylvania state champion in Alpine ski racing and a See Black on page 32

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Mother Earth

Kitty TV

By Gayle Morrow

W

hat do you do when you’re a cat and it’s cold and icky outside?

Put on your big kitty pants and go run around in the snow?

Hardly.

You get up from your nap, you have a little snack (and that dish better have some food in it, human), you scratch on the furniture, maybe knock some stuff off the table, and then you go amuse yourself with the feline version of TV. One corner of the back of the couch is next to a big window that has a nice, wide, just-for-kitties windowsill. It’s the proverbial catbird seat, and from there they take turns (“take” being the operative word) watching the Bird Feeder Channel. There are birds at the feeder, obviously—chickadees, nuthatches, a variety of woodpeckers, juncos, mourning doves, blue jays. There are squirrels, too—gray squirrels, red squirrels, and flying squirrels. The flyers are cute little buggers—great at defying gravity and almost a channel unto themselves. Once in a while, usually either really early or really late in bird feeding season, we get a bear.

12

From this perch, the cats can also see who or what has the audacity to be walking out on their road. They can keep track of what might be scurrying around on the ground between the window and the front door. And don’t worry about the welfare of that potential prey. Other than inviting chipmunks into the house, the cats talk tough but really don’t hunt much.

When I watch the cats watch their world, I am regularly amazed. There’s a kitty, as intent on what’s happening through that glass as you or I might be during an especially juicy episode of Californication or Shameless. Suddenly she sees something particularly interesting, and she’s off that windowsill and over to the front door quicker than you can say Showtime. You just better be there to open it.

Or, if it happens to be a bear, or a stranger in the driveway, to close it.

My question is: how do they know?

There is definitely a thought process, some sort of reasoning taking place. How do they know that what they’re seeing through the window is something they can get to by

going out the door, or something that might be able to get them if it gets through the door? How do they know, by sight alone, that this would be a fun thing to chase, or that it could be something that might chase them?

There is research that shows cats’ brains have more nerve cells in the visual areas than do humans and most other mammals, and that, overall, they have brains that can share sensory information between interconnected areas. This allows cats to, among other things, construct a complex perception of the real world. Maybe that’s part of the answer, but it doesn’t completely explain Luna.

Luna is our goofiest cat. Some days, for whatever reasons, the Bird Feeder Channel does not suffice for her. She resorts to the real deal. She picks a spot that puts her almost at eye-level with the TV screen, and she’ll watch what we’re watching. Lately I’ve been bingeing on the original Star Trek.

Luna seems to find Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock quite as fascinating as I do.

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Maggie Barnes

Out of the fire (pit) and into an avalanche of possibilities: Bob Barnes masters the art of taking a simple task and morphing it into a mountain.

Deliver Me from Deliver-It-Yourself Trailers, Tears, and Home Improvement

By Maggie Barnes

“Y

ou know what would be nice?”

Bobby flipped down the top third of the newspaper and regarded me with the natural suspicion of husbands everywhere.

“What is that?’

“A small piece of flat land.”

I was standing at the windows that offer a sweeping view of the New YorkPennsylvania border and our field and woods, all carpeted in snow and capped with a lead gray sky. Robert—a veteran of many encounters with my “ideas,” simply waited.

“For a fire pit,” I continued. “Wouldn’t it be nice to have an outdoor fire pit? We just have too much slope.”

I sighed.

14

Now, back in middle school, when they took all the boys into one assembly to teach them to shave or belch, or both at the same time, they put the girls together and introduced us to female methods of persuasion. Some of these concepts cannot be discussed openly or I will lose my membership in the Sisterhood, but there are a couple in the public domain. Tears are the most commonly mentioned, but one of the go-to tactics in my toolbox is The Sigh. It’s gotta be impressive, starting from your knees. It should be sustained and loud enough to overcome environmental noise factors—like a husband with his fingers stuck in his ears. I am an expert sigher, though, and Bob knows all that is usually left for him to do is wait for the little timer

to pop out of his cooking goose.

However, men are not exactly weaponless themselves, and that moment at the window represented the last time I would be the lead dog on this particular home improvement project. In fact, all I did was kick the first stone off the mountaintop.

