Kutsher’s Country Club, a 1,300-acre property in Thompson, N.Y., will become a healthy-living resort, marking the end of the era when “Borscht Belt” clubs served as summertime destinations for families from New York City.
The sale of the last of the iconic Catskill Mountains destination country clubs was finalized on November 27, reported the Middletown (N.Y.) Times Herald-Record, when the century-old, family-operated Kutsher’s Country Club in Thompson, N.Y. was acquired by Veria Lifestyle, part of the Veria Living conglomerate owned by Indian media mogul Subhash Chandra.
Kutsher’s, a 1,300-acre property with both man-made and natural lakes, will now become the $90 million Nature Cure Lifestyle Management Center that will feature “yoga sciences,” “ayurvedic medical treatment,” “biodynamic restaurants,” and “a wide range of health-driven activities,” in addition to golf and tennis, the Herald-Record reported.
Veria Lifestyle’s management said it hopes to start demolition very soon, with a reopening expected next spring, the Herald-Record reported.
Brothers Louis and Max Kutsher first opened the property in 1907, the Herald-Record reported, and over the next century, it was transformed from a rooming house to a 400-room, year-round resort with a golf course and, at one time, a sports academy. In its heyday, Kutsher’s was the centerpiece of “Borscht Belt” vacation properties that catered to Jewish families from New York City. Celebrities including Wilt Chamberlain, Mickey Mantle and Jerry Seinfeld spent time at the property, the Herald-Record reported.
Much of the club’s development in the last half-century was overseen by Milton and Helen Kutsher, considered the “matriarch of the Catskills,” according to the Herald-Record. Their son, Mark Kutsher then took the reins in the early 1990s and helped guide the resort to its new ownership, after a brief period when it was leased to Yossi Zablocki and branded as The New Kutsher’s Resort, the Herald-Record reported.
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