SALAMANCA — Sally Marsh kicked off her 50th year of hootenanny singing Tuesday night at the amphitheater outside the Seneca-Iroquois National Museum.

She was greeted by dozens of people wearing her green 50th anniversary Hoot shirts who had missed the 2020 hootenannies in Allegany State Park due to COVID-19 restrictions.

“I thought it was great, looking out into that sea of green shirts,” she said. “There were people from the park, from Salamanca and friends.”

More than 100 people attended the first Hoot hosted by the Seneca-Iroquois National Museum. Sally’s first song? “I Did It My Way” by Frank Sinatra. She also sang “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head,” by the late B.J. Thomas and her signature song, “Crazy,” written by Willie Nelson.

Last summer, Sally hosted weekly virtual Hoots for her hootenanny friends and supporters “to keep everybody going.”

There was no guarantee that Allegany State Park’s Quaker Amphitheater could be used for hootenannies this summer. Even the state park’s 100th anniversary is virtual this year. So when the Seneca-Iroquois National Museum offered to host the hoots, Sally jumped at the chance.

“These people make me feel like I’m part of their family,” Sally said of her supporters. “I’m grateful for this opportunity the Senecas have offered me.”

Her supporters held up banners before she began singing Tuesday night. One of the banners thanked the Seneca Nation for the use of their amphitheater.

“There was going to be a 50th hootenanny if I had to have it in a parking lot or a cornfield,” she mused.

“We sold over 1,300 of the green presale hootenanny shirts,” Sally said. “We made 2,000 shirts.” The rest are on sale at the Hoots — Tuesdays and Thursdays this summer.

Sally starts the hootenanny at 8 p.m. after an hour of others singing as people arrive at the venue.

Tonight will be a patriotic night, a salute to veterans. Josh Larson of Frewsburg, who is no stranger to Sally’s Hootenanny, will start with three patriotic songs, followed by Judy Fiero of Ashville, one of Sally’s longtime supporters. Sally will sing a few patriotic songs of her own at the hootenanny.

The Salamanca site is right off Interstate 86’s exit 20, which is an easy drive for state park campers.

Sally also expects to see many of her Salamanca friends who might not have driven to the Quaker Amphitheater in the state park, as well as campers who watched her Facebook Live virtual hootenannies last year. “People have missed singing,” she explained.

Sally said her favorite event at the hootenanny Tuesday was dancing with children for the “Chicken Dance Song” and the “Hokey Pokey.”

She also sang with a longtime fan, Steve Piscitelli of Salamanca, for whom she recorded the song “It Never Rains in Southern California,” when he was going through cancer treatments two years ago. “Sally’s the best,” Piscitelli smiled Tuesday night.

It has been years since one of Sally’s hootenannies has been rained out. Tuesday was no exception. Rain threatened early, but held off until nearly 10 o’clock. “We started getting dark clouds around 9:15 p.m. We ended a little early and got everything packed up before it rained,” she said.

Her state park hootenannies drew between 300 and 500 people on Thursday nights in past summers. She was encouraged by the more than 100 people at the first hootenanny this year — a number that Sally expects will grow.

Bob Schmid, the historian of the Allegany State Park Historical Society, is a big Sally Marsh booster. “This is a milestone,” he said of the new venue Tuesday night. “To see this woman who has done so much win the appreciation of all these people is great.”

Schmid said he first started attending the hootenannies back in the 1970s when Sally was still singing with longtime singing partner Page Martin. “She’s been singing at the hootenanny for half as long as the state park has been in existence. She’s a genuine human being.”

He added: “It’s wonderful to see generation after generation coming to her hootenannies.” Schmid regularly brings his wife, daughter and his grandchildren to the hootenannies.

She got one text Tuesday from a supporter who said, “If you were having a hoot on Mars, we would all come.”