The avalanche that followed was all on him.

In a matter of hours, the simple idea of an eight-by-eight platform for a small fire pit had morphed into a tiered deck addition to the house, complete with outdoor kitchen, covered seating area, and hot tub. Staring at the architectural-quality drawing my better half had produced faster than a hiccup, I realized I had played right into a plan that was fully developed in his head long before See Deliver Me on page 16

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Perfected plan: from a simple sigh to a completed vision.

Deliver Me continued from page 14

my sigh had begun its journey up my body.

We started gathering pieces of the deck project as we found bargains. The fire pit was an out-of-season snatch for a song and the stonework was a discontinued stroke of luck. On a bitter March day, I saw a sale on the type of decking boards we were interested in. We trucked off the hill and found the stuff was just what we were after. We purchased just shy of a thousand square feet. (Remember my eight by eight idea? Forget it. All this thing was going to need was a wind sock and the medical helicopter could land on it.)

“Will they deliver the boards?” I asked as I climbed into the truck.

My husband grinned and shook his head.

“This,” Bob said triumphantly, “is why we bought a trailer.”

The autumn before, we had picked up a fifteen-foot trailer, a nice one with sides and a gate, to help with all the chores having our hilltop home seemed to necessitate. It was parked next to the garage, snoozing away the snowy days. Bob had the hitch set up on blocks, so it would be easy to back the truck up, fit the ball over the hitch, secure it, and head out. Turns out, the blocks had shifted and the trailer was sitting firmly on the frozen ground.

That was okay, because we had hydraulic jacks to lift the hitch back up and slide the blocks under again. Bob retrieved the jacks and put one into position. Crank. Crank. Crank. Crankity-crankcrank. It sure looked to my untrained eye like the jack wasn’t lifting anything, including my husband’s spirits.

“It’s too cold. No problem,” he rebounded.

The truck was turned on, the heat in the cab blasted, and the unresponsive jacks placed on the seats. One of us asked again about having the boards delivered. Instead, it was suggested by the other of us that all we had to do was prop the trailer up enough for me to jam the blocks back into place.

This was not suggested by me.

Bob got a 2x4, jammed it under the trailer hitch, and pushed down while I tried to return the blocks to position.

THUD! The trailer slipped off the board and crashed back to earth, triggering my self-preservation instinct. I leapt up and back and counted all my fingers upon landing.

“Ready to try again?” My husband showed no concern for my future ability to feed myself.

“Can’t we just ask them what they would charge to deliver the boards?” I tried to sigh, but the cold had set up camp in my feet and no air was getting higher than my shins.

“For all those boards? It would be a fortune. Come on, give it another shot.”

We did. This time, I got two of three blocks under the hitch before the trailer dropped again. We were painfully close. And by painfully I mean frostbite.

“Bobby, it’s one phone call. You don’t have to ask, I will. I’m great at not knowing stuff. It’s one of my best things!”

We had been at it more than an hour. The lead sky was unloading an odd mixture of sleet and snow that plastered our faces and made breathing a contact sport. The warmed up jacks were given another chance to be heroes, but declined to rise to the occasion. Finally, we got the trailer up high enough to receive the connection from the truck.

At the home improvement store, the first board was fed into the trailer and my husband dragged it in. In a heartbeat, we knew we had a numbers problem. Fifteen-foot trailer. Sixteenfoot boards.

Bob did everything but stand on his head trying to get that board to fit. I looked at the mountainous pile of boards to be loaded, a trailer with a gate that couldn’t be closed, my half-frozen husband, and decided to risk a question.

“Just for giggles,” I said to the young man beside me, “what would you charge us to deliver this?”

“The boards? Up to your place?” The kid mentally calculated for about a nanosecond, then responded. “Twenty bucks.”

Something deep inside of me snapped. It may have been my spinal cord when I whirled around with murder in my eyes and barked, “ROBERT!” Informed of the delivery cost, Bob, still standing in the trailer with a half-bent board over his head, calmly replied, “Oh. Let’s do that.”

He was right about the size of the deck. He was right about the outdoor kitchen and the hot tub. He was right about the stone for the fire pit.

