In Years Past
In 1914, Cyrus Emory Jones, eldest son of Cyrus E. and Minnie Beebe Jones, died at the family home on the Lakewood Road shortly before noon this day. Death followed an attack of typhoid fever of about two weeks standing. He was in his 18th year. There was no young man in Jamestown who had a wider acquaintance in various circles than Emory Jones, who had spent most of his life here. He was a young man of the highest character and superior intellectual attainments, advanced in his studies, active in athletics and a leader in all departments of high school activities. He was a member of the Jamestown High School football team of 1912 and captain of the team in 1913. He was also editor in chief of The Red and Green, the high school magazine and was the organizer and president of the anti-cigarette league.
Frank Syracusa, the supposed leper who escaped from Oil City was in Clymer under quarantine from Friday until Sunday but Sunday night he broke quarantine and was supposed to have gone back to Oil City. Dr. Marion A. Keyes, local health officer notified the state Department of Health of his presence here and Dr. Grover Wende of Buffalo was detailed to make an investigation. Wende came here and Syracusa was put in quarantine.
In 1939, New York’s barge canal would remain closed until at least April 17 because of an unusual amount of snow on the watersheds of the Mohawk and Hudson rivers, state Canals Commissioner Harvey O. Schermerhorn said. “The unusually cold spring has prevented any appreciable runoff of the winter precipitation,” he asserted. “Until at least a portion of the snows now in the watersheds have disappeared, it is in everybody’s interests not to attempt navigation on the system prior to the date indicated.”
Approximately 100 different items comprised the regional exhibit from Chautauqua, Cattaraugus and Allegany counties which would soon be sent to New York city for display at the world’s fair. The collection, which had been prepared by Walter H. Edson, county chairman, and Henry F. Love, exhibit chairman, was rich in historical lore as well as depicting the various industrial activities of southwestern New York. The vertebra and tooth of a mastodon maximum unearthed during excavations near North Main Street in Jamestown in 1871 and Indian arrowheads from the collection of George A. Persell, former superintendent of Jamestown schools, would be among the items shown.
In 1964, shattered Alaska counted more dead and reports from backwater villages indicated there might be still many more victims of the great earthquake. The toll of dead mounted to 178 in a tally released by Alaska Civil Defense. The picturesque island of Kodiak, southwest of Anchorage in the Gulf of Alaska, appeared to be the state’s hardest hit area. The report showed 72 or more dead or presumed dead as a result of Friday evening’s quake and tidal waves. Omitted from the list was the community of Chenega on Prince William Sound. Reports indicated half the town’s population of 45 may have been lost in a desperate race for higher ground against an 80-foot tidal wave.
More than 100 employees of the Hotel Jamestown would meet to consider a “firm offer” by management which was expected to end seven months of negotiations for a new labor contract. Representatives of International Hotels Inc. presented a “firm and substantial” contract proposal according to Raymond Roos chief local steward of the Hotel & Restaurant Employees Union. He said hopes were bright for an immediate settlement of labor issues when union members voted on the latest company proposal on Sunday at the hotel.
In 1989, an expanded schedule for watercraft operated by Chautauqua Lake Historic Vessels Co. was planned for the coming season. Executive Director O. Winston Bartholomew reported the “Sea Lion” would be at her dock ready for tours the weekend of June 3-4. As for its sailing schedule, President R. Craig Campbell said, “We will sail the ‘Sea Lion’ with a responsible crew as often as we can,” noting that the ship’s crew consisted of volunteers.
Jeffrey M. Pulvino, 24, of Dunkirk, died after his car skidded head on into a telephone pole at about 2:15 a.m. at the intersection of Routes 20 and 39. Pulvino was pronounced dead at the scene by Chautauqua County Coroner Warren Riles, said State Police at Fredonia. Pulvino’s 1972 Datsun 240-Z was eastbound on Route 20 when he apparently tried to make a right turn onto Route 39 and crashed into the pole, police said. They said he was traveling at a high speed at the time of the collision but fog and wet roads also contributed to causing the accident, they said.
In Years Past
In 1914, while little Joseph Catania, aged four years, was playing on a footbridge a short distance from the Jamestown Oil Company on Steele Street, near Sprague Saturday afternoon, he fell into the swollen waters of the Chadakoin River and was carried away in spite of the efforts of two men, Charles Lund and another man, to reach him in a row boat. The little lad was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Nunzio Catania of West Second Street, who were grief stricken as a result of this tragedy. Joseph, together with a six-year-old playmate, Tony Destro, strayed to the bridge to play and boyishly attempted to cross the foot bridge which really was not a bridge at all but merely a narrow strip of board. Friends of the bereaved parents searched the stream until a late hour Sunday evening but the river had as yet refused to give up the body. Although Mr. Catania was a poor man, he had offered a $10 reward for his child’s body.
The somewhat unusual conditions leading up to the accident in Allen Street Saturday noon, which resulted in the death of Charlotte Harrison, were being investigated by Coroner B.F. Illston. The witnesses included Arthur Nutter, the conductor on Car 14, which struck Harrison and Motorman Peter J. Burns of the same car, who was running the car when it struck Harrison. The front corner of the fender struck the woman’s left ankle. She fell to the pavement, landing on her head.
In 1939, Sen. Norris (Ind.-Neb.) said he had “gained the impression” in conversations with President Roosevelt that the chief executive did not want to run for a third term. Norris, an administration supporter and third term advocate, explained the President never had actually told him whether he would run again. If Roosevelt should refuse to run himself, Norris said it was possible he would support Solicitor General Robert H. Jackson for the Democratic nomination. Norris described Jackson as a “thorough liberal” who would be an “ideal president.”
The 15th annual banquet of the Jamestown Rifle Club was held in the Hotel Samuels Wednesday evening with 95 members and friends in attendance. Murray Davidson presided as toastmaster and the principal speaker was James Levack, a well-known rifle shot who exhibited firearms and discussed trick shooting which he learned from Annie Oakley. Motion pictures of fishing and hunting owned by Freeman Peterson of Warren were projected by John Appleyard. Howard Nobbs, president of the club, who ranked 12th among the nation’s crack shots the past year, announced that the Bradford club of the New York-Pennsylvania league, would shoot against an all-star, 20-man team in the near future.
In 1964, Jamestown’s largest civil defense fallout shelter became the first to be stocked when truck loads of supplies were delivered at the Hotel Jamestown. Supplies that could sustain more than 5,000 persons for two weeks in event of an emergency were distributed throughout the hotel. Local civil defense officials, including Mayor Fred H. Dunn, director, said the shelter stocking was a significant step in the city’s civil defense program.
Officials at the local Red Cross had sent inquiries for 48 families in and near Anchorage, Alaska, but they had, so far, received no word. Meanwhile, four Jamestown families were known to have received word of the safety of loved ones after the earthquake which destroyed much of downtown Anchorage. Among those was Eva Sturdevant of S. Main St., whose anxiety was relieved Saturday when she was phoned by a ham radio operator in Fairbanks, Alaska, that he had word from another ham operator in Anchorage that her son, Clyde Sturdevant and family were well.
In 1989, Town of Ellicott Supervisor Frances C. Morgan was hopping mad. She said Jamestown owed the town $100,000 – and she was out to collect it. Not so, said Michael A. “Ang” Munella, deputy director of the Jamestown Department of Development. “That $100,000 was meant to be split between the city and the town of Ellicott for a county road,” Munella said. “That was Allen Street Extension, from Buffalo Street to South Work Street. That’s the way the Chautauqua County Legislature appropriated it.” Munella said all of the money in question had been spent except for $32,920 which had been returned to the town and an additional $26,745.10 to be returned later.
A flood watch in effect for Western New York and Pennsylvania could be changed to a warning if another two inches of rain fell on the region. The watch meant there was a possibility flooding would occur within 24 hours, according to Paul Lazarus, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Buffalo. The weather system responsible for the rainfall was a complex one extending from Kentucky into southwestern Pennsylvania and moving northeast this morning. The system was strong enough to drop those two inches of water, Lazarus said. Area forecasters predicted rain for the next three days.
In Years Past
In 1914, Henry Sloan, proprietor of the hotel at Sinclairville, died suddenly on this morning, the result of heart failure, following a few days’ illness with the grip. Sloan’s condition was not regarded as at all serious and the news of his death came as a great shock to his friends in Sinclairville and elsewhere. Sloan was about 60 years old. He was a single man, never having been married but was survived by a brother and two sisters. He was for many years the clerk in the Sherman House in Jamestown where he made many friends among the people of Jamestown and with the traveling public generally.
The first of an order of 10 trolley cars for the Jamestown Street Railway had arrived in the Erie Railroad yards and would be placed in service early in the summer on continuous Falconer-Lakewood and Falconer-Celoron runs. The cars were secured from the Third Avenue Railway Company of New York and were of the semi-convertible type similar to the smaller Chautauqua Traction cars. A rearrangement of the east and west lines so that passengers might ride from Falconer to Lakewood or Celoron without change would be the culmination of plans which had been under consideration for some months looking to more efficient service east and west. The details of the new arrangement would be made public in due time.
In 1939, it was not unusual for police to run into human beings who would “play possum” with the law but it was rare indeed that a limb of the law would run into the real thing. It happened the previous night. And Jamestown Patrolman Edward Eggleston was the victim. Officer Eggleston and a brother officer were on patrol on Hallock Street when they spotted, lying in the middle of the street, what appeared to be a dead cat or dog. Eggleston approached the animal. Then he reached down to pick up the creature. With lightning rapidity the animal turned on him and sank its sharp teeth deep into Eggleston’s right hand. Before he could recover from the surprise attack, the possum shot across the street and disappeared. Eggleston was taken to Jamestown General Hospital and given injections of anti-tetanus serum. The appearance of a possum was considered very unusual in this vicinity. Recently, however, these shy little animals had become rather common inhabitants of the city.
The Jamestown Bottling Company, 601 West Eighth Street, which was closed for a few weeks following the recent death of the late Philip F. Simon, its former president, had been purchased by a new local corporation which had reopened the plant and resumed operations, in the charge of Philip W. Albano, general manager. The new company, which would soon elect officers, planed to make whatever modern improvements might be deemed advisable and retained in its employ a majority of workers numbering about a dozen. Charles Johnson, veteran mixer, had been with the concern for the past 39 years.
In 1989, the state budget was due to be passed on Saturday, April 1, but it didn’t look like the state would make the deadline said two of the area’s representatives in the New York State Legislature. Sen. Jess J. Present, R-Bemus Point, said he did not think the Legislature would pass a budget by the weekend. Asked if that surprised him, the 23-year veteran of the state Legislature had a short answer: “No.” Assemblyman William L. Parment, D-North Harmony, was no more optimistic. “I’m sure we’ll have the Parment version, but I doubt it will get enough votes to pass,” Parment said.
A three-member CBS television crew arrived in Jamestown to research a possible segment for the newsmagazine show “A Current Affair” on the mysterious disappearance last May of Kathy A. Wilson. Police Chief Richard D. Ream said the decision to come here was a direct result of reports of the keys of Wilson’s van being found in Mechanics Alley earlier this month. Ream said the television crew conducted some Interviews and were continuing them this day while shooting locations around the city.
