POTSDAM â Potsdam-Mayor Reinhold Tischler has announced that a historic marker memorializing the original site of the Crane Institute of Music will be installed at 10 a.m. June 11. The marker will be placed at the site of Julia E. Craneâs Main Street home, where she established the Crane Normal Institute of Music in 1886. Crane School went on to become one of the nationâs first schools to train public school music teachers.The Crane School became part of the Potsdam Normal School, later SUNY Potsdam, in 1926. Today, generations of top music educators, performers and scholars are Crane alumni, and Crane continues to be vital to the areaâs cultural and economic landscape.