Georgia VanZutphen, a former OB/GYN nurse, moved to the Hudson Valley from the Albany area about 10 years ago upon her retirement. “Life reinvented for me revolves around my love for the lakes and the Hudson River Valley,” she says, which led to her involvement in the Hudson-Athens Lighthouse Preservation Society. Her artwork of the lighthouse will be on one of the limited edition tea labels featured at a tea-tasting event to benefit the iconic structure at Verdigris Tea & Chocolate in Hudson, New York on Saturday, Aug. 20. I was always interested in the lighthouse. I’ve painted and photographed it, and finally joined the Preservation Society a few years ago and now I’m on the board. We do fundraising, tours four times a year, and take elementary school children out to it in the spring and fall. We also do the administrative things, like collecting and organizing the museum memorabilia and the winter holiday lights. As volunteers, we also run the tours of the lighthouse on the second Saturday of July, August, September and October from both the Athens and Hudson sides. In 2008 the lighthouse had a lot of foundation work done, and we did another major repair in 2015. Maintenance is an ongoing thing. For instance, the power cables under the river from the Athens side to the lighthouse have disintegrated. We may go to solar power as a replacement. We get the funds from grants, donations, membership dues and private events like weddings and birthdays.
For the event on Saturday, we approached Kim Bach at Verdigris, who was so helpful in putting it together. We reached out to local artists for their paintings or photographs of the lighthouse to go on the labels. We put together a seasonal series and Kim matched a tea with each season. The tea tasting will also include lighthouse cookies made by Regina Simmons, the baker at Verdigris. The teas will be available at Verdigris shops in Hudson and Catskill, New York, of course, but also at the gift store in the lighthouse and at Olana. The proceeds from the specially labeled teas will support the lighthouse. When I retired, I wanted to find something self-fulfilling to do. My new enjoyment is painting. I also joined community service clubs, making event centerpieces and decorating. But the most important and worthwhile involvement for me is the Lighthouse Preservation work we do.