But the next time he won’t ask about delivery, I’m skipping the sigh and going straight to the tears.

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Maggie Barnes has won several IRMAs and Keystone Press Awards.

She lives in Waverly, New York.

17

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Courtesy Nadia Mauer

Steeped with heritage: Mauer family members (from left) Adam, Nadia, Mark, and Benjamin are flush with family success.

What IF?

Unflappable Success for the Iron Flamingo Brewery

By Ann E. Duckett

I

n today’s choppy economy, many new business owners wonder if they have a leg to stand on. If that makes you think of flamingos, read on.

For the Mauer family, success has come over the last five years in measured steps as they remained committed to opening a business—the Iron Flamingo Brewery. Iron Flamingo opened December 27, 2014, and the Mauers feel a great sense of pride in being part of the fabric of a growing group of small but successful Corning businesses. As in other small towns across the country, growth is happening organically in Corning—with long-time residents taking the lead.

Enter the Iron Flamingo.

What do flamingos, iron or otherwise, have to do with beer? Company founders Mark and Nadia Mauer, partnering with sons Adam and Ben, explain that the Iron Flamingo has become a symbol of family unity and the business—their logo is an iron flamingo. Iron represents strength and “contributes to the brown color in

beer bottles, protecting the beer from light. It’s also very important in preserving that awesome flavor so unique to Iron Flamingo beer,” explains Adam, who oversees marketing, brand integrity, and events for the brewery.

And the flamingo itself?

“They are strong, elegant, and monogamous creatures, staying together for life,” Adam continues. “They get their food by straining it from water through a unique mechanism only flamingos possess.

It is very similar to making wort for beer (in essence, wort is the beer before the beer—unfermented). Taking the “I” and “F,” the abbreviated “IF” led us to wonder, ‘what if?’”

Mark and Nadia grew up in Scranton, working in family-owned restaurants.

They met at the Greenwood Inn (formerly owned by Mark’s family) and learned of one another’s lineage in brewing.

“Brewing beer has long been a passion on both sides,” says Nadia. “Grandpa Mauer came from Germany and was primarily a

butcher. He made his own beer and wine for his bar and restaurant. Grandpa Stec was a family doctor and was quite the entrepreneur who also owned a brewery. We have the original stock certificate hanging in our brewery.

“Mark and I came to Corning in1990 from Rome, New York, where Mark served in the U.S. Air Force. We settled here because of the family atmosphere, good school system, and the small town feeling we found. Corning is supported by both Corning Inc. and the tourism industry—this makes it an ideal place to start a brewery.”

What you’ll find at Iron Flamingo Brewery is a relaxed family-friendly atmosphere with exceptional customer service. Given the day of the week, you’ll be greeted in the tasting room most likely

by Adam or Mark, though Mark is a family medicine physician, so look for him more on weekends. Tours are encouraged so you can see where the beer magic happens. You’ll discover a unique collection of craft beers See Flamingo on page 22

20

Congratulations to our February Photo Contest Winner...

Sue Vogler

Holiday & Home Decor Jewelry, Clothing, and Knitwear

Irish & Scottish Guinness Merchadise

Mary’s Celtic Collectibles If you’re interested in getting on our photographer mailing list or to submit your photos for next month, email gwenb@mountainhomemag.com or call 570-724-3838.

Mary Schuehler Owner

117 East Mill St. Horseheads, NY

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

@ Horseheads Mill St Market

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Welcome to Corning’s Corning’s Gaffer GafferDistrict District Welcome to We to to Wecarry carryan anarray arrayofofproducts products complement compliment your yourhair haircare careand and beauty beautyneeds. needs.

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21

Courtesy Nadia Mauer (2)

Flamingo continued from page 20

brewed by Ben, with ingredients sourced from the fertile Finger Lakes growing regions. From their full-bodied Mocha Coffee Porter to the brooding Dark English Ale to something clean and crisp like IF’s Blonde Ale or the mellow and hoppy American Amber Red, they’re all exceptional. And, there’s always a creative seasonal special or two, like Sweet Potato Stout, milky and sweet, with the added depth of roasted chocolate, coffee, and caramel.