In Years Past
In 1914, Charlotte Harrison of Foote Avenue, Jamestown, was in WCA Hospital in critical condition due to an accident sustained on the Jamestown Street Railway near the corner of Institute and Allen streets on this afternoon. Her skull was fractured and the physician in attendance stated that she was in a very critical condition and gave little encouragement for her recovery. The woman was struck by a Willard Street car, running eastward on Allen Street. Motorman P.J. Burns saw Harrison step from the curb. He thought she wanted to get on the car and prepared to stop. When the car was near her, the woman suddenly started to hurry across the tracks. Burns immediately reversed the power and sounded the gong. She almost succeeded in getting across the tracks when the fender struck her, knocking her to the pavement.
The Lynndon Worsted mills, located at the junction of Work Street and the Erie Railroad tracks at Falconer, was sold at auction on a mortgage foreclosure at the law office of Edward J. Green on this morning by Walter H. Edson, the referee. It was purchased by the Farmers & Merchants Bank of Jamestown. The Elite Furniture Company of Jamestown was also a bidder on the property. In addition to the building, the sale included considerable property around it as well as the machinery and the equipment.
In 1939, George W. Goodell, son of Dr. and Mrs. Chas. E. Goodell, Lakewood Road, who was voted the most valuable player on the Amherst College varsity baseball team the past season, was in training at the spring camp of the Rochester Red Wings of the International League in Winter Garden, Fla. Goodell, who was an infielder, was working out at second base and would remain with the Rochester squad until it would break camp April 15. The Jamestown athlete who had played on local league teams in recent years, expected to report for a tryout with the local club of the PONY league this season. An athlete at Jamestown High School, Goodell played football here and at the New England college from which he was graduated in 1938.
Fire department officials in Salamanca were investigating a terrific explosion which on Sunday demolished the home of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Verra on William Street, blew a slumbering youth out of bed in his home across the street, smashed windows in a number of buildings in the vicinity and rocked the entire city. Fire swept the ruins immediately, badly scorching two adjoining dwellings. Two fire companies were able to prevent the flames from spreading. No one was injured although for a time it was feared that Mr. and Mrs. Verra, both had lost their lives. Later it developed that they had left Saturday afternoon for Buffalo to visit friends. The only effects of the Verras which were saved were several small articles of furniture which were blown out onto the street.
In 1964, the heart of the metropolitan city of Anchorage, Alaska, was virtually destroyed by an earthquake that rocked the state, leaving a death toll that might reach several hundred. The quake struck at 5:36 p.m. at the height of the rush hour. Hundreds of people were caught on the streets or en route home in cars. Huge cracks opened in the ground. In the center of the city, three-story concrete buildings – many of them quite new – tumbled or caved in upon themselves. Area residents with relatives in Alaska were informed that it would take from 24 to 48 hours for the Red Cross to set up a registration center from which information could be sent out.
A major construction project to provide the largest exclusively-designed private nursing facility in the Jamestown area, a 108-bed nursing home, would be started on May 1. The project would be located on a one-acre plot on Prather Avenue, directly across from Fenton Park. It would be known as “Park Manor Nursing Home” and would be operated by a private local group of businessmen. A decision to construct the home was reached after a study showed “an urgent need” for more private nursing and convalescent facilities in Jamestown, according to an announcement by Anthony Liuzzo, president of the contracting firm.
In 1989, three 24-year-olds, tentatively identified as Jamestown residents, died in a crash at about 2:20 a.m. after their speeding car apparently left the road and hit a palm tree in Fort Myers, Fla. The car involved in the accident was owned by James Stockwell of Avalon Boulevard, said Lt. Malcolm Rhodes of the Florida Highway Patrol at Fort Myers. Melissa Graham of Jamestown told police Stockwell’s passengers were Jason Saulsgiver and Trina Carr, both of Wicks Avenue. The three had been sharing a condo on Florida’s Gulf Coast with four or five other Jamestown area college students including Melissa Graham, who had been dropped off by the trio at about 9 p.m. so she could study.
Restaurants all along the New York state Thruway would be converted to fast food operations over the next several years in an attempt to boost sales and satisfy consumer demand. Marriott Corp. held contracts with the Thruway to operate at 25 of the 26 rest areas along the 559-mile superhighway, the nation’s longest toll road. The operation that was on the Buffalo-to-Erie, Pa., spur, was a joint operation that included a McDonald’s and a Denny’s restaurant.
In Years Past
In 1914, Capt. Peter Grace, one of the pioneers of the oil industry, and for many years a resident of Jamestown, died this morning of pneumonia at Robinson, Ill. Grace was a Civil War veteran. He enlisted in the 83d Pennsylvania regiment at the outbreak of the war as a private. He returned at the close of the war with a commission as captain. As stated, Captain Grace was one of the pioneer oil men of the country. In 1860 he started drilling for oil at Tionesta, Pa. After the war was over he resumed his oil operations and with signal success. “At one time,” stated Louis Heineman, one of his Jamestown friends, “Captain Grace was the heaviest individual oil producer in the United States.”
The small boys, Joseph Agato, Norman Borst and Ferdinand Woodard, who confessed to robbing several of the business places in Jamestown during the past few weeks, were arraigned in police court. Agato was sentenced to the western House of Protectory at Buffalo. Woodard was sentenced to the Rochester Reform school but sentence was deferred with the understanding that his mother would take him in hand and leave the city. Borst was placed under probation for a period of one year.
In 1939, had Orson Welles’ Martian play been broadcast Sunday evening, it was very likely that the couple residing in the house at the corner of Main and 12th streets in Jamestown would have had good reason to believe that a Martian attack was actually being made on the United States. Mr. and Mrs. Justin Shields, 915 N. Main St., were seated in their living room listening to the radio when a careening car crashed into the front porch, following a collision. The impact broke several windows behind the couple but the startled duo escaped the flying glass when they scurried to the other side of the room.
When Norman Robinson of Livingston Avenue, Jamestown, returned to his auto and found a parking ticket on it Saturday, he had the somewhat original idea of posting 100 pennies as bail for his appearance before Judge Allen E. Bargar in traffic court this day. His originality was demonstrated again when he sent his wife to appear in court in his stead. But other people had other ideas. Bargar sent a special invitation to Robinson via his wife, requesting Robinson’s appearance in court the following day.
In 1964, a pre-Easter storm, accompanied by gale force winds, rain and snow, hit Chautauqua County the past night, making driving hazardous. Most highways in the eight-county area, comprising Western New York were slick with the snow, which began falling about 7 p.m. the previous evening. But Chautauqua County appeared to have received the greatest amount with nearly 4 inches overnight. Winds, reported to have reached up to 50 miles per hour, whipped snow across the highways, cutting visibility to practically zero. City and county crews were on duty all night, plowing and salting and cindering the slippery roads.
Three Jamestown High School debate team members were injured, one seriously, in a car crash during a blinding snowstorm at 8 p.m. the previous evening on Route 60 near Cassadaga. Most seriously injured was Kenneth W. Hauck, 17, a senior, who was in WCA Hospital with fractured ribs and a fractured pelvis. The debater’s father, William Hauck, Crescent Tool Company personnel manager was a patient in the same hospital. Other debaters hurt were Neil Anderson, 18, and Sharlene Lindquist, 18. The three were passengers of Robert A. Carlson, the team’s coach. They were in route home from Buffalo where they had been doing research work in preparation for a meet in New York City. Carlson was not injured.
In 1989, entertainers Lucille Ball and Bob Hope took a break Saturday afternoon during rehearsals for Wednesday’s Oscar show in Los Angeles. The pair, who had co-starred in several movies, would appear together to present one of the awards at the 61st Annual Academy Awards show.
Highway superintendents in towns throughout Chautauqua County expected spring thaw breakup problems every year but this time around appeared to be worse than usual for some of them. Perhaps reacting most strongly was Sheridan’s Robert M. Wdowisz. “It’s like a war zone,” he said of the town’s 41-mile highway system maintained by four men and himself. Portland officials reported unusually poor conditions as well. “The whole winter’s what’s caused the problem, with fluctuating temperatures,” Wdowisz explained noting that some of the town’s roads were beyond repair.
In Years Past
In 1914, Alexander Anderson of Second Street, Jamestown, was struck and instantly killed in Westfield by an automobile as he was about to board a Chautauqua traction car for Jamestown. E.N. Skinner of the firm of Skinner & Nichols, was trying out a brand-new automobile and was traveling at considerable speed down the hill that headed to the trolley station. He saw Anderson in the path of the auto and sounded the horn to warn the pedestrian of his danger. It was thought the noise of the trolley car drowned the sound of the automobile and Skinner, who was an experienced driver, could not stop in time to avoid the accident. Anderson was about to visit Jamestown to conclude negotiations for the purchase of the Pearson farm about four miles below Falconer. His household goods were already packed and he had expected to commence occupancy of his new home on Tuesday next.
Jamestown’s oldest house, according to old settlers, built by Royal Keyes in 1816, at the southwest corner of Main and Fourth streets, was being torn down to make room for the Odd Fellows’ temple to be erected the coming summer by Mt. Tabor Lodge, I.O.O.F. The work was started Tuesday. Though the house lacked but two years of being a century old, the timbers and lumber were in good condition. During the past two years the front of the house had been a bakery. The old house was seen at once to be very old by its low rooms and the other architectural features.
In 1939, the Jamestown Veneer and Plywood Corporation was the winner of the only plaque for safety presented by the Associated Industries of New York state, as a result of a three-month campaign ending Dec. 31. Councilman Russell Valone accepted the plaque on behalf of the corporation when presented by Oscar A. Lenna of Jamestown, director of Associated Industries.
The Amateur Hunt, presented Friday evening at Bemus Point Central School for the benefit of the P.T.A. was a most successful event, opined the audience which indicated its pleasure in the unusually clever and varied entertainment. Teachers and pupils in the Belleview, Bemus Point, Fluvanna and Maple Grove schools cooperated splendidly with the program chairman, J. Maxwell Ward, in the preparation of the entertainment which offered a variety of acts from a one-girl number to a puppet show and a circus. The first prize of $3 was awarded to Laurian and Onalee Stowell in a piano and tap dance number.
In 1964, two youths who took a “short cut” with their cars across an Allen Park lawn got a stiff lecture and paid a total of $31.12 for the trip. They were summoned before City Judge Lester E. Berglund who warned that further incidents of city park damages this year would result in arrests and fines. The boys were accused of cutting ruts in a portion of a lawn near Allen Park washrooms the past Sunday. They appeared with their mothers in Jamestown City Court and agreed to pay $15.56 each to the city parks department.
