New aid helps restore Stewart Park overlook

Earlier this month, Friends of Stewart Park (FSP) announced the start of much-needed restoration work on the Fuertes Overlook in Stewart Park thanks to a recent $20,000 grant from the estate of Tapan Mitra. Mitra, who died in 2019 at the age of 70, was a leading economic theorist and long-serving professor at Cornell University.

Like Stewart Park itself, Fuertes Overlook has quite the history. According to FSP’s announcement, it was originally built in 1934 as a gift to the city of Ithaca from the Cayuga Bird Club (CBC) and honored famed ornithologist Louis Agassiz Fuertes.

“Located near the historic Cascadilla Boathouse, the Fuertes Overlook has long been a beloved landmark in Stewart Park, where it overlooks the Fuertes Bird Sanctuary and ‘swan pond,’ which was also funded by the CBC and constructed in 1927,” the announcement said.

FSP initially worked to restore the overlook in 2018, using financial support from the Triad Foundation and other donors. Brainstone Stonework and Accufab Inc. performed the necessary stone masonry and metal railing fabrication, respectively, and volunteers reset pavers to create a stone pathway leading up to the overlook.

Two years later, FSP was hit with quite the disappointing discovery, as Rick Manning, FSP co-founder and executive director, explained.

“The pond goes up and down with the lake, and it goes up and down quite a lot — could be 3 or 4 feet, maybe more,” he said. “And so, when it went down [in 2020], it exposed a gaping hole in the bottom. And we had observed one corner where it seemed like the gravel that is the base of the stone, the heavier stone, flagstone, seemed to be falling through. But we didn’t know what was going on. Well, turned out that there was a big hole there. It’s just kind of water erosion moving up and down, freezing. So yeah, we were pretty bummed.”

Though that news certainly wasn’t welcome, Manning and others knew that they had some time to properly address the issue before the overlook became hazardous, so work began to try to find funding to support further restoration efforts. Finally, after two long years, they found someone willing to provide just that.

“We just found a donor who is a Cornell alum, [a] professor who loves Stewart Park and loves birding,” Manning said. “So, when he passed away, he left some money in the estate that his nephew was handling to see what would be a suitable project to fund, and I described this one. And lo and behold, he said, ‘Yeah, let’s do it.’ So, he donated $20,000.”

Mitra’s nephew, Aveek Majumdar, spoke about the decision in FSP’s recent announcement.

“My uncle cared deeply about the wildlife and natural beauty of the Finger Lakes and spent a great deal of time at Stewart Park over the span of almost forty years,” he said. “As an avid birdwatcher, he would be delighted that this gift will play a role in restoring and preserving the Overlook.”

Ithaca City Forester Jeanne Grace explained that that money came just in the nick of time.

“We’re kind of at a critical year,” she said. “If he hadn’t gotten funding this year, I think it might have been beyond the point of repair. We might have had to demo that section. I think we were really, really relieved that he was able to get that money and then the mason was able to mobilize so quickly and start working on it before the water was completely [at] summer heights.”

As Grace mentioned, work to restore the crumbling base of the overlook began almost immediately. FSP brought on Reilly Masonry, who put in a lot of effort to get the most important work done, which was completed about two weeks ago.

“We were fortunate enough to find Kevin Reilly, who is a very skilled stonemason,” Manning said. “He had a two-week window, and he kind of got in there and battled the elements. He had to dam it off. …. There’s pictures of him in his waders up to his hips in really cold water, basically pumping lake water out so that they could get at the bottom to put in a concrete footer and then do all the stonework. And it was kind of [a] brutal couple of weeks.”

All that work paid off, as Manning attested.

“We’re totally thrilled,” he said. “It looks great, and it will be up now for a long time, we think so. So, it’s sort of exciting. We kind of got lucky to find him willing to do it and have the time to do it before his season really got going.”

Grace added that the reception from community organizations, especially CBC, has been positive.

“The Cayuga Bird Club was very interested in seeing it restored,” she said. “I know that we do have a very, a very active birding community. And so, that overlook is a very nice opportunity to kind of be able to go a little bit into that pond. And you’ll get a better look at the birds that are migrating through and using Stewart Park as a waystation on their migration.”

While Fuertes Overlook may seem like a small aspect to Stewart Park, there is still significant value in restoring it, Grace said.

“I think it get really gives Stewart Park a part of its unique character compared to our other waterfront parks, which is Cass Park,” she said. “So, Stewart Park is kind of more of our passive park for picnicking and that type of recreating. And so, the historic boathouse and the pavilions and the stonework, all of that really gives the Stewart Park the atmosphere that people really enjoy.”

Manning shared Grace’s perspective.

“It’s a little off the beaten path, but it’s historically significant, so we just would have hated for it to have fallen apart,” he said. “And after we had invested $18,000 and doing the work, to find it falling apart from the bottom was not a good thing. So, we’re thrilled to have really preserved it. We thought we preserved it, but now, we really have.”

Though much of the restoration work is now complete, FSP still has more to do and is looking to raise an additional $4,000 to fully fund the project. Manning said that additional work includes connecting the overlook to the boathouse with a new stone path, landscaping of the surrounding area and additional signs about the habitat around the overlook. Those interested in donating can visit stewartpark.org/overlook or call FSP at (607) 319-4766.

Now that the weather is getting warmer, Grace and Manning encourage readers to visit Stewart Park and all of the outside offerings across the county.

“The thing that I’m most excited about right now are the daffodil bulbs that we’ve started to plant all along the Waterfront Trail,” Grace said. “We have a bunch at Stewart Park. We have a bunch at Cass Park. We have some over where the trails go to the golf course. But eventually, we’d like to connect the entire trail so that in the spring, you could walk from one end of the trail to the other and just have all these daffodils flowering. And we’re working with the Ithaca Garden Club to do fundraising to make that happen.”

Jessica Wickham is the managing editor of Tompkins Weekly. Send story ideas to editorial@VizellaMedia.com.