HISTORY COLUMN
By Tom Heitz |
35 Years Ago – April 1970
A flash fire broke out in the garage of Beadle & Co. at 43 Main
Street, shortly after 10 o’clock Sunday morning, and for a time the
dense smoke from oil and tires gave the appearance of a conflagration
that might spread to surrounding buildings. The fire started at the
center of the building when a spark from a lighter, triggered by James
Fikes who was working on a car, touched off gasoline fumes and filled
the garage with flames. Fikes escaped with slight burns to the Potzner
store next to the garage. Mrs. Potzner placed the call for the local
fire department. Firemen were on the scene with equipment in less than
five minutes and their quick action saved neighboring buildings. Smoke
and water damage to the auto showroom and appliance store, and the two
apartments on the second floor of the building was fairly extensive.
Three automobiles in the garage for repairs were destroyed, tools were
lost and merchandise and parts stored in the cellar were inundated with
water.
40 Years Ago – April 1965
Twenty-four people from the Richfield Springs, Cherry Valley, East
Springfield, Cooperstown, West Winfield and Burlington Flats areas
attended a meeting at the Pine Grove Hotel on the West Lake Road for
the purpose of forming a Citizens’ Band Radio Club for the center state
area. Eugene Hecox, president, Mike Silvernail, vice-president and
Joyce Zvirzdin, secretary-treasurer were elected temporary officers.
50 Years Ago – April 1955
“American Indians are not yet ready to be given full freedom and rights
as American citizens and take their place among the white race on equal
terms,” was the opinion voiced by Louis R. Bryce, national spokesman
for the Indians, at a meeting last Friday night in the Village Library,
sponsored by Ganowauges Chapter, D.A.R. Lack of education among the
greater majority of the Indians now living on reservations in the
southwest, has made about 80 percent of them illiterate. A member of
the Mohawks, Mr. Bruce also brought out that “my people would be
legally extinct as a race, for with the end of segregation, they would
soon lose their traditions, their ceremonials and the Indian arts for
which they have long been recognized.”
60 Years Ago – April 1945
Principal Everett M. Lane of the Richfield Springs Central School has
announced that Harold Lincourt has won the honor of Valedictorian of
the graduating class of 1945. Barbara Quartz of Warren has won second
honors as Salutatorian. Other honor students are Henrty Lasher and
Edward Laymon. Harold Lincourt is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Dolphus
Lincourt of Lake Street. During the first five years of his schooling
he was at Allen’s Lake which was later centralized with the Richfield
Springs school system. Lincourt will be graduated with a diploma in
business education.
75 Years Ago – April 1930
Voting by acclamation the Otsego Presbytery in session at Delhi on
Tuesday expressed a practically unanimous objection to the proposal to
ordain women as elders, as ministers and as local preachers in
Presbyterian churches. Three different propositions were advanced by
the Presbyterian general assembly at its meeting last year affecting
the entrance of women into church orders, all of which must be approved
by a majority of the Presbyteries of the assembly, before adoption, and
each of these was clearly defeated at the Otsego Presbytery session.
100 Years Ago – April 1905
Notice: Whereas my wife Mary Jane has left my bed and board without any
just cause or provocation, I forbid all persons trusting or harboring
her at my account, as I pay no bills made by her. F.W. Dibble,
Sr. Town Topics – Mrs. Elois Guiwits has just returned from a
business trip to the Pacific coast, going as far as Portland, Oregon. A
small Fairbanks gasoline engine has been set up in the show window in
the Buchanan Hardware Company’s store and a representative of the
manufacturing company has been here and given Fred Fox instructions in
running the engine.
Resources for this column have been provided courtesy of the New York State Historical Association Library.
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