Robert Sandy of Sinclairville had chalked up a lot of experiences while driving in his camper truck but none was as tension-packed as the one he went through recently in Omaha, Neb. Sandy found himself in the unhappy position of being a suspect in the slaying of a Sherrill, N.Y. couple. It was all because Sandy’s camper truck bore a New York state license plate and matched the camper truck of the slain pair. There was one difference – Sandy’s truck was a 1959 model. The slain couple’s was a 1963 model. Sandy’s unwanted brush with the law came four days after the slaying and had all the elements of a movie thriller. He was driving his truck down the street when all at once he found himself surrounded by squad cars, disgorging a veritable army of police. Naturally Sandy came to an abrupt halt. As he reached for his registration papers in the glove box, all he was conscious of, he said, was a policeman with a drawn .38 revolver and a shabby man in a slouch hat standing outside the car window. “Two things went through my mind,” Sandy said. “One was that the police might think I was reaching for a gun; and the other was the poor old man was about to ask me for a dime for a cup of coffee.”
In Years Past
- In 1914, investigation of the bad fire in the Davis building at Ashville the previous night was in progress but the damage done in the rooms where the fire originated was so serious that it was practically impossible to determine the cause. The fire, when discovered, was bursting through the walls and roof and within a few minutes a large volume of flame was shooting through the roof of that part of the block. Ashville was without fire protection and the hastily formed bucket brigade was nearly exhausted and was making little headway toward saving the big building when the first assistance reached them in the form of the chemical engine from Lakewood. The firemen from Lakewood saved the building without question and perhaps prevented a conflagration which might easily have done many times the damage which was done.
- Considerable excitement in Jamestown was caused the previous evening when a heavy explosion which shook houses and broke windows occurred near the tracks of the Jamestown, Westfield and Northwestern railway, a short distance from the Chadakoin River, not far from the municipal lighting plant. Several people came rushing to the scene of the explosion but found only a hole in the ground showing the place where it had occurred. A young boy of perhaps 12 years was standing a short distance away. He was taken into the electric light plant by a man who intended to turn him over to the police but the little fellow pleaded his innocence so earnestly that he was allowed to go.
- In 1939, Lions Clubs throughout New York state would convene for their 1939 session, in Jamestown June 15-17, according to an announcement made by Manager Charles Laycock of the Jamestown Convention and Visitor’s Bureau. John M. Barrett, past president of the local club, was general chairman of the affair. Committee meetings had been held during the past several months perfecting plans for the entertainment of fellow members. unique program had been arranged for the entertainment of some 200 or more Lions and their families, who would visit this city for a three-day stay.
- Two Jamestown youths were arrested at Waterboro, S.C. this day in possession of a car owned by Supervisor Coyle A. Boyd, of Clinton Street, Jamestown which was stolen from a parking space near the welfare department headquarters March 21. The two lads were charged by South Carolina authorities with driving without a license, according to a telephone call received by Chief of Police Edwin Nyholm of Jamestown from the sheriff of Collins County, S.C. The South Carolina sheriff told Chief Nyholm that the two had confessed the robbery of a service station at Oil City, Pa., and the burglary of a house at Fairmont, W. Va., enroute south.
- In 1964, Mayor Frederick H. Dunn of Jamestown carried to the White House his plea for federal help on public works projects for the city. The mayor conferred at the White House with Henry H. Wilson, Jr., special assistant to President Johnson. Mayor Dunn emphasized Jamestown’s continued economic distress and the need for federal help on public works improvements as part of the community development and revitalization program. The Mayor was appealing for approval of federal assistance for the proposed new reservoir which would be built near the present reservoir. Estimated cost of the new 5.5 million-gallon reservoir was $550,000 and the city was seeking half in federal assistance under the Accelerated Public Works Program.
- La Giconda restaurant on Central Avenue in Dunkirk, closed for several days, was burglarized some time between Sunday and Tuesday. Joseph Pucciarelli told police 30 porterhouse steaks, two large containers of meatballs and 12 chickens were missing from the refrigerator. Pucciarelli added that an unknown quantity of whisky also was taken. He estimated the value of the foodstuff and beverage at $1,000. Entrance was gained by breaking the glass pane in a 32 by 48 inch window.
- In 1989, the black cherry lumber produced in Western New York was probably the best in the world. That took in a lot of territory but it was true of native black cherry trees grown in this area for lumber. This was the opinion of Charles P. Mowatt, associate forester with the Falconer office of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. Mowatt put it quite emphatically, saying, “In Southwestern New York and Northwestern Pennsylvania we have unquestionably the world’s best cherry.”
- Al Tech Specialty Steel Corp. plants in Dunkirk and Watervliet, near Albany were among operations the parent company was considering selling to a South Korean company. James H. Mintun, Jr., Al Tech’s president and chief operating officer, said Rio Algom Ltd., of Toronto had signed a letter of intent for the sale of its steelmaking holdings to the Sammi Group of South Korea.
In Years Past
In 1914, the trouble with most thin folks who wished to gain weight was that they insisted on drugging their stomach or rubbing on useless “flesh creams” or following some foolish physical culture stunt while the real cause of thinness went untouched. One could not get fat until the digestive tract assimilated the food eaten. Thanks to a remarkable new scientific discovery, it was now possible to combine into simple form the very elements needed to help people convert food into rich, fat-laden blood. This master-stroke of modern chemistry was called Sargol and had been termed the greatest of flesh builders. Sargol aimed to soak up the fattening elements of food and pass them into the blood where they could be carried to every starved, broken-down cell and tissue of one’s body.
The Jamestown common council met in regular session Monday evening in the council chamber with all the aldermen present. The board of estimate and review reported that petitions for paving Hoyt Alley between Second and Third streets and Third and Fourth streets had been examined and found to contain the names of the majority of the resident property owners. It was recommended that the alley be paved with No. 2 side hill block between Third and Fourth streets and with No. 2 state block between Second and Third streets, both to be laid on a five inch concrete base with cement curbing.
In 1939, the Public Service Commission in Albany had instituted an investigation to inquire into the services, practices, methods and facilities of the municipal electric plant of the Village of Mayville, in extending and furnishing electric service outside the village. The purpose of the investigation was to determine whether the village was legally operating beyond its municipal boundaries. It was started after it had been made to appear to the commission that the village of Mayville had extended its electric service and was furnishing service outside the village limits without first having obtained permission and approval of the commission.
A request that the city of Jamestown clean up the property about the boatlanding bridge, demolish the old repair shop at the water’s edge and construct a new steamboat dock on the west side of the outlet, near the bridge, was received by the Tax Sale property committee meeting at city hall. The request came from Chester McCray of Celoron who operated the Steamer City of Jamestown. Mr. McCray added the request that billboards standing on the west bank of the Chadakoin River, by the site he proposed for a new dock, be removed to provide for automobile parking space.
In 1964, a mentally deranged Japanese youth scaled a six-foot wall at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo and plunged a knife so deep in the right thigh of U.S. Ambassador Edwin O. Reischauer that it reached the bone. But Reischauer, 53, after undergoing emergency surgery and a blood transfusion was declared to be in good condition and recovering. The popular U.S. diplomat was stabbed as he was coming out of the embassy door to go to lunch. Dr. Reischauer spoke for a week at Chautauqua Institution in 1959 on “Japan and the Far East Today.”
Lady luck was with Mark O’Neill, 3, at 1 p.m. the previous afternoon. Only thin ice held him at the arm pits from sinking into more than two feet of icy Chautauqua Lake water after he walked on the ice for a distance of about 25 feet from shore at the Municipal Recreation beach in Lakewood. Dressed in a snow suit, the boy was alone. Police Chief Anthony Caprino rescued the boy from possible drowning. He unbuckled his heavy gun belt, dropped it to the ground and ran into the water, which reached up to his hips. A passerby had seen the boy fall through the ice. He ran to the nearby home of E. Robert Bootey from which the telephone call notified the police.
In 1989, despite three feet of mud, deteriorating access roads and unstable weather, Brocton’s Lake View Correctional Facility was on schedule, according to James R. Moore, project superintendent for Dick Enterprises of Pittsburgh, prime contractor for the project. “We are ahead in some areas, behind in others, so I guess it evens out,” Moore said as he four-wheeled his truck through a sea of thick, sticky mud that would be the site of a prison by winter. This was the fourth prison Moore had helped build in the past 18 months.
A member of a musically oriented Jamestown family would perform with the U.S. Navy Band when it played in Jamestown in April. Master Chief Musician Mark V. Mallare, son of Mr. and Mrs. Vincent F. Mallare of Falconer St., would be with the Navy band on April 5 at Jamestown Community College. Mallare was a 1966 Jamestown High School graduate. A trumpet player, Mallare had been with the Navy band since 1970. He was also a member of the Navy Band Brass Quintet and served as division officer for the organization’s concert/ceremonial division.
In Years Past
In 1914, any effort to compel owners of buildings spanning the outlet in Jamestown to spend large sums of money to line the creek channel with cement work in accordance with the flood abatement plan of the state engineer, would meet with an absolute refusal from the owners of at least five of the properties affected, according to information which came to The Journal from a well-informed and interested property owner. “You can say that it is childish to threaten these property owners,” stated this gentleman. “The club they think they hold is purely imaginary. Any effort to get this matter into the courts would result in disclosures which would show the absolute futility of the proposition.”
The county authorities had been asked to conduct an investigation of an incident which happened at the public school at Ormsby, McKean County, Pa. Florence Apple was the teacher and among her pupils were the three daughters of Bob Green. When the teacher asked Bessie Green to take her place for a recitation she balked. When Apple tried to force the girl to obey, the three Green sisters, Bessie, 15, Sarah, 13, and Virginia, 11, attacked the teacher. In a few minutes there was a panic among the 30 other children. William Brown was called in and he rescued the teacher but not until Apple had obtain many bruises and one eye had been discolored. The school directors expelled the three Green children. County Detective E.W. Jones was investigating.
In 1939, there was no reason why the United States must become involved in a new European war in any eventuality, despite the situation in Europe, according to H.V. Kaltenborn, dean of American radio news commentators and this night’s Civic Forum lecturer. Perhaps it was the warm rays of Jamestown’s first truly spring-like sunshine which prompted such optimism from the lips of this expert on foreign affairs. Whatever the cause, the sentiment was expressed without qualification. Kaltenborn really believed that America and Americans need not be alarmed over the prospect of this country engaging in a foreign war.
The Ariel Athletic Club of Jamestown, after an absence of three years from the theatrical boards, sent a capacity audience home from Shea’s Theater Wednesday evening singing the tuneful minstrel numbers of the 26-year Jubilee edition. The show would be repeated Friday evening at 9:10 p.m. with a good picture sandwiched on either side of the home talent revue. The club men who organized in September 1912, had not presented a show since 1936.
In 1964, Jamestown City Council would meet this night in what could be one of the most tumultuous sessions in recent years. The fuel to supply the fire was composed of: Council approval two weeks ago of a measure to enlarge the Jamestown General Hospital Board from seven to nine members over the objection of Mayor Fred H. Dunn and Council President Frank R. Franco. A proposed $1.4 million bond issue to help Jamestown pay for several community projects, including expansion of Jamestown Community College. Plans for a “march on City Hall” by placard-carrying students from JCC, urging passage of the school bond issue. These issues shaped up as a test of Dunn’s control of the City Hall.
