WILTON — Kelly’s Angels, a Capital Region charity devoted to helping children and families facing loss and grief, has awarded $36,000 in scholarships to 24 local high school graduates. The scholarship winners have all overcome significant adversity and shown a commitment to helping others.

Recipients of the $1,500 scholarships include Willow Donaldson and Santino Ciccone from Saratoga Springs; Joseph Andrews and Isabella San Angelo from Saratoga Catholic; Angela Morrison and Luis Caminero from Glens Falls; Ashton Humphries and Lauren Durfey from South Glens Falls; and Jacob Niznik and Catherine Carney from Stillwater.

SARATOGA SPRINGS —  The award-winning Leadership Saratoga program recently completed four impactful projects for local nonprofits, and is currently seeking project ideas for the upcoming 2024-2025 class.

Sponsored by the Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce, the program is dedicated to the development of leaders who will serve their communities today and in the future. As part of the program, the class assists up to four local nonprofits to help enhance or re-envision programs, operations, and strategies key to their future success.

The class of 2024 completed the following projects:

Saratoga Pride

Saratoga Pride is an all-volunteer organization that has served the LGBTQ+ community and allies for more than 15 years. Leadership Saratoga class members helped to create a strategy to expand county-wide programs and opportunities for effective partnerships with businesses and non-profit organizations aligned with Saratoga Pride’s mission. Additionally, Leadership Saratoga helped Saratoga Pride expand its public library partnership program in Saratoga County.

Our Lodge Foundation

Our Lodge Foundation’s primary purpose is to support Frederick Allen Elks Lodge #609, a black international fraternal organization, in their philanthropic efforts, as well as the sustainment and upgrade of their building located on Beekman Street. Leadership Saratoga helped Our Lodge Foundation with a communications, outreach, and development strategy.

Saratoga Sponsor-A-Scholar

Saratoga Sponsor a Scholar assists students from Saratoga Springs High School in graduating from high school and attending and graduating from college or other technical higher learning programs. Leadership Saratoga helped Saratoga Sponsor-a-Scholar to re-envision and update its mentor handbook and provided additional consulting on mentor recruitment.

Lifeworks

Since 2005, LifeWorks (formerly Saratoga County EOC) has conducted an annual photography workshop and exhibit titled “Estamos Aquí” (We Are Here) and hosted an annual celebration of the photographers and new photos with the goal of providing the resources and platform for self-representation for Latinos in Saratoga. Leadership Saratoga provided research, planning, and strategy for LifeWorks for a potential expanded community showcase of Latino art and culture coinciding with the annual reception for “Estamos Aqui.”

For the upcoming 24-25 school year, nonprofits serving Saratoga County are encouraged to submit a project proposal detailing their organization’s needs. Proposals are reviewed by a subcommittee of the Leadership Saratoga Advisory Board, which selects up to four projects for groups within the incoming class to complete as part of the nine-month-long program.

Project proposal applications should be submitted to Leadership Saratoga by Friday, August 23. Organizations will be notified in early September of their status. More information about Leadership Saratoga and how to submit a project proposal is available at www.leadershipsaratoga.org.

BURNT HILLS — About a month after breaking ground on a $13.8 million construction project, the Charlton School’s upgrades continue with the addition of Bo Goliber as Chief Strategy and Impact Officer. 

The newly-created role was designed for Goliber’s unique expertise and skill set, and will complement her background in marketing, communications, fundraising, and development.

“Bo joining our team comes at a crucial time in our continued growth,” said Alex Capo, executive director of Charlton, in a statement. “I am confident Bo’s talents and previous experience will significantly elevate The Charlton School’s brand and story, bolster fundraising efforts, and create community connections that will lead to enhanced opportunities for the students and families we support.”

Goliber spent ten years with the Franklin Community Center, followed by eight years as Head of Philanthropy at the healthcare marketing firm Fingerpaint. Most recently, she was Chief Development and Communications Officer at AIM Services for nearly four years.

“The mission of The Charlton School has always resonated with me, and I’m humbled to now be placed in a leadership role where I can help make a difference and bring people into the mission,” Goliber said. “The need to support the mental health of young women is more prevalent than ever, and I’m excited to help educate our community about the impactful and innovative work being done here.”

The Charlton School, located in Saratoga County, supports young women aged 12-18 who are struggling with their mental health. In June, the school broke ground on its largest redesign since 1955, which will see four new dormitories added to the campus.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Saratoga Central Catholic announced this week that it has hired Jana Alfarone as a new Middle School science teacher. Alfarone will be teaching 6th grade science, 8th grade science, and forensics.

Alfarone has an Associates in Science in Medical Laboratory Technology from SUNY Farmingdale, a Bachelors of Science in Education from SUNY Old Westbury, and a Masters in Continuing Education for Teachers from SUNY Stony Brook. 

