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The last nail in the coffin was the advent of television and affordable home air-conditioning in the mid-1950s. These days, children often live miles from their parents and rarely take long vacations with them. Meanwhile, in a trend repeated across America, the extended families that once streamed into the Catskills began breaking up. For about the same money, couples could fly to Puerto Rico, Las Vegas, Miami and even California. After awhile, people wanted more from a vacation than 15 kinds of herring and sour cream.”īeginning in the mid-’60s, Kanfer says, people who made regular trips to the mountains suddenly had more options. “There has never been a domain like it, but tastes change. “Time just passed this area by,” says Stefan Kanfer, a senior editor at Time magazine who wrote “A Summer World,” a social history of the Borscht Belt. Families that once visited the mountains every year now spend their money elsewhere.Īs for the entertainers who once graced the marquees up here, don’t ask. Summer camps that kept city kids out of trouble are long gone.

Bungalow colonies that once housed thousands are crumbling.

The swank hotels that once numbered more than 100 have dwindled to a dozen. But now, the Catskills have fallen on times harder than day-old bagels.

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