Bernard Hodgson Jr., 25, of Limestone, N.Y., was killed Sunday near Bradford, Pa., when his automobile left the highway, plunged over an embankment and landed on railroad tracks, where it was struck by a train. State police said Hodgson was traveling alone. Troopers said his car failed to negotiate a curve. The train dragged the car about 100 feet before stopping, police said.
In 1989, the area’s two Republican congressmen voted for different candidates of a new Republican whip in the House of Representatives but both said they were ready to work with the man now second in command of House Republicans – Georgia conservative Newt Gingrich. The tally was close: 87 Republicans, including Warren’s William F. Clinger, cast their ballots for Gingrich. Eighty-five, including Amo Houghton, who represented New York’s Southern Tier, voted for Edward Madigan, the slightly more moderate deputy whip from Illinois. One ballot that read “other” was declared spoiled and one Republican was absent.
The 100,000th L-10 diesel engine rolled to the end of the line at the Jamestown Engine Plant of Cummins Engine Co. at 9 a.m. Wednesday as employees gathered for the landmark occasion. The unit was scheduled to be shipped to the Springfield, Ohio, plant of Navistar, formerly International Harvester, according to Cummins Plant Manager Joseph Peganoff. He said Navistar was the largest customer for the Cummins L-10 engine, as well as the company’s biggest customer for all of its heavy-duty truck engines. The L-10 engine had been produced at the Baker Street Extension plant since July 1982 and was used primarily to power heavy-duty on-highway trucks.
In Years Past
In 1914, 44 rats killed in one battle was the record of Edgar Powers and son Leslie, living near Ashville. The affair occurred one morning early in the week when Powers went to his silo to get out the morning feed for his dairy and found the place fairly alive with rodents. He had known from the tracks that rats frequented the place during the winter but had never seen nearly so many before. The explanation was found in the fact that the rats had been able to run up over the frozen ensilage inside the silo to an opening and so to go and come at their pleasure. Powers jumped in among them and started the work of extermination but they attacked him fiercely when cornered. He called for the assistance of his son and the two of them killed nearly every rat inside the silo. The rats had come from the barn into the silo as before but as the frozen silage had thawed they could not get up to the opening to escape.
Commissioner Frank E. Wade of Buffalo, in a report to the state commission of prisons, recommended that until a new city jail was provided for the city of Jamestown, the present women’s room should be used for lodgers and that rooms be provided on the upper floor of the City Hall or elsewhere for the detention of women and children and for the matron. Part of his report read as follows: “No criticism is made of the men’s cell room nor of the janitor’s service in the Jamestown city jail. Conditions, however, in respect to the detention of women, detention of children and the mingling of persons under arrest with tramps and lodgers are discreditable to the city of Jamestown.”
In 1939, puffing and panting as it pulled two ancient wooden coaches, the William Crooks, historic No. 1 locomotive used for 78 years by the Great Northern railroad and the St. Paul & Pacific line, which preceded it, stopped for 20 minutes this day at the Erie train station, en route to New York City, where it would be a part of the Railroads on Parade exhibit at the World’s Fair. Thousands of Jamestowners both young and old gathered as Grandpa Crooks, as the engine was affectionately known, arrived in this city at 1 p.m., two hours behind schedule after its seven-day run from St. Paul. Credited with being the first locomotive west of the Mississippi, the William Crooks, granddaddy of the Great Northern’s modern Empire Builder, was viewed by the large throng as it took on water at the station platform.
New York state’s only woman mayor lost her job this day as a tally of ballots in the previous day’s village elections gave Harry C. Bray, Republican, a 48-vote victory over Catherine Wyekle, Democrat at Clyde, N.Y. Bray polled 670 votes and Wyekle 622. In the village of Savannah, the “Don’t Vote for Me” campaign of four Republicans nominated by the Democrats in opposition to the regular Republican slate, succeeded as the regular Republicans were elected. Republicans generally strengthened their grips on village boards in communities in this area.
In 1989, a firefighter swept gasoline into a ditch so that it could be vacuumed away by a nearby mobile unit during cleanup operations on this morning at Payne’s Supply on Route 60 in Cassadaga. Between 800 and 1,000 gallons of fuel spilled onto the highway after a gas pump hose ruptured, prompting the evacuation of about 30 residents, a fire chief said. The residents would be returned to their homes this afternoon, according to Mike Ferry, third assistant chief of the Cassadaga Fire Department. The leak at the service station was discovered by Chautauqua County Sheriff’s Deputy John Crossly during a routine patrol at about 3:52 a.m. Firefighters said a rubber hose connecting an 8,000-gallon underground gas tank to a service pump, had apparently ruptured from the cold.
A plan to cut government contributions to government employee pension plans would save county, city, village and town governments in Chautauqua and Cattaraugus counties more than $2.5 million this year. That was according to a report issued by the state Senate Finance Committee. The plan was the brainchild of state Comptroller Edward Regan. Regan and other state officials had billed the plan as a tradeoff for cutbacks in state aid proposed by Gov. Mario Cuomo in his budget for the fiscal year that would begin April 1. Since Cuomo unveiled his budget in January, local officials had said proposed state aid cuts could force them to raise property taxes to maintain services, some of which the state mandated.
In Years Past
In 1914, Anna Mills Halsall, wife of George Halsall, died at her home on West Fourth Street in Jamestown on this morning, following a stroke of apoplexy suffered by her late the previous evening. Her age was 57 years and 1 month. Halsall attended the meeting of Mt. Sinai chapter, Order of the Eastern Star, in the evening, apparently in her usual health and took part in the initiation work. After returning home, however, she complained of being cold and was helped to bed by her husband. Within a few minutes she lapsed into unconsciousness from which she never rallied. Her death was a severe shock to the members of her family and her numerous friends in the Eastern Star and throughout the city.
Zero-degree weather in March scored again on this morning and reports from reliable thermometer readings in the early hours of the day showed temperatures ranging from three degrees above the zero line down to 10 below reported from Lakewood. A sufficient number of these readings were below zero to indicate that this point was generally reached. And this day marked the astronomical date for the beginning of spring.
In 1939, the state of New York would probably receive the estate of John Swanson, Jamestown, following an unsuccessful 12-year search for heirs. No one had been able to locate any relatives of the man who was taken ill in his room in the Allen Square building and died in the Jamestown General Hospital on Feb. 1, 1927. Search of the man’s room failed to disclose anything of value but when his clothing was placed in the fire to burn, it was noticed that something appeared to be stitched to the lining of the garments and it was found that $600 had been sewn into the lining. As it was believed that the man was a Swedish citizen, the Swedish government made an extensive search for heirs and could find no clues other than the man had become an American citizen.
- Canadian Prime Minister W. L. MacKenzie King told the House of Commons that Canada was ready to consult with Great Britain and other countries on cooperation to halt Nazi aggression. He added Parliament must decide any action Canada might take but that he had no doubt what the decision would be if Great Britain were attacked. An attack on Britain “with bombers raining death on London,” he said, would be regarded as “an act of aggression menacing freedom in all parts of the British commonwealth.”
In 1964, Daniel Szocki, 39, prominent Dunkirk attorney, was dead on arrival at Brooks Memorial Hospital in Dunkirk following a truck-car accident at 12:15 a.m. just east of the city line on Route 5. Sheriff deputies reported that Szocki’s car collided with the tractor-trailer truck just a few hundred feet from Cedar Cliff Drive, where the attorney resided. The truck driver, William C. Duncan, 39, of Erie, Pa., told investigating officers that the Szocki auto was zigzagging from lane to lane as he approached from the east. The fatality brought Chautauqua County’s 1964 total to seven. Police said the truck driver was uninjured and the truck was able to continue under its own power.
R.A. Lenna, president of the Blackstone Corporation, announced that the plant capacity of its Canadian subsidiary, Blackstone Industrial Products, Limited, of Stratford, Ontario, would be more than doubled with a planed expansion to cost in excess of $500,000. The Canadian plant manufactured automotive radiators and heater cores used as original equipment by Canadian car and truck manufacturers. Blackstone built its original plant at Stratford in 1954 to better serve the Canadian counterparts of its U.S. customers.
In 1989, the number of farms in Chautauqua, Cattaraugus and Warren counties declined between the 1982 and 1987 censuses of agriculture, according to figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In Chautauqua County, figures showed a decline from 2,143 farms in 1982 to 1,972 in 1987. In Cattaraugus County, the number declined from 1,211 to 1,102 and in Warren County it fell from 494 to 472.
Gov. Mario Cuomo’s seventh consecutive veto of legislation restoring the death penalty in New York state was a “first degree mistake,” said the Legislature’s most powerful Republican. State Senate Majority Leader Ralph Marino said Cuomo turned his back on New Yorkers who “overwhelmingly” supported restoration of the death penalty with his veto. “The death penalty would not help us, it would debase us,” Cuomo told students at Albany’s College of St. Rose, a Catholic college. “It would not protect us, it would make us weaker.”
In Years Past
In 1914, the investigation by officials of the Buffalo, Lockport & Rochester railway early this day failed to throw any light on the mysterious starting of an unmanned trolley car late the past night and the subsequent head-on collision with another car at Mabee’s, two miles east of Gasport, which resulted in the death of one man and the injury to 17 others. The man killed outright was Glenn W. Bridgeman of Lockport. Of the 17 injured, nine were taken to hospitals at Medina and Lockport and others, less seriously hurt, were taken to their homes. Of the injured, two might die. Motorman Edward Martin and Conductor Robert Baxter said they left the car standing in front of the station at Gasport and went inside. They heard the car start and before they could reach the door, it had gone to full speed.
The senate, in Washington, went on record in favor of a constitutional amendment for equal suffrage. The vote was 35 to 34 in favor of the resolution but as two-thirds vote was required to pass the resolution, it failed to carry. This defeat was the hardest blow the equal suffrage advocates had received in their campaign to force congress to act favorably on the equal suffrage question. An amendment offered by Senator Williams of Mississippi, restricting woman suffrage to white women, was lost by a vote of 44 to 21.
In 1939, a triumphant skunk on Thursday morning, held the downtown business region of Westfield at bay. Seen meandering down the north side of Main Street about 7:30, he took possession of the open doorway leading upstairs to the Odd Fellows lodge hall. There he held the fort. one lodge time and still Jimmy Skunk remained on guard and briefly there were no Odd Fellows odd enough to risk disturbing Jimmy and the meeting was off. Bystanders, and not very close bystanders at that, had an assortment of suggestions as to routing Jimmy from his stand but not one suggestion was carried out. Sometime in the night Jimmy disappeared but his memory lingered on.
Jimmy Levack, nationally known pistol, rifle and shotgun expert, demonstrated his ability with firearms before 125 people at the Celoron Rod and Gun Club Sunday afternoon. He tossed three potatoes into the air, breaking them with a .22-caliber rifle with which he also smashed mothball targets. He hit spinning washers on the edges, making them disappear from sight and performed spectacular feats with a .44-40 rifle as well as showing how a shotgun should be handled.