Alfarone served as a 6th grade science teacher at Woodland Middle School in East Meadow, Long Island from 1993 to 2022.

“I am excited to get to know students in small group settings in a faith-based environment,” Alfaribe said in a statement. 

SARATOGA SPRINGS — K-12 enrollment has been steadily declining in Saratoga County for more than a decade despite overall population growth, data from the New York State Education Department shows.

In the 2012-2013 school year, there were 34,282 K-12 students in the county. A decade later, the number stood at 31,360, an 8.5% drop. 

The Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce said it will “monitor” these numbers due to declining enrollment’s impact on the local labor pool. The chamber also said that declining enrollment plus increases in median home sale prices “speaks to the growing need for more workforce housing across Saratoga County.”

In the Saratoga Springs City School District, K-12 enrollment has decreased from nearly 6,000 in 2021-2022 to 5,798 in 2023-2024, according to data presented by Assistant Superintendent Dr. Lisa Cutting in May. The district is also seeing an increase in economically disadvantaged student enrollment, from 1,435 (or 24% of all students) in 21-22, to 1,687 (29%) in 23-24

Portrait of Abner Doubleday courtesy of the Saratoga Room, Saratoga Springs Public Library.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Abner Doubleday, best known as the man who did not invent baseball, is probably the most consequential figure in American history to have lived in Ballston Spa. He witnessed the beginning of the Civil War. He led an infantry division at the Battle of Gettysburg. He even accompanied Abraham Lincoln on a train ride prior to the Gettysburg Address. 

But there’s another side to the legendary general that few know about; a secret history that connects Doubleday to Buddhist sages, transcendentalists, and Russian mystics. 

“It’s a bit of an odd story,” began Benjamin Bogin, an associate professor of Asian Studies at Skidmore College. 

For Bogin, discovering that secret history began in July 1992, when Bogin’s uncle Rick Fields published the book, “How the Swans Came to the Lake: A Narrative History of Buddhism in America.” In that book is a chapter about the Theosophical Society, an organization founded by the Russian mystic Madame Blavatsky in 1875. The society helped introduce Buddhism and other Asian religions to America. Among the many Americans interested in these newly-introduced religions was none other than Civil War hero Abner Doubleday.

“He was a very philosophical and spiritually-inclined child,” Bogin said. During his military training, a young Doubleday wrote a letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson, the famed leader of the Transcendentalist movement. Around that time, transcendentalists became some of the first writers to translate and publish Buddhist literature for American audiences.

In his letter to Emerson, Doubleday expressed doubts about the morality of being a soldier. He also displayed a keen interest in Christianity and Asian religions. Doubleday was “looking to those areas as a source of illumination for other ways to understand the world and our place in it,” Bogin said.

Doubleday’s interest in religion and spirituality continued throughout his life. His experiences in war may have also steered him in the direction of the Theosophical Society. “Coming face to face with that degree of violence and death led him to search for meaning,” Bogin said.

Although Americans’ understanding of Buddhism was quite rudimentary at the time, the possibility of communicating with the dead held significant appeal for those who’d lost loved ones during the Civil War. 19th-century spiritualism became increasingly popular, especially in upstate New York, where the Fox sisters supposedly talked to spirits (they later revealed the whole thing was a hoax), and where Joseph Smith allegedly had visions that led to the creation of Mormonism. Even the mineral water spring that helped make Ballston Spa famous had its origins in “spiritual and visionary mystic traditions that were really widespread in the 19th century,” Bogin said.

Those traditions greatly interested Doubleday, who retired from the military in 1873 and some years later, became an official member of the Theosophical Society. When founder Madame Blavatsky departed the U.S. for India, Doubleday became the organization’s president.

As president, Doubleday apparently wrote quite a bit about the society and its beliefs. But those writings are closely guarded by leaders of the present-day society, who have not granted outsiders access to Doubleday’s letters and diaries. Nonetheless, obituaries at the time of Doubleday’s death in 1893 make references to his tenure with the Theosophical Society. One obituary even identified him as a Buddhist.

Despite his esteemed military career and lifelong interest in spiritual matters, Doubleday would become best known for a false story spread in the early 1900s that cemented the myth that he invented the game of baseball. In fact, there’s scant evidence Doubleday had anything to do with baseball.

“I think people shy away from Doubleday because only a fool would believe he invented baseball,” Bogin said. “No one says, ‘oh yeah, I’m from the same town as the guy who didn’t invent baseball.’” 

A bit of historical fake news has shrouded the true story of Doubleday’s role in America’s early exploration of spiritualism, mysticism, and Asian religions. That secret history, partially obscured due to scholars not having access to Doubleday’s writings while he was president of the Theosophical Society, is still being uncovered.