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The late 1800's saw a large number of chatauqua's develop in the mountains, by the seashores of the Atlantic, and in the cooler northern states. A Chautauqua can be defined as an educational and recreational assembly with a program that includes concerts and lectures modeled after the original cummer schools inaugurated at Chautauqua, New York in 1874. Many of these chautauquas were established to promote Christian principles. The 800 acres which Mountain Lake Park was developed sat between Oakland, a commercial town in the cool summer mountains on the main line of the railway, and Deer Park, home to the Deer Park Hotel, a posh railroad built hotel of which there were many at that time. A group of Methodist ministers and Methodist businessmen from Wheeling, West Virginiia purchased the lan and began a summer Chautauqua with religious, educational, and recreational programs. |
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