Daniel Stetkar

15-Sept-02

For me, the Caffè was not just a business or a job, it was a major factor in molding me into the kind of 60-year-old person I am. I was a senior in high school when I first went to the Caffè with some friends one afternoon in the spring of 1960. Bill or Lena (I can't remember which one) offered me a job as waiter. The rest is...whatever.
     For the next 5 years or so, the Caffè, its people, and what happened there were the center of my life. I was a student at SUNY-Albany during the week, and would get the Trailways bus there every Friday afternoon, and go home to Saratoga and my job. I would usually, on the way to the bus, stop at the Roma Importing Company on Albany's lower Madison Ave. to buy espresso beans and imported cheeses for Lena.
     What do I remember? I remember the first 'opening' of a print exhibit before the Gallery/Theater had its premier drama performance. I remember BEING in a Gallery Theater drama performance. In those days, the Gallery-Theater was an arena theater. The stage was a 2 piece, moveable plywood hexagon in the middle of the room. The 2-part audience sat on either side of the stage. The primitive 'lighting booth' on the wall facing Phila St. was totally visible to audience and cast.
     I remember running the espresso machine (which is not there now) and steaming milk for cappuccino (but only between songs because the process was too noisy while a singer was singing). I remember the telephone being right next to it and how furious I or Lena would get when it rang during a quiet song. Later, the phone was moved.
     I remember shopping for Lena at the defunct A&P on Broadway, at Tannenbaums (now Goldie's on Phila & Maple Ave.) a few doors down from the Executive, and buying Vermont cheddar cheese for the Caffè's cheese tray at Grippons which used to be on Caroline St. . I remember coming to the Caffé after my Friday afternoon bus trip and finding Lena frantically baking all the pastries for the 'pastry tray' .
     I remember all the Caffé crowd hanging out at the Executive on weekend afternoons and evenings. I remember emergency runs down to Mother Goldsmith's to get change for the cash box. I remember doing Caffé laundry at Earl's Laundramat which is now Hattie's Chicken Shack.
     I remember Bill Spencer's vintage, black MG-TD which was parked outo in the parking lot behind the building for years because Bill couldn't afford to restore it. I remember the year Bill taught art in public school because the Caffé couldn't support him and Lena.
     I also remember the original reason for Caffé Lena's creation. Lena and Bill had decided to open a coffeehouse in a college town to accumulate enough money so they could go to live in Europe. This streak of impractically in both of them is perhaps what made them buy all the cups, saucers, and pastry/cheese plates from Bennington Potters. In about 6 months, most cups had lost their 'trigger-mug' handles and we started buying our coffee mugs at Woolworth's.
     I remember when Dave VanRonk was married to Terri. I remember going to the Newport Folk Festival with Lena and have photos I took there of Dave and Terri Van Ronk and Joan Baez. I remember the weekend that a scruffy kid named Bob Dylan came to perform at the Caffé, filling in for an ailing Van Ronk.
     I remember Joe Alper. I remember Pasha.
     I remember Skidmore girls coming to Lena's and hanging out or waiting on table when the Skidmore campus was still in town, and having to rush back to their dorms, Cinderella style, at curfew time. I remember Goldie's on Congress St. where Skidmore girls were forbidden to go but some did anyway. (This is before boys could go to Skidmore.) I remember when Hattie's was just off Congress St. around the corner from Goldie's.
     I remember the now-torn-down building on Phila St. hill which Lena rented for a year or 2 as a home/ "crash pad", (as we said in the '60s), for the featured weekend singer and for the Caffè's communal family. The buiding's 2nd floor had fabric ceilings and was at one time -legend had it- used for gambling. I remember Lena living at the Caffè when times were tough and taking a 'bitch bath' (her term) in the LADIES room sink. I remember Lena having various apartments in town when she could afford them.
     I remember when the Trailways/Greyhound bus station was on Division St. and driving singers there after Saturday night closing to get the midnight bus back to Manhattan. When Lena didn't rent the Phila St. building, various Skidmore faculty and local Saratoga friends would play host to the weekend performer in their homes so Lena wouldn't have to pay, for a hotel room.
     I remember when the Caffè was new and had yellow walls and a lavender floor. The round wood tables were also painted lavender.
     I remember that EVERYONE, including Lena, smoked cigarettes in those days. We had no air conditioning-just an electric fan in the window. Some performers-including VanRonk- would smoke on stage during their set. Tom Paxton had a song-"The Talking Cancer Blues"- about the killer cigarette. Every time he came he would sing that song to a smoking audience which LOVED it.
     I remember when the Caffè was still new, there was Sunday afternoon jazz, which was later discontinued. There was an upright piano against the wall between the Caffè stage and the stairs.
     I remember when Convention Hall burned because I worked at the Caffè that night.
     I remember regular customer Saratogians like the Taubs, the Wassers, and Bernie & Carol Serotta. I remember regular customer Yaddo folks who came in like Hortense Callisher, W.D. Snodgrass, and Marc Blitzstein.
     I remember sneaking into the unlocked, unrestored, deserted Batchelor Mansion with some other Caffè groupies. (Just to snoop! Vandalism was never even thought of.)
     I remember "Jake's Dugout Of Buddies" on Maple Ave. Of course, there was no public library there during the early 60s. Now, Jake's is gone.
     I remember Bernice Johnson Regan when she performed regularly at the Caffè with the FREEDOM SINGERS before she got her doctorate, worked at the Smithsonian, and formed SWEET HONEY IN THE ROCK. I remember that Peter,Paul, and Mary split up for a few years in the early 60s, and Paul (a.k.a. Noel Stookey) performed on his own at the Caffè several times.
     I remember Caffè Lena's 25th anniversary Canfield Casino bash.
     I remember Saratoga before it became a crowded Victorian theme park.