In 1964, the Jamestown General Hospital medical staff said it viewed with “grave concern” City Council’s action two weeks ago in enlarging the hospital board from seven to nine members. In a statement made public this day, the medical staff declared: “Nothing is more corrosive and destructive to the morale, efficiency and even the financial health of a public supported hospital then to introduce the element of political expediency.”
Robert S. Koon, The Post-Journal managing editor, not only had printer’s ink in his veins – but all over his lawn, too. Rushing to pump out his flooded cellar during the recent flood threats in the area of Lakewood, he grabbed some tubing from the pressroom to use as a hose. No one thought to check the tubing for ink residue. As a result, his lawn had taken on an ebony hue.
In 1989, spring had arrived and with it came construction work. Workers for Cleveland Trinidad Paving of Cleveland, started work on the Fairmount Avenue widening project on this morning at the corner of Catlin and Fairmount avenues in Jamestown. Spring arrived with little fanfare, though, looking more like winter than the season that signaled a reawakening. Meteorologist Rich Webber of the Buffalo office of the National Weather Service put it in perspective. “I think we had spring this winter and maybe we’ll get winter this spring,” he said.
No one was hurt in a fire in a duplex on Maple Street in Celoron which kept firefighters from Celoron and Lakewood busy in pelting snow Saturday evening. The family dog was credited with smelling smoke and alerting the family to escape. Investigators believed the blaze might have started after something fell onto a heating register, causing the furnace to overheat.
In Years Past
In 1914, the members of the Jamestown South Side Thimble Club paid a surprise visit, for their regular club meeting, to the home of Mrs. Richard Toothill on East Sixth Street. Toothill was not a member of the club but she had been a visitor at some of the meetings and was a friend of all the members; hence the visit, which proved to be a very special occasion for the hostess and guests. The day was spent as usual: a business meeting before dinner, dinner at 1 p.m. and sewing and sociability during the afternoon.
The Rev. Dr. Isaac T. Headland gave another of his series of lectures on the Chinese in the Jamestown First Congregational Church. His theme on this occasion being The Chinese Woman. Despite disagreeable weather, the attendance was excellent. According to Headland, woman was the most fascinating interesting and incomprehensible subject in the world – a perpetual conundrum. When one had decided what she was, something else came up and she was not. “However, a Chinese woman is just a woman.” That statement, Headland defined as “profound.” The speaker made it as a discovery of his own. The Chinese woman was described as a labor-burdened, oppressed creature, a puppet to her husband. Headland first began to take active interest in the question of the education of Chinese women upon reading, in one of the works of Dr. W.A. Martin of Peking, that not one in 10,000 Chinese women could read.
In 1939, a veteran riverman suggested that an aviator play “boogie man” to scare flocking wild swans from the treacherous eddies above Niagara Falls. William (Red) Hill, for years a close observer of life and death along the Niagara River, his specialty was recovering bodies of persons swept over the falls, asserted: “Apparently neither the Canadian nor the United States governments are concerned about the swans. If either sent an airplane to swoop over the flocks, the birds could be forced back upriver to safety.” A number of the swans had, within the past several days, been drawn to destruction over the falls.
The Great Northern pioneer locomotive, William Crooks, and two passenger cars, which were en route from Chicago to New York City, to appear in the World’s Fair pageant, Railroads on Parade, would pass through Jamestown over the Erie railroad lines the following Wednesday, making a half-hour stop here. Interested members of the public were invited to inspect the train. The engine, which was built as a wood burner in the 1860s and later converted into a coal-burning type, travels over one division a day under its own power at the rate of 15 miles per hour. The train would stop here for coal and water on its 103-mile trip from Meadville, Pa., to Salamanca. The 77-year-old locomotive and the ancient passenger coaches would be on exhibition near the Erie passenger station on West Second Street at the foot of Lafayette Street.
In 1964, final cost of building and equipping the new addition to Jamestown General Hospital was estimated at $416,919 in a financial report on the project presented to the Hospital Board by Mark W. Lyons, superintendent. Joseph J. Valone, chairman of the Buildings and Grounds Committee, reported that all four floors of the new wing were in service. Noting that only landscaping and a few minor items remained to be done, he pronounced the project 98 percent completed. With the first floor of the new wing occupied by the Municipal Laboratory, the upper three floors had a total of 28 rooms equipped with 63 beds, which gave the hospital a capacity of 165 patient beds.
A statewide state police raid on gamblers and bookmakers netted six arrests in Dunkirk. No other community in Chautauqua County or Cattaraugus County was visited by state police. The Western New York raid was directed by Troop A. State Police Commander, Capt., John P. Nohlen, Batavia. The zero hour for the simultaneous raids was 2 p.m. throughout the state. Participating in the Western New York drive against gamblers included members of Falconer and Westfield state police patrols. They raided two places in Dunkirk. Charges of bookmaking were filed against each man. They each posted $200 cash bail at Dunkirk police headquarters and each was set free pending arraignment before Dunkirk City Judge August R. Jankowski.
In Years Past
In 1914, Orrin Kelley of Ellery Center narrowly escaped serious injury Tuesday. He was at work in Ernest Caskey’s saw mill in Earl Hall’s woods at Driftwood and while adjusting a belt to machinery in operation, his clothing was caught in the shaft. In an instant he was stripped to his waist and the only covering left on his arms was the wristbands of his shirt. Mr. Kelley suffered from the wrenching he received and was taken home, but it was believed that he did not sustain permanent injuries.
The Gitche Gumee Campfire Girls of America entertained a large audience in the auditorium of the Y.W.C.A. building in Jamestown Tuesday evening. The manner of presentation of the numbers was unique in the extreme and it was not until things actually happened that those present were at all enlightened as to what the entertainment was to bring forth. As the curtain rose on the first part of the program, the Sixteen Sibylline Sisters were disclosed, their costumes concealed by long kimonos. Madame Makinah charmingly presided, making a few introductory remarks concerning each character as she made her debut. The second part of the entertainment was an amusing farce on the servant problem.
In 1939, Harold E. Hopwood, 16 years old, son of Mr. and Mrs. Robert C. Hopwood of Westfield, died in the Jamestown General Hospital the previous morning from a bullet wound in the forehead received while shooting in Chautauqua gulf near his Westfield home. Coroner William Crandall, in his investigation, learned that the youth was in the habit of going two or three times a week to the gulf to shoot crows. He used a .22 caliber rifle, the safety device of which was so difficult to operate that he removed it and it was believed because of this the accident happened.
Further conferences with city officials and local businessmen on the plan to lease the new Jamestown Airport to the White Aviation Corporation, Inc. brought an announcement from Donald G. White, president of the aircraft company, that he had full confidence that the negotiations would be completed successfully within a week. If an agreement was reached, the White Company immediately would take over the operation of the airport and would move its manufacturing operations to Jamestown. “Our first step will be to start production of ten White Amphibian planes,” said Mr. White.
In 1964, Democrat Village Board candidates Mearl Cramer Jr., and Mrs. Caryl VanderMolen won a landslide victory the previous day in a Lakewood Village election which brought out record crowds to the voting booth. A total of 1,420 votes were cast in the election which resulted in some other firsts: The first time a woman had ever held a seat on the Village Board and the first time in over a quarter of a century Democrats had held a board majority. The Lakewood election was the climax of a heated campaign centering around the rejection of a zoning change to permit Niagara-Mohawk Power Corp. to build a $100,000 commercial building in a residential district.
A veteran Jamestown Dept. of Public Works employee chose to stay with his runaway vehicle on the Sprague Street Hill the previous afternoon and averted what could have been a highway disaster. The employee, Robert Jones, Jr., of Washington St., was seriously injured and was in fair condition at Jamestown General Hospital. Officials highly praised Jones for his courage. They said he had a chance to leap from the cab of the vehicle but chose to run it off the road rather than let it careen freely down the hill into the path of heavily traveled Steele Street. The vehicle, a 10 ton loading machine, lost its brakes going down Sprague Street.
In 1989, Jamestown was the home of one of the world’s most successful manufacturers of diagnostic test kits, Clark Laboratories. The business filled a building on Pine Street. It employed 25 Jamestown area residents, many with technical skills learned at the State College at Fredonia. Six of the newest employees formerly worked in the lab at Jamestown General Hospital. Begun in 1981 by Donald and Connie Clark and David Hansen, Clark Labs produced a variety of kits used to test for various diseases.
The American Legion Post in Falconer would host a meeting Sunday morning to discuss the recent approval of a site at Arlington National Cemetery for a memorial to women veterans. “This memorial is a long-awaited acknowledgment of women veterans,” said Shelley Larson, service officer with the Chautauqua County Veterans Service Agency. “It’s taken many years for people to recognize the fact that women veterans have played a significant role in the military service of their country,” Ms Larson said. An architectural and engineering survey of the proposed memorial site was under way and a competition for design of the memorial would be opened soon.
In Years Past
In 1914, a special car which left Grand Central station the previous night, carried 75 men who had been without jobs in New York city for most of the winter, to farmers waiting in Fonda, N.Y. to put them to work on dairy and truck farms. C. W. Larmon, deputy state commissioner of agriculture, in charge of the land and labor bureau, went along to see the experiment through. So great had been the demand for rural labor since the state’s intention was first announced, that two more carloads of willing workers would be sent to Rome and Utica farms on Thursday. The rest of the Mohawk Valley would be supplied later on if the men kept coming.
The Jamestown fire department was called to the corner of East Second and Cross streets shortly before 3 this afternoon to extinguish a blaze in the Thatcher block, a big tenement house. The building was a frame one and only the prompt response of the firemen prevented what might have been a very serious blaze. The fire started in a clothes closet in the apartment of Joe Gawiser on the first floor. The room was badly damaged and the remainder of the apartments were filled with smoke. The loss would not amount to very much.
In 1939, the Frewsburg fire department would have the honor of first place in the Dunkirk Firemen’s parade on July 4. The parade would be a feature of the field day and inspection of the Dunkirk department. A few days ago, the committee, in charge of the event, sent invitations to 120 fire companies to be present in Dunkirk July 4 and to take part in the festivities. It was announced that position in the parade would be governed by time of entry. The Frewsburg department and Ladies’ auxiliary wasted no time in accepting the invitation and would have the honor place in the parade as a result.
No one knew how many of the traditional “nine lives” remained for 14-year-old “Mutt,” but already he had practically doubled the average life span of a feline. “Mutt” the cat was owned by Mr. and Mrs. Oscar W. Larson of Forest Avenue, Jamestown, having resided in at least five places since leaving his original home at Ivory, N.Y. In referring to the average life span of a cat as about six or seven years, feline fanciers considered the perils other than health that could cut short the life of the average cat.
In 1964, Jamestown’s Automatic Voting Machine Corp., would soon become a completely independent company operating on its own. It had been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Rockwell Mfg. Co. of Pittsburgh. Automatic’s independent status was forecast in a letter by W. F. Rockwell Jr., President of Rockwell, to Rockwell share owners. Mr. Rockwell said that A.V.M. would continue to manufacture and sell voting machines, as in the past, but would operate autonomously. Approximately 300 people were employed at the Jamestown plant. The firm was founded in 1898 and became a Rockwell subsidiary in 1958. Lloyd A. Dixon Sr., president of A.V.M. since 1962, would become chairman of the board.
