FAIR HAVEN - Cupping Little Sodus Bay, the village of Fair Haven is known for hosting dramatic sunsets over Lake Ontario, but it's starting to get a reputation for something else - a great place for women to start a business.

The resort town of 873, with a population that drops dramatically in the stark winters on Lake Ontario, is a haven for female entrepreneurship, with at least a dozen businesses run or principally operated by women.

"The women we're talking about, want very much to be in business and feel very confident they are able to run the business and have the talent to do it," said Carole Zukovsky, who has operated her sewing business, A Stitch In Time, since 1995.

"I think women are just very well accepted here," said June Smith, who officially reopened the Cutter's Inn restaurant and bar on Main Street after renovating it for 2 1/2 months. "You're not inundated like you are in cities with competition and larger amounts of capital."

For Smith, buying and renovating Cutter's Inn was a no-brainer, with Fair Haven's proximity to the Fair Haven Beach State Park, the Sterling Renaissance Festival and Seaway Trail. Smith had previously co-owned another business in the 1990s, but moved away to North Carolina, where she worked as a medical consultant for 10 years.

Most of the women are at a loss to explain the trend.

"All of a sudden, I started realizing how many of us there were," said Bonnie Bridson, who has run the Fly By Night Cookie Company for 18 years.

"Maybe it's because Fair Haven is a peaceful town, and women like peace," was the best guess Barbara Gillis could offer. Gillis is co-owner of the Gillis Restaurant on Route 104A. She has run the restaurant year-round with her husband, Carl, for eight years.

Despite the number of women who own businesses in the village, there are still lingering stereotypes. Pat Cooper-Pratt, who has run a variety of businesses in Fair Haven over the years, has seen men walk right by her, and go to the first man they see - looking for the owner.

Now, as she runs the Springbook Golf Course on Old State Road, Cooper-Pratt said salesmen and patrons still ask for her son or husband.

"Guys assume guys are the boss," said Cooper-Pratt, who, along with her son, opened Springbook's first nine holes in 1995 and the last nine holes in 1998.

Cooper-Pratt thinks women are providing strong female leadership role models to the village's young people.

"I think boys who grow up here won't be gender-biased," Cooper-Pratt said.

Many of the women started a business in order to be their own boss.

"At some point it strikes us, 'Duh, we should be working for ourselves,'" said Judy Devries, who is a full partner in the Fair Haven Gift Shop.

Before moving to Fair Haven, Devries worked as a cashier and buyer at a gift shop in Irondequoit, but finds it meaningful to have designed this gift shop to have plentiful light, to stock cards and other items useful for local residents, and to stay open year-round.

Zukovsky said sewing on items for boats and clothing alterations on garments like prom and wedding dresses are personally rewarding because every person who walks through her business' door is a blessing.

"I know I was born with a talent to sew, and I could see there was a need for it in the community," Zukovsky said.

Gillis said running a business with her family pulled them together. Gillis and her husband moved from the Rochester area 20 years ago to get their children out of the city. Gillis used to waitress, and Carl used to drive a truck, but now along with their three daughters, Katina, Macey and Michele, they prepare homemade soups, chili, sandwiches, hamburgers and baked goods in their restaurant.

"We were a family before, but now we're a real family," Gillis said.

Staff writer Amaris Elliott-Engel can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or at amaris.elliot-engel@lee.net