IF is located in a great neighborhood just five minutes across the Chemung River from the historic Gaffer District. After searching for the perfect spot for about a year and making sure the zoning was right for the brewery, the Mauers began a twelvemonth renovation project on a building that had sat vacant and unused for thirty-two years, doing a lot of the work themselves.

“Owning and operating a brewery has been a lifelong dream.

Good fortune led us to the 196 Baker Street location, formerly a fruit distributor and the Becraft Tire Company,” says Nadia.

“It was truly a labor of love! From removing walls, scraping and painting ceilings and walls to putting together an indoor cooler it was, and is, a big family affair. We’ve transformed this unique location into Corning’s first brewery to bottle and A leg-up lineup: distribute beer. With off-street parking, outside seating, flashy flamingos and a uniquely designed tasting room, the brewery has grace the taps become a meeting place for beer lovers throughout the and Mauer area and numerous visitors to our community.” brothers (from As staunch supporters of Corning, the Mauers left) Benjamin, head brewer, invite patrons to order food in from local restaurants, and Adam, CFO, and they regularly host food vendors for tastings or events. oldest (visiting) There is a spacious game room for families and groups.

Matthew pitch in During the summer, folks relax under the big tent, at with production. picnic tables, or play lawn games in the generous yard.

Working to keep their community a healthy place to live and raise a family, they are proud to incorporate green energy in the brewery, using solar power for the brewing process.

Now in its fifth year of operation, goals for IF include becoming a premium craft beer brand in the northeast, while maintaining its high quality and core values. That involves reaching into other markets, increasing production for bottled and kegged beer, and distribution facilities.

When asked what patrons love most about Iron Flamingo, Nadia says she believes it is a combination of “our laid back atmosphere” and the fact that “we are small and very friendly with awesome beer!”

“And,” she adds, “who doesn’t love flamingos?”

Iron Flamingo is open Monday through Friday from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m., from 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturdays, and from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sundays. Call them at (607) 936-4766 for tour scheduling. And, be sure to save the date for this year’s “#EXPLORECorning” event, March 4-8. The Cabin Fever Craft Beverage Tasting, designed to get you out of hibernation, is Friday, March 8, from 5 to 8 p.m., and features more than twenty of the region’s top wineries, breweries, and distilleries. For details visit gafferdistrict.com/events/cabin-fever-2019.

Ann Duckett is a certified cheesemaker and former cheesemonger who now devotes her time to educating and helping others find their cheese bliss through classes, presentations, special events, and cheese catering.

22

welcome to

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Maggie Barnes Green with envy: those visiting Mary’s shop will find themselves yearning for Irish items ranging from jewelry and wedding items to scarves and socks.

An Emerald Aisle

Mary’s Celtic Collectibles Brings a Bit of the Auld Sod to the Horseheads Mill Street Market

By Maggie Barnes “Well it’s a nice, soft night, so I think I’ll go and join me comrades and talk a little treason. G’night, Sean.”

I

f you are of Irish descent, or pretending to be during the annual March shenanigans, you probably recognize that quote from The Quiet Man. The classic film, which squares off John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara, is routinely ranked as America’s favorite Irish movie. There are Irish movies? Oh, yes. And Irish shops.

America is home to thousands of Celtic stores that celebrate the heritage of Irish and Scottish families.

Ask Mary Schuehler why there aren’t German shops, or English shops, or Swedish shops. Why do the Irish get to have all the merchandise?

Mary’s round face, framed with auburn hair that announces her ancestry, splits into

a smile.

“I don’t know. Maybe because we are just happy, gregarious people,” she says.

Mary’s Collectibles is one of those shops that celebrates ties with the Emerald Isle. Located on the second floor of Horseheads Mill Street Market, Mary presides over her inventory of sweaters, hats, jewelry, and home décor, all created to showcase the joy of being Irish.

But back to John Wayne wooing a spirited and reluctant Maureen O’Hara.

Throughout the movie, Wayne wears a cap that’s as Irish as a shamrock. People come into Mary’s store looking for a hat like that, and she can go one better—the official The Quiet Man movie hat. Check out the tag.