Councilman Robert E. Godfrey criticized Jamestown Police Chief John Paladino’s use of the word “dissension” in a recent statement by the chief urging higher salary scales. The councilman said at a meeting of the Public Safety Committee that “disgruntled” would be a more accurate word to describe dissatisfaction over police salaries. Mr. Godfrey was chairman of the committee. He said the chief exaggerated the situation and that “disgruntled” should be limited to a few policemen.
In 1989, Chautauqua County’s Health and Law departments were cooperating to halt two unauthorized people from allegedly distributing anti-smoking signs to small businesses. The action was taken after numerous complaints were received on the conduct of the individuals said to be involved. It was reported that they were visiting such businesses as service stations, beauty shops and small stores advising employees of the county’s regulations against smoking in public places. In some instances it was reported that they were placing signs on the premises. The department had been advised that the individuals gave the impression they were employees of the health agency but refused to identify themselves.
Journalist Terry Anderson, in his fifth year as a prisoner of the politics he once reported, was “tired of being caged like an animal,” his sister said. “Enough is enough. … This cannot continue,” Peggy Say said at a ceremony in Washington, D.C., attended by members of Congress, Anderson’s colleagues and relatives of the hostages in Beirut, Lebanon. The ceremony marked the four years Anderson, the chief Middle East correspondent for The Associated Press, had been held captive and was one of many observances across the country.
In Years Past
In 1914, the mystery over the disappearance of Ephram M. Wright from his home near Abbotts Corners near the village of Sugar Grove Feb. 5, was partially solved by the finding of the remains of a man which had been identified as Mr. Wright. The body was found lying in a hollow, still partially covered by snow, behind the orchard in the rear of some farm buildings. As soon as the discovery was made, a description was telephoned to Mr. Wright’s relatives and the description fitted that of the missing man. Owing to the silly superstition that seemed to exist in Pennsylvania, no one dared to touch the body until the arrival of the coroner.
The Beardsley case was up before the court again when District Attorney Sterns advised the court that Ethel Austin had been held in custody as a witness for 60 days and that, under the law, she was entitled to compensation. The court remarked that the law provided allowance up to $3 a day and said that in her case he would make half that amount. He made an order allowing her $90. Justice Bissell said he wanted to go on record as denouncing the town officers of the town of Chautauqua for the action in allowing the Beardsley children to be removed into the state of Pennsylvania and given into the custody of that dissolute grandmother to be brought up where they would be more likely to turn out as criminals instead of having them committed to a proper institution where they might be brought up as good citizens.
In 1939, Thomas J. Burke of North Warren, Pa., a mail truck driver on the route from Warren to Jamestown, died in the WCA Hospital this day a few hours after apparently being stricken with a fatal heart attack about a mile south of Stillwater on the Kiantone Road. Mr. Burke appeared in good health when he left home at 6 in the morning. Eldred Griffin, Kiantone, a driver for the Endress Ice and Coal Company, found Mr. Burke in an unconscious condition in his truck by the side of the road at 7:45 a.m. With the assistance of another man, who had also stopped when the mail truck was discovered, stopped partially off the pavement. Mr. Griffin took Mr. Burke to the hospital, where he died without regaining consciousness.
On the eve of the third anniversary of Jamestown’s record snowfall of 26 inches on St. Patrick’s Day which paralyzed the city in 1936, the weatherman once again forecast lower temperatures and probably snow flurries in this section of the state. The sharp change from Wednesday’s spring-like weather to the blustery condition of this day was in direct comparison to the conditions in 1936 – except in respect to the amount of snowfall.
In 1964, schools from Pittsburgh, Pa., and Montrose, N.Y., won the two-day weekend Tri-State High Schools’ eighth annual Robert H. Jackson debate trophy contest at Jamestown High School. The program attracted 44 teams from 24 high schools in Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York. There were about four members to a team. Central High School, Pittsburgh, took first place. The school would hold possession of the Robert H. Jackson Debate trophy for one year. The other Pittsburgh school, Taylor Allderice High School, won second place. Third place went to Henry Hudson High School, Montrose, N.Y.
Baton twirling and modeling were included in the spring term of Jamestown YWCA youth classes. Miss Linda Barnes would teach baton twirling. The modeling course would be taught by Mrs. Wilbur Jones. This was for girls 14 to 18 who wished to learn to be models or to study poise and good grooming for modern teenagers. Tap dancing and ballet would also be offered.
In 1989, many area employers who had traditionally paid new employees minimum wage were finding they had to pay more to attract the number and quality of employees they needed, according to Hugh Tranum, coordinator of the Jamestown Area Labor Management Council. Fewer and fewer employers were paying minimum wage, Tranum said. Employees of Quality Markets were among those who started at more than minimum wage, according to Jack Henry, vice president for personnel. “We have been (starting employees at more than minimum wage) for more than two years now,” Henry said. New Quality Markets employees earned $3.50 per hour. After 30 days they earned $3.70 per hour, he said. The minimum wage had been $3.35 per hour for eight years.
Area highway department employees and the motoring public undoubtedly would say “Amen” at this time of the year, to an old Cornish prayer. It went: “From ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged beasties, and things that go bump in the night. Good Lord, deliver us!” Those things in the night might be potholes resulting from poor drainage or the freeze-thaw cycle. And trying to control them was sometimes more than a full-time job for crews of the Chautauqua County Highway Department. “They can happen overnight,” according to Donald Maloney, assistant construction maintenance supervisor. “It’s really a hard job to keep up with it,” Maloney said.
In Years Past
In 1914, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Cooper entertained nearly a hundred guests in honor of George R. Randell and his bride, Bradley Dye, who were married by the Rev.H. Lawford Nichols, on Feb. 13. The bride was a daughter of the late Marvin Bradley and together with her sisters, Mrs. Rockman, Mrs. Swan and Mrs. Simmons, was well-known at Falconer. Among the guests were noted a number from Levant and Jamestown, including Mrs. Edwin Linquist, sister of the bridegroom, Mr. and Mrs. George Bowman, Mrs. Allen Kimball and Mary Porter. Thomas Boyland represented friends at Westfield and Mr. and Mrs. Frank Walter attended from Drybrook. The Rev. Nichols, in a few felicitous words, made a presentation on behalf of the company, which was responded to by the popular couple.
Mr. and Mrs. Norman Russell had reason to consider themselves particularly unlucky for they only recently removed from Kane, Pa., to Jamestown and had not transferred the insurance on their household goods. The house into which they moved caught fire on this morning and their furniture was badly damaged. Presumably the insurance companies would not pay the loss. The house was located at 100 Willard Street. Around 5 a.m. Sunday morning an alarm was turned in to the fire headquarters. By the time the firemen arrived, the fire had gained considerable headway. To save the building, the firemen had to turn on two heavy streams of water. Of course the water did considerable damage to the furniture.
In 1939, what was believed to be the highest bail ever asked in a local court was set Tuesday afternoon in Warren when Justice of the Peace T. Richard Evans, demanded $100,000 bond from G.H. Anderson, Toronto stock salesman, for his appearance at a hearing the following Monday. Anderson, who allegedly induced a Warren woman, Clare B. Schofield, to invest between $50,000 and $100,000 in a Canadian gold mining stock, was arrested in Warren by Chief Investigator Eugene A. Holland of the State Securities commission. Arraigned before the local justice, Anderson pleaded not guilty and demanded a hearing which was set for Monday afternoon. Attired in the popular version of Wall Street fashion including striped trousers and spats, Anderson waived hearing the reading of the information which was understood to contain a list of his several visits to the community and the amount of cash and securities received on each occasion.
Adolf Hitler, protector of Bohemia and Moravia, sponsor and guarantor of Slovakia, joined his vast cavalcade of soldiers pouring into shattered Czecho-Slovakia while Czechs cried as his tanks rumbled through the streets of Prague. The swastika flew over Bohemia and Monrovia which had become in effect merely parts of the greater German Reich and probably would be less independent than most protectorates. They were shorn of armies and power over their foreign affairs and lacked even a common name. Before the day was over, Hitler was expected to proceed like a conqueror of old into Hradcany castle, Prague’s most famous fortress residence of Czecho-Slovakia’s president and the burial vault of men who made glorious bohemian history.
In 1989, New York stood to lose $100 million in federal education funding if it failed to bring its program for educating handicapped children into compliance with federal standards by July 1. The situation was explained at a meeting of the Chautauqua County Legislature’s Human Services Committee by Robert White. He was administrative assistant to the legislature and in charge of the handicapped children’s education program in the county. “They (the state) will lose the money if they don?t pass some kind of a law by July first,” White said, noting the state had not been in compliance with the federal law for many years. White explained the federal requirement would take responsibility for education of handicapped 3-to-5-year-olds away from the Family Court and place it under the auspices of the school districts.
If, as Robert Frost said, “Good fences make good neighbors,” then it was also true that “good neighbors make good treaties.” Canada and the United States were good neighbors who had made a good treaty, according to Derek H. Burney, Canadian ambassador to the United States. Burney was referring to the Free Trade Agreement negotiated by the two countries. The ambassador made his remarks before 600 Western New Yorkers at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Buffalo as part of a continuing ambassador lecture series sponsored by the Buffalo Council on World Affairs.
In Years Past
In 1914, that work was progressing on making the maps and locating the owners of the various pieces of property to be affected by the proposed improvement of the Chadakoin for flood abatement purposes was good news to the residents of Jamestown now in daily fear of a big thaw and more floods. The assistant state engineer had been spending several days on the work and it was reported to be progressing rapidly. The next stop after securing the maps, marking the property lines and locating the owners, would be to secure the releases from possible damage. These were necessary preliminaries to beginning the work and the good done would far over-balance the harm. Little if any property should have any damage.
T. Henry Black had just had installed at his photographic studio in Jamestown, a new light for taking pictures at night. This light was a recent discovery in electricity and was the last word to artificial lighting which was a pronounced success. The light was being patented by Weeks and Kennedy of Jamestown and promised to be a forthcoming substitute for daylight. Black was fortunate in securing this light at present in his studio as he would be enabled to make pictures at any time day or night and would be fully equipped at all times to accommodate his patrons.
In 1939, a country woman doctor, two state troopers and a score of volunteers came to the end of a snow-blocked trail which they fought for 15 hours to bring medical aid to two children critically ill in a marooned farmhouse. Dr. Anna Perkins of Westerlo, N.Y., who did the last mile and a half of the 20-mile trip on snowshoes, reported the children, Marion, Shufelt, three and her sister, Ethel, six, had “excellent chance of recovery” from influenza. They had been without medical aid for several days. The farmhouse was located near Triangle Lake in the Helderberg mountains southeast of Albany. Drifts from 12 to 15 feet high slowed progress of the party.
