Jim Haskin • Treasurer

After receiving an engineering degree from the University of Rochester, a job at IBM brought me to the Hudson Valley. After a few years I went back to school and got an Art degree from New Paltz. That led to spending the next 25 years running a small manufacturing business and Arts Center in Kingston (R&F Paints).

I moved to Red Hook from Stone Ridge in 2010 for my wife's work and for the school system.

Within Red Hook, I am also connected to Red Hook Repair Café, Red Hook Responds, and (when our son Harry was younger) the Red Hook Soccer Club.

I became interested in Red Hook’s history after I started taking pictures of the buildings within the village as part of a series I started to document rural New York towns. I met Claudine Klose (then Board President) through my wife and her job at Montgomery Place. After selling the business, I wanted to get involved in the Red Hook community more. I thought my interest in history, along with business and computer skills, could help out at HRH.

I began an interest in my own family history after finding out about the work my mother’s father had done on the family tree including our connection to the Mayflower. This was done back in the 1950s way before computers and before I was born. (On the family chart you can see that the four youngest grandkids were written in later). I’ve been expanding on this for many years. Now with Ancestry.com my tree is up to over 5,400 people. I was able to find links back to the Mayflower for both of my father’s parents also. Other interesting facts I found: Barack Obama is my 10th cousin once removed and George HW Bush is my ninth cousin. FDR is my 8th cousin 3x removed. If you go back far enough, everyone is related somehow...

Going forward with HRH, I would love to see what we have started on the Elmendorph Green continue to expand and become a gathering place for everyone.

I love the beauty of the Hudson Valley and have spent countless hours and thousands of miles bike riding through the rolling hills of the farms and orchards in the area.

Jim Haskin is a member of the Development, Executive, and Finance Committees and can be contacted at treasurer@historicredhook.org.