Clothing to ward off the chill as you wander the heather seems to be the most popular items for shoppers. Mary has an impressive collection of sweaters, shawls,

and capes. They are the genuine article, made in Ireland from soft Merino wool.

She only buys from vendors in Ireland and Scotland, making the trek across the pond to select items from some of the 500 vendors on hand.

“I try to feature one new type of sweater each year, depending on the new patterns. The Aran pattern is the most known for the sweaters. I also have products from Baber, the best known Scottish maker of hats and sweaters,” Mary says, while handing over a scarf that manages to be baby soft and heavy-duty cold protection simultaneously. The colors lean heavily towards blue, gray, brown, and a dozen shades of green, of course. In that sea of earth tones, the shamrock scarf in every hue of the rainbow stands out like a Guinness at a tea party.

Ah, the Guinness. Ireland’s favorite See Mary’s on page 26

24

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Mary’s continued from page 24

Maggie Barnes (3)

brew is strongly represented in glassware and those striped rugby shirts that the young folks favor. At the other end of the age spectrum, the official “Grandfather” linen shirts are available in stone and jade. (Picture a nineteenth century nightshirt, make it about a third shorter, and you’ve got the “Grandfather.”)

Mary had always worked in customer-service jobs. She was a bank teller and a cashier in a mall store. Come 2011, she took a leap of faith and rented space in Horseheads Mill Street Market.

“It took me a while to figure out what would sell,” she admits. She started with ceramic pottery and a couple of other items, but sales were disappointing. In 2014 she landed on the idea of exclusively selling Irish and Scottish items. Her study of buying patterns continued, and Mary began to narrow her focus even more.

“Signs don’t seem to be very popular anymore,” she says, so those items are being phased out. “With jewelry, I’ve learned to have a wide price range. There are high-quality things for life’s special occasions, but there are also everyday pieces that won’t break the bank.”

There is even a section for that most special of special days—a wedding. When the bride and groom both hail from the Auld Sod, there is a pewter stand that holds their champagne flutes connected by a Claddagh. Known the world over, the ultimate symbol of Ireland has three components; hands that represent friendship, a heart to stand for love, and a crown, Green with envy: which speaks of loyalty. “People who strongly identify with those visiting being Irish are drawn to this section of the shop,” Mary says Mary’s shop will as she spins a sparkling display case. find themselves Mary even carries wool socks that boast of the wearer’s yearning for Irish devotion to Syracuse University. Christmas is on display all items ranging from jewelry to wedding year with ornaments and Santas bedecked in green. “We see items and scarves a lot of tourists coming to the Finger Lakes and they won’t to socks. be back before Christmas, so I need to have the ornaments year round,” she says.

There’s really only one topic that can cast a cloud over Mary’s cheerful countenance. She has special interest in that conundrum known as Brexit, the planned departure of Great Britain from the European Union. As anyone who follows world news is aware, the whole issue has ended up in a confusing heap of unanswered questions. Mary has some of those.

“What’s going to happen with Northern Ireland and Scotland? Will there be tariffs and new taxes on things? Will delivery be slowed? It could have a big impact on my business.”

But a moment later, she is pointing out the wool ties featuring some of the family tartans of Ireland, and admitting with a laugh that she is in a “mixed marriage.”

“He’s German. And an accountant. And he hates it when I call all this my hobby. But I just enjoy it too much to think of it as a job.”

Obviously, that is the luck of the Irish.

Find Mary’s Collectibles on Facebook, calle her at (607) 738-5272, or better yet, head to Horseheads Mill Street Market at 117 West Mill Street, Horseheads, and climb the stairs to a little slice of the Emerald Isle.

26

Maggie Barnes has won several IRMAs and Keystone Press Awards.

She lives in Waverly, New York.

Bradford County Opportunities for Everyone of All Ages

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FOOD

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Memories Are Made of...Vegetables Our Columnist Recalls Food Fun without the Fighting

By Cornelius O’Donnell

T

he bitter cold winter weather kept me indoors and gave me the opportunity to catch up with reading something other than cookbooks and mystery novels. The Wall Street Journal ran an article a bit ago on the topic of picky eaters and getting them to consume at least most of the good-for-you food you place before them. As Jennifer Traig, the author of the piece said: “Getting kids to eat what they should is one of the biggest

28

fights that modern parents face.” It’s been a long time since I, as the eldest of four and mom’s little helper, placed the small piece of chicken or green bean or whatever on a spoon and made believe it was a choo-choo heading into a little tyke’s tunnel, a.k.a. mouth.