Sirens broke the comparative stillness of the Jamestown business district around 11 p.m. Monday evening when trucks from the city hall fire station responded to a call from Gretchen’s Kitchen. Reaching the Washington and Second street location of the dining place, a half dozen firemen marched into the place with the usual burden of fire fighting paraphernalia. Patrons gulped. “Is there a fire here?” a smoke eater asked. “Not to my knowledge,” the stunned gentleman behind the counter responded. “It must be the Third Street place.” The firemen about-faced and resumed their positions on the trucks and, with sirens wailing again, roared off for the opposite end of the business district. Sure enough, arrival at the Third Street place provided the familiar pungent odor of smoke. The floor beneath a stove in the kitchen had caught fire and was smoldering. Damage was slight aside from the hole in the floor and the charred beams.
In 1964, Theodore P. Bauer, 20, of Lister Ave., Falconer, father of a six-week old daughter, was fatally injured shortly before 7 p.m. the previous day when his car struck a utility pole at Allen and Barrows streets. It was Chautauqua County?s sixth auto fatality of the year and the first in Jamestown since Nov. 13, 1963. Preliminary police investigation indicated that Bauer, employed by National Worsted Mills, Falconer, was returning to work after eating lunch in Jamestown. The impact was so forcible that the entire left side of the car was sheared and the left front door crashed against the pole and became embedded in it as though it had been hammered around the pole. Bauer had taken delivery of the car, a 1956 Pontiac, earlier in the day.
An arsenal of 34 antique weapons found in the Westfield Academy athletic fieldhouse had mystified police and those acquainted with the value of the assortment, which included swords, sabres, daggers and two British Crown flintlock pistols, all in perfect condition. Other pieces of the collection were a World War II German dagger, with the red and white Nazi emblem in the handle; a United States Army bayonet made in 1906 as well as a small pearl handled vest pocket dagger. The weapons were found by the academy’s custodian, Clarence Carraher, when he went to the fieldhouse at noon to check on the small building’s roof. He found the weapons, neatly laid out on a stretcher on top of a large stack of football tackling dummies and other athletic equipment.
In 1989, raising the minimum wage was not a popular idea with leaders of local chambers of commerce who said they would support a training wage. Charles Turcotte, acting director of the Jamestown Area Chamber of Commerce and president of the Manufacturers’ Association of the Jamestown area, said it was his opinion that government should not raise the minimum wage. Neither organization he represented had taken a position on the issue. “It’s probably better if we let the marketplace take care of paying those wages that can be afforded within the present minimum wage,” he said.
Rita Rosedahl’s hands shook and her eyes teared when she was called to the podium as Jamestown’s 33rd Woman of the Year at the Marvin House. “Let’s all look deeply into our own hands tonight and see the blisters that mean something to this community,” master of ceremonies Russell E. Diethrick Jr., told the audience that included 16 former Women of the Year. “I just can’t believe this. I’m not worthy of this,” she said, as her husband, Evans, son David and daughter and son-in-law Carol and Daniel rushed to greet her. “I don’t know how he could keep the secret,” she said of her husband, who said he almost “spilled the beans” one day the past week.
In Years Past
In 1914, clad in her brown khaki uniform with a brown hat and big plume, Alice Stebbins Wells of the Los Angeles police force urged the assembly cities committee to report favorably a bill providing for 20 or more policewomen in New York to do special work. She predicted that within a few years every city would follow the example of the 15 which already had women police. Mrs. Frederick Jenkins of Brooklyn said that policewomen were needed in parks, playgrounds, dance halls and during the summer in Coney Island. Mary Wood, representing 90,000 club women, endorsed the bill.
Edward Beardsley was started for Auburn this morning on the 10 a.m. train in custody of Deputy Sheriff Ernest A. Gossett. Beardsley was handcuffed to Michael Nowak, another prisoner under sentence to Auburn. Before leaving, he denied to the attendants at the jail that he wrote the story of his life which had been published. He said he did tell his story to Mr. Jackson but he did not write it himself. In his story of the events, Beardsley said that when he came out of the house and shot towards the sheriff, that the latter was running about 150 feet ahead of the team. Evidently he was attempting to tell the story that was circulated around after the shooting and which had been of great annoyance to the sheriff.
In 1939, when Desk Lieutenant John Saunders appeared at Jamestown police headquarters for work with the midnight shift this night he would be starting his 30th year of service with the department. Saunders was appointed patrolman during the Gokey fire emergency 29 years previously. Approximately four years after his appointment, he suffered a broken neck when struck with a brick while on duty during the bitter street car strike. Except for the period during which he was confined to a hospital and to his home, Saunders had served as a desk officer at headquarters ever since the date of his injury.
A representative of the New York state department of health and an officer of the state medical society were agreed on the basic program of socialized medicine. Discussing the problem at Union College, Dr. Ernest L. Stebbins of the state department said he thought it necessary to have “some form of socialized medicine” but added he knew of “no perfect plan.” At the same time, Dr. Peter Irving of New York City, executive secretary of the medical society, said “the doctors will support the so-called indemnity insurance plan” but would oppose the compulsory health insurance plan.
In 1964, a 39-year-old fireman was injured while battling a United Refining Co., fire the previous afternoon in Warren. The blaze, which threatened several buildings following an explosion, caused damage estimated at more than $10,000. Two fuel tank trucks and a large gasoline storage tank also were damaged. The fireman, Walter Main, broke his left foot when he tripped over a hose line. Fire Chief Leon Mintzer summoned mutual aid from North Warren, Clarendon and Glade Township as the flames shot upward more than 300 feet and flaming gasoline spilled onto the highway. The fire broke out as workmen were loading gasoline from a storage tank into a railroad tank car on the Pennsylvania Railroad siding.
Personnel with more than 200 years combined experience in the merchandising field were looking forward to welcoming area residents to Carnahan’s Men’s and Boyswear Store, 17-23 W. Third St., Jamestown, during its current grand opening. The three-day grand opening at the store’s new location, started the previous morning. Mildred Wilbur, office manager and 40-year veteran with the firm, said the 500 roses, one of about 80 free gifts being offered during the opening, were gone shortly after the store opened. The new location was designed by the late Clyde L. Carnahan, a founder of the store.
In 1989, Lucille Ball memorabilia was being sought for a community exhibit that would be presented in conjunction with Ball’s visit to Jamestown May 18-21. Anyone who had photographs, movie posters, theater costumes, souvenirs and other memorabilia they would like to loan to the exhibit was being asked to contact the Fenton Historical Center. Ball, an area native, was to return to Jamestown to receive an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from the State University of New York at Jamestown Community College. The exhibit, one of several events being planned in cooperation with her visit, would take place at the Fenton Historical Center and the lobby of the Jamestown Municipal Building.
Bill Cosby and “The Cosby Show” swept the People’s Choice Awards with five honors and the TV sitcom “Roseanne” and the film “Rain Man” also were viewers’ favorites. Cosby was voted favorite male television performer, all-around male star and his NBC series won favorite comedy in the 15th annual edition of the entertainment popularity contest conducted by a nationwide Gallup Organization poll. “The Cosby Show” also won all-time favorite television show honors, edging out longer-running hits “M-A-S-H” and “Star Trek” while Phylicia Rashad was picked as favorite female television performer.
In Years Past
In 1914, Beardsley, the Chautauqua County outlaw, made into a hero by cheap newspaper notoriety, received the verdict of the jury which had been trying him in supreme court at Mayville. The verdict was received shortly after 11 a.m. before Justice Herbert P. Bissell. Beardsley was found guilty of the crime of assault in the first degree “as charged in the indictment.” The verdict was announced by E.W. Strickland, who had been named as foreman of the jury. The effect which the trial of this case had produced on the minds of the 12 men who sat as Beardsley’s jury was demonstrated by the fact that the jury was in the jury room but four minutes to arrive at their verdict, a unanimous decision that Beardsley was guilty. Beardsley was sentenced to serve a term in Auburn prison at hard labor of not less than five years nor more than nine years and six months. This maximum limit was fixed as the law provided that a sentence must expire in the period of spring and summer.
It was a fine eclipse and Jamestown folk viewed it in various sections of the city. The cloudless night afforded unusual opportunities for viewing the phenomena and it was unquestionably an impressive sight. The shadow had pretty nearly covered the moon just as the theaters were letting out and the theater crowd squinted skyward with much interest. The astronomers had it figured to the minute for at 9:45 p.m. Jamestown time, the first faint dark streak crept along the edge of the moon and in less than an hour and a half the satellite was obscured. By 11:15, the moon was in total eclipse. It was a wonderful demonstration of one of the most mysterious and impressive phenomena of nature.
In 1939, Kathryn Ross, a restaurant operator who obligingly cashed paychecks for workers in a Buffalo neighborhood plant, wanted City Court Judge Peter Maul to do something about a few mistakes she said she made. Confused by a change in the form of checks she usually cashed, Ross told Maul she paid off according to the serial numbers of the checks rather than the actual monetary value of each check. Thus, she asserted she paid $102.49 to a man entitled to only $16.01, $102.29 to another instead of the proper $29.44 and $102.11 to a third whose check called for $35.53. Ross and the three check cashers were given a week to submit memoranda.
The following weekend the sixth annual Western New York bridge tournament would bring many out-of-town bridge experts to the Hotel Jamestown under the auspices of the North American Bridge Association. Persons might, however, play in the tournament without being members of the association. The tournament manager was R.E. Needham of Greenville, Pa., with H.N. Katzen of Pittsburgh as tournament director. Players would be here from Cleveland, Erie, Rochester, Ithaca, Pittsburgh, Buffalo and many other cities. Friday evening a mixed pair game would be played. On Saturday afternoon an open pair game would be played in two sessions and Sunday there would be a team of four play.
In 1964, Jamestown firemen carried three small children from an East Second Street residence the previous afternoon during a fire which left two families temporarily homeless. Rescued unharmed were the children of Mr. and Mrs. Larry Ackley of East Second Street – Craig, 5; Shirley, 3 and Brenda, 18 months. Firemen found Mrs. Ackley near collapse at an entrance on a side street. Distraught, she told firemen that three of her children were still in the building. She said she had been unable to enter the house to rescue them because the door, equipped with a snap lock, had accidentally blown shut, locking her out. A ladder was raised and Fireman Fred Bunge crawled through a second-floor window, reappearing moments later carrying the two older children. Meanwhile, Fireman Harry Sweetin entered the downstairs bedroom through a window and rescued the youngest child from her crib.
Chautauqua County’s financial future was apparently anything but bright, according to Supervisor Frederick E. Mattison, town of Ellicott. The supervisor, addressing members of the Jamestown Optimist Club in the Hotel Jamestown, said the need for more revenues to meet the rising costs of services was of deep concern to county officials. Mattison, chairman of the special committee formed to study the need for a county sales tax, said there were only two ways to raise these revenues. One by increasing real property tax and the other, a county sales tax.
