[From the Fall 2023 Showcase of Homes Magazine]
Written and Photographed By George Hanstein
One late afternoon - 40 or so years ago - before I lived here, and only had a camp, a friend of mine and I were sitting in a bar in Northville. We were doing some serious beer drinking after a hard day of fishing on The Great Sacandaga Lake. Suddenly at around 5:30, everybody got up from the bar and tables and started to leave. It was a mass exodus.
I stopped a guy and asked him where everyone was going. He looked at me like I was from another planet and said, “The Chimney Swifts are back.” and rushed out. I looked at my friend and said, “Let’s go!” We followed the bar folk out and saw that there were hundreds of people walking in the same direction. It was like a scene from the movie “Time Machine” when the Morlocks turn on the sirens. We walked a couple of blocks and saw everyone looking up at the top of a very large smokestack. Within minutes, the high school band arrived in their best parade uniforms. They played music for about 20 minutes and then…it began.
A few birds appeared and circled above the smokestack. Everyone cheered. They circled for a little while at very fast speeds and then dove straight down into the chimney. More birds followed and did the same. Pretty soon there were hundreds, maybe thousands of these tiny creatures circling the chimney and diving in. First two or three at a time and then 20 or 30 at a time. Everyone clapped and cheered and oohed and aahed at every dive. As it started to turn dusky, it was over.
All the Chimney Swifts were safe at home in their beloved chimney.
The band marched back to the high school playing their best marching music and all the townsfolk went back to their homes. My friend and I and all the rest of the bar folk went back to the bar. The talk was all about the Chimney Swifts and what a great return it had been. I wondered how they knew what day the Chimney Swifts would return.
Some grizzly old guy told me that they had been back for weeks. He told me that they fly out of the chimney during the day and return every night, during the spring. He went on to say that the town always picked a certain day to celebrate their return and acted as though it was the actual day of their return. (I wish he hadn’t told me).
I attended that event every year until they tore the crumbling chimney down for safety purposes. I was sad to see it go, and I know that most of the residents of Northville were sad also.
I often wonder where the Chimney Swifts went. I hope they found a nice new chimney to live in and are doing well. I doubt, however, that they will ever get the nice warm welcome that they got every year in Northville.