Ah, memories of tying on those bibs!

As I remember, the somewhat too exuberant sound effects of that puffing train would have put anyone off their eating mettle.

Well, the kids survived, and order returned to the breakfast nook.

I then digress back to my days as a preteen and teenaged eater.

My mother, having an Irish heritage plus a husband who asked no more than meat-and-potato fare, usually featured a potato dish with most meals. So often this was in the form of a mash.

My close-in-age brother number two thus creatively solved the problem of downing the vegetables we most assuredly did not enjoy. We simply smashed the green bean or Brussels sprout or spinach into the liberally buttered mashed potatoes. (No, I don’t remember the ratio.)

Turning Carrots into Karats My dad was most assuredly not a fan of our subterfuge. “Stop playing with your food,” he’d bark, and we’d cut back a bit on the obviousness of our mixing. To get all of us to eat those orange slices of carrots, mom sprinkled them with some brown sugar, and we’d gobble them us. She was a real pre-Mary Poppins. Corn, usually purchased in season from farm stands, was a no-brainer.

We loved eating the ears and even frozen or, more likely back then, canned. It all went down like a treat. Did you ever make bets with your sibs as to how many ears you could eat in a sitting?

Brother Robert and I did.

Among the Missing Things I don’t remember having regularly—if at all—include zucchini, called Italian squash back then, or squash of any kind, except for pumpkin, which always came in a can at our place.

Cauliflower was another vegetable we’d do anything to avoid, so Mom made it with buttery crumbs on top or disguised it by ladling on a cheesy cream sauce. That made it OK. Mom loved beets; us kids didn’t. She’d de-can them and those rosy-red slices plus cottage cheese made her lunch. (She was about a size eight.)

I never saw a sugar snap pea or even a pea pod until I was in my thirties. Hot pepper seasoning (think Tabasco) never appeared.

Yes, we had a pepper mill that we took turns using. Maybe that’s why I treasure such mills today. Fresh herbs were absent, but somehow Parmesan was on the table Friday evenings when we had spaghetti, sauced from the cellar’s hoard. There was a grinder—a round one with a metal loop on top into which you slipped your hand. Somehow, I think it was imported, despite the war.

Those Friday evening spaghetti feasts were much looked forward to. No meat in the sauce or meatballs, of course. It was Friday in a Catholic home and the fish came from a take-away place. I remember being shocked one Friday when there, on the menu board for the school cafeteria, was what I thought was “rabbit.” Turned out to be “rarebit.” That’s a cheese dish and probably served on those Fridays to clergy.

To us, that orange mash served on Thanksgiving was known as turnip. Never saw the white variety until I was past my teens.

Salads, other than egg and tuna, were reserved for my mother who had a victory garden out back during the war. We did put lettuce on sandwiches, of course, and we loved Arnold’s thin “Brick-Oven” bread.

Does any of this sound familiar?

I wonder if we would love vegetables more if we helped grow them. I love reading about the kids in San Francisco who tend plots in the San Francisco school yards. Brilliant! And I know my interest in food was sparked by helping cook meals. Surely kids See Vegetables on page 30

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REAL ESTATE

Vegetables continued from page 29

can learn to measure out ingredients that they help find in the refrigerator or cupboard. I did.

My best friend, who often dined with us, had a mantra that he’d repeat—endlessly: “There are two things I can’t stand, parsnips and margarine.” He needn’t worry, as my mom never used either.

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I do want to leave you with a recipe, and here’s one that uses the tomatos you preserved last August or the wonderful canned versions like San Marzano or the fire-roasted variety. I got this recipe years ago from Marion Cunningham who was the editor of the newer Fanny Farmer books.

Marion’s Walnut Creek Chicken You will have lots of tomato sauce left over and it is perfect to ladle over pork chops or meat loaf. This is probably the easiest recipe I’ve ever cooked. To make it even easier, lightly smack the cloves to remove the skin, then grate the cloves with a microplane right into the pan. I’ve made this with chicken thighs and was delighted.

