Winter fun for Deb and Bob Kreider means hooking up their fluffy Siberian huskies and hitting the snowy trails that meander around their 100-plus-acre forested property in Vermontville.
February 2019
The Movie Man
Working from a lab and factory in Essex, Ken Richter invented and built specialized aviation and camera equipment that was used around the world. As a globe-trotting pilot and cinematographer himself—in 1974, The New York Times named him one of the top travel film–lecturers in the country—many of these inventions were born of his own desire for better equipment.
Even as a youth in Randolph, Massachusetts, in the 1930s, Richter was obsessed with the clarity of images. He ground his own telescope lenses, and earned a scholarship to Harvard to study astronomy. It was a short leap to photography, where he experimented with both still and motion-picture cameras. After college, Richter worked as a cameraman in Hollywood, shooting everything from comedy shorts at Columbia Pictures to outdoor scenes used in montages.
Within three years, Richter left to film travelogues, those 15- to 20-minute tours of places like Mozambique or the Yukon that were once part of a typical night at the movies. He wanted the freedom to wait for the right atmospheric moment despite what the weather or budget said, to invent his own equipment when nothing available was good enough. And he wanted to see the world on his own terms, to portray places like the Alps and the Sahara accurately, not as backdrops to imaginary stories. Maybe the idea of shooting slapstick falls and punches on a sound stage felt too confining.
Homegrown Talent
In most family businesses, the lines are clear from the outset. A patriarch or matriarch hatches a plan, succeeds, and then inevitably brings the children into the line of work. John D. Rockefeller Jr. followed his old man into oil and finance. The New York Times gets handed down from Sulzberger to Sulzberger.
Not so the Posts of Au Sable Forks. Larry Post literally fell into his business, by way of what could have been a tragic accident. In April of 2003, he took a nasty tumble and hit his head while skiing at Whiteface. A slow-bleeding subdural hematoma caused a stroke that nearly killed him and wiped out much of his short-term memory. He couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t remember things, couldn’t even recite the alphabet. “It was like being with somebody with Alzheimer’s,” recalls his wife, Joann.
Lapland Lake
In Fall 2013, my boyfriend, Keith, and I arrived at Lapland Lake Nordic Vacation Center in the southern Adirondacks for the first time. We were greeted by a black-and-white cat, Little Bit, as well as Kiva, a Karelian bear dog, who bounded onto the scene, his tail wagging. Along with our welcoming party, the bright foliage, the rushing stream in the background, and the smell of pine signaled that we were home.
Then again, Keith and I both knew Lapland would be “our place” before we ever left our apartment in Brooklyn. After combing through lists of places to stay in the Adirondacks, we surprised each other by both picking this resort in Benson, about nine miles from the village of Northville. For Keith it was the description: spring-fed non-motorized mountain lake, miles of forest trails, little housekeeping cottages—or “tupas,” as they’re called in Finnish—and most important, peace and quiet.
Rebel Love
Sometimes when we have nothing else to argue about, my husband, three sons and I debate which of our dogs has been the smartest. Over the past 15 years we have owned four: all Labrador retrievers released as puppies from Guiding Eyes for the Blind, made available for adoption as pets when, at eight weeks of age, they failed to demonstrate the exact mix of measurable traits needed to succeed as service dogs. When the members of my family debate which of our four would-be guide dogs was the smartest—well, Rebel’s name just never comes up.
On Sale Now
February 2026
Meet Lake Placid’s Tate Frantz, a top ski-jumping contender at the Milan-Cortina Olympics—plus Fourth Lake ice hockey, North Creek Ski Bowl lore, brews at Lake Clear's historic Charlie’s Inn and more!
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