The town’s Future
Farmers of America chapter, one of only two in Dutchess County, is a program
where local farmers mentor children and teach them about farm life, for example,
how to take care of a calf. Children are bused to the program and can adopt a
farm animal that they are taught to care of, with the program culminating in an
annual agricultural fair at the high school.
The Stissing
Center opened as a community center with Wynton Marsalis headlining a benefit
concert there and plans to host great performers in music and the arts.
Pine Plains’ reputation for terrific restaurants is on the rise, including classically
trained chefs from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park (Dutchess County,
New York) and those from New York City. The town offers the small-town
charm of its Mexican and Sicilian restaurants, pizza places and diner. With so
many nearby farms, the food is fresh and farm-to-table is everywhere. Many of
the town’s quaint shops feature work of its artists, craftspeople and
furniture makers.
Many hikers trek
to the Stissing Mountain’s 90-foot steel Fire Tower and take advantage of the mountaintop
site for picnicking and views of the Catskill, Berkshire and Housatonic
mountains. Pine Plains has its own beach at Stissing Lake, which becomes an ice
rink for winter outdoor activities. Thompson Pond is home to New York State's
smallest type of turtle.
Schools, the
first central school district in Dutchess County, and medical centers nearby
are all highly rated; its library was also the first created in Dutchess
County, in the 1700s.
Pine Plains
got its name from the vast numbers of pine trees covering the valley floor with
the original inhabitants being Mohicans; one of whom is believed to be the
model for the character Chingachgook in James Fennimore Cooper's novel, The
Last of the Mohicans.