1 quart canned or homemade tomato sauce 3 cloves garlic, minced 1 medium onion, minced (pre-chopped is OK) Few grinds of the pepper mill Salt 2 bay leaves 1 tsp. dried oregano (or more to taste), crumbled ½ tsp. dried cumin ¾ c. raisins 1 Tbsp. vegetable, olive, or corn oil 1 Tbsp. red wine vinegar 3 to 4 pounds chicken, cut up

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One fruit/vegetable we all rooted for was that red stuff. A bottle of catsup/ketchup was often on the table. For years I’d even put it on my morning scrambled eggs. And my mother made all sorts of things when the tomato harvest came in. She’d convert those bushels into the chili sauce I still crave today, or the jarred tomatoes she’d make that lined the shelves in our basement.

Hours: Mon-Sat 7-5

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine all the ingredients except the chicken in a 3-quart Dutch oven or lidded casserole.

Stir to blend and then add the chicken pieces. Spoon the sauce over it. Bake for 1½ hours.

Makes 4 to 6 servings.

Go Online There are many sources of ideas out there on the Internet for feeding young’uns. One I liked was “30 Kid-Friendly Dinners” that you’ll find by going to My Recipes.com. Now I’m going to make some meatballs that were denied to me in my youth.

However, I have to find the ice-cream scoop necessary to shape those orbs just so.

Chef, teacher, author, and award-winning columnist Cornelius O’Donnell lives in Horseheads, New York.

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Black continued from page 11

competitor in the Junior Olympics.

“Ski racing is a character builder,” says Curt, who went on to coach two other state champions. “At some level, competitors become your teammates.” Curt recalls Jason competing against a celebrated young skier from western Pennsylvania the year he won the Alpine event. The other kid had a “different pair of skis for every type of run”—the downhill, the slalom, the giant slalom and the super-G (super giant slalom). Curt remembers overhearing a conversation between the two young competitors in which Jason said he only had one pair of skis for every type of slope. “That Jason could ski so well on one pair of skis,” laughs Curt, “totally got into this other kid’s mind.” He lost and Jason won the title.

“Jason was usually very calm and collected, very attentive,” Curt continues. But not always. When his athletes would get frustrated about a bad run or glitch in technique, Curt redirected them with a no-nonsense approach. “I’d tell him that you only have to be the racer that makes the least amount of mistakes,” Curt reflects. “Just keep going.”

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In a profession where “people jump around a lot,” Jason looks forward to staying with RRE for a long time. “I love what I do. It is really a very fulfilling job and one that is so unique to what I love.” He is on track to become a partner at the venture firm, and in his spare time, he sits on the boards of ten different companies.

“I love continuously learning,” he continues, “and of watching companies grow and helping them grow.”

Sometime after Jason moved to New York, his mom wondered if he was doing too much.

“I said to him once, ‘You’re always working,’” Kate remembers, “and he said to me, ‘Mom, I want to be the best I can be in this field because I love it.’”

Her older son greatly credits his upbringing for his ambitions, saying that it taught him to be himself and do what he loves. Sherm Warner taught his classes that “you can go further than you expect on your own,” says Jason, and he has found his teacher’s lessons to be as true in Tioga County as they are in Manhattan. Jason loves living in New York City, and he tries to “recreate” his hometown’s sense of community by getting to know his baristas and bartenders.

Kate likes to hear this. She recalls pinning a Dale Carnegie quote to a corkboard in Jason’s room at home. It read as a principle from Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People: “Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.”

And mom doesn’t need to worry about her son’s working too hard. He manages to get outside of the office to cycle at least 100 miles every week.

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B A C K O F T H E M O U N TA I N

Sleepy Screecher

By Sarah Wagaman

T

his owl—we call him Mr. Who Who, we presume he is wise, and we think he is a red-phase eastern screech owl—is not troubled by human guests. He took up residence in this old tree near the house, and seems content to rest here until it’s time for his next meal. His beautiful cyan-colored eyes are the only part of him that doesn’t provide camouflage.

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