Hilltop Tavern: Town of Schodack NY 12033

Periodically I have stopped by Rt. 9 close to the Albany entrance ramp to I90 in the Town of Schodack NY. About one half mile from the Columbia County border. It was in this vicinity that once stood an old Road House type bar. The Hilltop Tavern located at the crest of an incline on Rt9. Minor digging and search with a metal detector has only turned up a couple of old rusty nails. The Hilltop was bought by the State of New York on EminentDomain when the final leg of the I90 interchange was being constructed for the entrance ramp. No basement remnants were found and I presume the entire structure was raised during ramp construction. This occurred circa early 1970's. This was an old style local bar on a once fairly busy highway. The original owner I remember was named Katie. A women from the bootleg era it was often said she kept her money in jewels for safety as did not trust banks. Later on in the 60's the Finn family took it over. The business was expanded to sell Pizza. A very good pizza for the time and place. Today , there is a very different beer market than that era. Many local beers such as Fitzgeralds of Troy , NY or Doblers beer brewed in Albany were bought out or went out of business. The national chains such as Schlitz or Budweiser had taken over. The most local beer was Genny brewed in Central NY. As we can observe with local brew pubs and small breweries such as the Brooklyn brewery in NYC times have seemed to have gone back to earlier years. Hilltop served only Genny beer and Genny Cream Ale. I believe no hard alcohol was there. Their claim to fame was their beer cooloing system. Refrigeration in the basement and then the beer was pumped up stairs by a hand suction pump at the bar. The beer would go through a series of coils that were packed in ice. This created a truly ice cold beer which gave the rather cheap Gennesse truly a richer taste. The best I ever drank. The bar also had a bowling machine people used and I have been told an occasional poker game was held on the premises. Generally speaking this was a locals bar. Local rules. Women were not encouraged to sit at the bar there was a table where the ladies would sit. Local people with names like Golden , Kunicki , Van Deusan etc frequented the place. It felt in a sense like home for the locals. You talked, discussed issues from the Vietnam War to how the lack of rain was affecting crops. Everyone knew your name. This rather ramshackle looking bar in need of a paint job was a major connecting point for South Schodack area people. Part of the fabric of small town life , that has slipped away as we sped up the pace of life in this country.