My favorite image of Clayton “Peg Leg” Bates is a familiar one from the Peg Leg Bates Resort advertisements. He is standing with legs apart, hands on his hips, and a wide smile. The image radiates the confidence of a man who knows his place in the world because he defined it himself. Bates was many things: a black man from South Carolina, an amputee, a tap dancer, performer, entrepreneur, humanitarian, and, of course, owner of the first integrated resort in the Catskills. The Peg Leg Bates Resort, which was located in Kerhonkson, NY, was a summer haven for African Americans from 1952 to 1987.  

People came by carloads and busloads. They visited for a week, a weekend, or a day, year after year.  They made the trip for the pool, the food, the roller disco, and the hiking, and they came to see Peg Leg Bates, the one-legged dancing man. His performing friends came to visit as well. You never knew who would be in the casino to give a surprise performance alongside Peg Leg and his band. 

For the past year, the Peg Leg Bates Resort working group (see below) explored Bates’ life through the resort and his legacy as a tap dancer. The interviews ranged from his daughter about life with her father and the resort to the telling of a post office encounter with the consummate gentleman that he was to tap dancers discussing his tap legacy. A common thread runs through these interviews and in every discussion. Clayton “Peg Leg” Bates was an extraordinary man in every way. 

We present this webpage as a virtual step into the world of Bates and specifically the resort through photos, videos, and the voices of the people connected to him. It is a walk down memory lane for those who worked at or visited the resort. For others, it is a glimpse into the resort and the man that created it. 

Going forward, additions to the webpage include resources for further inquiry and discussions about Peg Leg’s role, his legacy as a black man in the 20th-century entertainment industry and as a humanitarian. 

The goal is for the Peg Leg Bates Resort webpage to become the virtual home for all things Peg Leg Bates. You can help by contributing. Have a Story for Us? We want to hear your Peg Leg Bates story.

Enjoy,

Elinor Levy
Folk Arts Program Manager
Arts Mid-Hudson

The Working Group
Elinor Levy, Folk Arts Program Manager, Arts Mid-Hudson
Geoffrey Miller, Ulster County Historian
David Winograd, Musician and community scholar
Dave Davidson, visual storyteller, Hudson West Productions
Rennie Scott Childress, 3rd ward alderman on the Kingston Common Council and assistant professor of history at SUNY New Paltz 

Interns
Rennie Raffington, Livingstone College
Joseph Johnson, Indiana University, Bloomington

Advisors
Stephen Vider, Assistant Professor of History and Director of the Public History Initiative at Cornell University
Susan Stessin, Town of New Paltz Historian
Alice Cross, Historian, vice president of Friends of Historic Rochester
Priyanka Sen, doctoral student, Architecture, Cornell University