Cooler bags a hit with track fans
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. » The Spa City’s name is already wellknown throughout the U.S.
Former Navy sailor Henry Isenbergh plans to keep it that way by distributing Saratoga Race Course cooler bags to help pay for his ship’s reunion next month in San Antonio, Texas.
The Vietnam veteran picked up 17 of the items Monday, the third of four track giveaways scheduled for this year’s meet. The last is a Saratoga clock on Sunday, Sept. 3.
“These are going all over the country, some to relatives, some to friends and every year I take some to our ships’s reunion,” said Isenbergh, of Albany.
He plans to put them in a silent auction, and expects they’ll each raise $15 to $20 more than the coupons he paid for to get them.
Isenbergh served aboard the USS Higbee, a World War II destroyer that was modified in the 1960s for service in Vietnam. It’s the first U.S. warship ship named for a woman -- Lenah S. Higbee, superintendent of the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps during World War I.
It was also the first U.S. warship bombed during the Vietnam War. On April 19, 1972, the Higbee was attacked by a pair of Soviet-made MiG-17s, flown by North Vietnamese Air Force pilots.
Eisenbergh spent 20 years in the Navy, retiring as petty officer 1st class.
Chad Vergine and Jeremy Stewart, both of Schenectady, also picked up a big supply of cooler bags for family members and acquaintances.
“Two are for friends in Florida, two are for friends who couldn’t be here and the rest are for myself,” Vergine said.
“I got two for my grandparents,” Stewart said.
Some people exited the track carrying large numbers of bags in hand-drawn shopping carts.
Ann Colvin, of Amsterdam, supervised a well-strategized plan for getting the most items possible, with help from her daughter, Christine Douglas, and sonin-law, Rick Husted.
“We got some for the kids who didn’t want to come here until the races started,” Douglas said.
“Yeah, us older people do all the work,” Colvin said, smiling.