JTA — Elaine Grossinger Etess, the third-generation Jewish proprietor of the famed Grossinger’s Catskill Resort Hotel, has died at 98.

Etess, who died at her home in Florida, was the daughter of Jennie and Harry Grossinger, the couple who grew the resort from a small boarding house to a 35-building, 600-room luxury complex.

Inheriting the property along with her older brother Paul, Etess continued the resort’s legacy as the “Waldorf in the Catskills.” Grossinger’s served three kosher meals per day and provided top-tier entertainment and athletic activities. Many Jewish comedians and entertainers of the so-called Borscht Belt got their start at Grossinger’s, including Mel Brooks, Sid Caesar, Jackie Mason and Joan Rivers. Jewish boxers also found a place to train there.

Born in 1927, Etess worked as a teenager as a “key girl” at the golf club and ran the resort switchboard. But she was initially set on finding a life outside the hotel industry.

She married her high school sweetheart, David Etess, in 1947, at her family’s resort. “My plan was to be a typical doctor’s wife and join the garden club while staying home with our children,” she recalled in an interview in 2017. “The problem was that I was bored.”

So Etess increasingly took on more roles at the resort. One of her trademark additions to the resort was the expansion of youth activities and the creation of a children’s day camp.

As a celebrity hotspot, Grossinger’s was known as the place where Jewish actor and comedian........

© The Times of Israel