In Years Past
In 1914, the defense of Albert Edward Beardsley that he shot Poormaster Putnam in defense of his home, was proving an exceedingly slim reed to lean upon. It had not impressed the court as Beardsley would like to have the court impressed, it had not impressed the spectators as some anticipated and, in view of the proceedings this forenoon, it was not likely to impress the jury. After Sheriff Anderson had been dismissed from the stand, Deputy Sheriff Colegrove was examined for the prosecution by District Attorney Stearns and cross examined by Robert H. Jackson, of counsel for the defense. This was Mr. Jackson’s first active appearance in the case.
Arthur A. Amidon, the Prohibition nominee for mayor of Jamestown and the man on whom it was said the bulk of the opposition to Mayor Samuel A. Carlson’s re-election would center, arrived home to Jamestown this day from Albany, where he had been attending a hearing before the assembly excise committee on a proposed constitutional amendment for statewide prohibition.Said the candidate, “I feel deeply grateful for the honor of being nominated for mayor and while I feel that my interests are tied up with the board of education, yet I think, in the interests of the party and the city, I will make as strong a campaign as I can for the office. I have received assurances of support from many citizens of Jamestown and I will try to deserve the good things they have said about me.”
In 1939, Donald G. White, president of the White Aircraft Company, Inc., flew to Jamestown from Buffalo the previous afternoon to continue negotiations with a local group interested in bringing the White Aircraft enterprise to this city. Mr. White was met at the airport by Mayor Harry C. Erickson and others of the interested local group. Although negotiations were not yet complete, The Journal was informed that it appeared very likely that the White Company would locate its manufacturing plant here. If present plans matured, the company would also lease the municipal airport to assume full responsibility for its operation. The operation plans contemplated a well-equipped flying school.
An excellent cast played Susan and God in Jamestown Friday evening. The cast was afforded a large audience at Shea’s theater for the production of Rachel Crother’s dynamic comedy-drama. The sweet music of applause lingered long after the final curtain of the superb performance, for the most distinguished group of players seen in Jamestown in many a moon. Years hence, some discriminating Little Theater group would probably pounce on Susan and God to play as a straight dramatic commentary on the erratic age which now was ours.
In 1964, nine-year-old John Ross was back in school this day none the worse for an ordeal which, but for a timely rescue, might have had a tragic ending. John and a schoolmate, Donald Johnson, 8, had ventured into a large open field near the Hundred Acre Lot. They were about midway between Curtis and Hotchkiss streets when the thin layer of ice gave way beneath their feet and they sank into muck above their knees. Donald managed to make his way to firm ground but John was unable to extricate himself. The more he struggled, the deeper he sank. Donald raced to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Earl R. Hall, 233 Hotchkiss St., and told them of John’s plight. Mrs. Hall arrived and found the boy had sunk into mud up to his hips. She was able to find solid footing close enough to grasp the boy’s hands and pull him from the mud. After receiving a hot bath and change of clothing, he was soon reported feeling perfectly normal.
Members of the Jamestown Retail Merchants Association executive board said they would delay any recommendation on a proposed amendment to the state’s Sabbath Laws until a larger group of merchants had studied it. The amendment was currently being studied by legislators in Albany. Guy B. Saxton, association secretary, said the amendment to the controversial Sunday opening laws, would mean that a merchant could remain open on Sunday if he closed some other day. It would further stipulate that if a merchant remained open on Sunday, he must not hire anyone to work on that day. He and his immediate family must do the business.
In 1989, Debbie Byren, a marketing employee of New Jersey Bell held a display unit that was used with a “Caller ID” service that would let a person know who was calling before they answered the phone. The service, used in New Jersey, was drawing opposition in Pennsylvania from consumer and civil rights advocates who said it would invade privacy and break a state anti-wiretap law.
Early the past Saturday morning about 150 children gathered in the Holiday Inn ballroom to watch a 38-year-old man try to set a world record. He was jumping rope. It looked easy enough – but they knew Bob Commers had been up all night. In fact he had been hopping the rope about 140 times per minute for 18 hours and, as mandated by Guiness Book rules, Commers only took five minutes each hour to grab a bite, a drink or take care of necessities, such as soothing newly formed blisters. Meanwhile, donations were pouring in to the Southern Tier’s American Heart Association, which had invited Commers to Jamestown for its 11th annual fund-raising drive. He stayed with it until he buried the former record by an hour and reached his goal of jumping rope for 23 hours.
In Years Past
In 1914, the Beardsley trial was well under way. The jury was chosen the previous day. District Attorney William Stearns opened the case to the jury on this morning. He recited Beardsley’s acts from the time he first attracted public attention at Garland, Pa., 12 or 13 years ago down to the present date. He told the whole unpleasant story despite the objections of C. F. Chapman, Beardsley’s lawyer. The most interesting feature of the day was the testimony of John G. W. Putnam, overseer of the poor of the town of Chautauqua. Mr. Putnam told how he went to the Beardsley home and received the wound that laid him up for several weeks. Regarding the attitude of the sheriff, Mr. Putnam, after he was shot, asked the sheriff if Beardsley should not be captured then and there. The sheriff replied that he had no gun.
Mrs. M. I. Green of South Main Street, Jamestown, reported that as she went to get her watch from her jewel case Monday morning she discovered that it, together with a diamond ring and two gold band rings, one of which was her wedding ring, were missing. The jewel case stood on the dresser in her bedroom. The last time she remembered seeing her jewels was the past Friday morning. Twenty nickels, which also lay on the dresser, were taken but a gold pendant was overlooked. The articles taken were valued at $100. She promptly notified the police who were investigating.
In 1939, F. Trott, assistant executive officer, procurement division, public building branch, treasury department, Washington, had announced the appointment of Carl W. Nordh and Glenn L. Raynor, Jamestown realtors, to appraise the value of two proposed sites for the new $725,000 federal building and post office to be erected in the city. Appraisal would begin immediately of the block bounded by West Third, Lafayette, West Second and Jefferson streets and the westerly portion of the block bounded by Prendergast Avenue, East Second and East Third streets.
The old wheeze about giving this country back to the Indians might happen in part, especially in and around Salamanca. The Seneca Nation of Indians of Allegany Reservation, on which Salamanca was situated, had demanded payment of some $20,000 of back rent for leased land. Some of the debt had been on the books for 30 years. Representative citizens of this town of 10,000 population, at a pow wow of their own, assured the tribesmen that they were in sympathy with the Indians’ efforts to collect their due and were willing to aid in any legal manner.
In 1964, a heavy blanket of ice that covered the area overnight played havoc with electrical and telephone lines and felled trees and limbs. At Warren, Pa., the Allegheny River was reported at flood stage and still rising. The ice, reported to be three quarters of an inch thick in places, snapped primary and service power lines throughout Jamestown, which appeared to be hardest hit, although power lines, trees and limbs were reported down throughout the Chautauqua County area.
The flower shop issue flared anew in the Celoron Village Board session Monday night. Two residents charged that James Buchanan of W. Fifth Street, was taking orders for flowers from his home. One complainant was Richard Hillerby of N. Allegheny Avenue, Buchanan’s brother-in-law. The other complainant was Jerry Hall of Fifth Street. He presented photographs of a sign displayed in Buchanan’s window at his home, which read, “Village Florist.” The board instructed Village Attorney John Barrett to notify Buchanan that he was violating a village ordinance since his home was in a residential area and not a commercial district.
In 1989, major changes in deer management unit boundaries and the number of antlerless deer permits issued were expected to be made by the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation. Terry Moore, regional wildlife manager with the DEC’s Olean office, said the DEC’s deer management goal was to maintain populations at levels compatible with range-carrying capacity and human land use, while affording optimal recreational opportunity. He said the whitetail deer was the state’s most important wildlife resource and the DEC was responsible for protecting and managing it for the benefit of all the state’s residents.
Chautauqua County Executive John A. Glenzer had recommended to legislators in a seven-page memorandum that they authorize him to accept the lowest responsible bid for a new telephone system for county office buildings. If the recommendation was rejected, Glenzer said in the memo, he would not approve any other system unless it was obtained through competitive bidding. The executive’s memo detailed the long history of the county’s efforts to replace the present telephone system.
In Years Past
In 1914, Arthur Edward Beardsley, who had held the center of the stage as the Chautauqua County outlaw for the past three months, was put on trial in supreme court at Mayville on this morning, formally charged by a grand jury indictment with the crime of assault in the first degree. This particular indictment was one of four which had been found against Beardsley and was based upon the allegation that he shot John G.W. Putnam, the overseer of the poor of the town of Chautauqua, when Putnam went to his home in December to take away his children to furnish them places where they could be decently housed and clothed. Beardsley wore a uniform which was said to be the uniform of the Canadian Mounted Police and there was much speculation as to where he secured it.
It was only through pure luck that no one was seriously injured when a Lakewood car sideswiped a Chautauqua Traction car early Saturday afternoon at the Beechwood switch. The two cars collided near the switch at the end of the double tracking, just east of the Beechwood station. Both cars were badly damaged. The cars met with a bump that wrecked the sides of the cars nearest the inside rails and jolted the passengers considerably.
In 1939, upstate dairymen warned of “possible violence” if New York city dealers failed to sign a voluntary milk marketing agreement. The warning was contained in a telegram sent by Homer S. Rolfe, president of the Metropolitan Milk Producers Cooperative Bargaining Agency to Holton V. Noyes, New York state commissioner of agriculture. It said in part: “The agency has not and does not recommend or condone violence. Because some dealers are steadfastly refusing to do what the overwhelming majority have agreed to do, farmers’ patience is wearing thin. If there is violence, it will be because some dealers have gone beyond the limit of farmers’ patience.”
Tree fanciers became a bit disturbed as employees of the Jamestown Parks Department removed two stately elms from either side of the entrance to the Jamestown General Hospital. Their consternation was referred to Krist Hansen, public works department foreman in charge of parks. He reported that the elms were providing “too much” shade in front of the institution, making it almost impossible to develop the flower beds along the front of the building or to grow grass. In place of the two elms, Mr. Hansen announced intentions to plant two 12-foot Colorado blue spruce trees.
In 1964, Crescent Tool Co., Division of Crescent-Niagara Corp., became the first Chautauqua County industry and one of the first in the Southern Tier to receive the Presidential “E” Award for excellence in developing export markets. John S. Stillman, deputy to the secretary for Congressional relations with the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, representing Department of Commerce Secretary Luther H. Hodges, made the presentation to Alaric R. Bailey, president of Crescent Tool Co., at ceremonies this noon in the Hotel Jamestown.
A personal check of Chautauqua Lake on Sunday by Sheriff Charles McCloskey Jr. had satisfied him that a great majority of fishing shack owners had cooperated in removing their structures from the ice. The sheriff said his check showed only two shacks remaining in the Maple Springs area and a like number in the vicinity of Kendall Club on Route 17. The sheriff said he was very satisfied that lake owners were cooperating in removal of fishing houses before lake ice had deteriorated to the point where it was unsafe and shacks could not be removed.
In 1989, many local travelers apparently prepared for the Eastern Airlines machinists’ strike long before the airline did, according to local travel agents. For the past several months, travelers had asked not to be booked on Eastern flights, according to Bonnie Weilacher, an agent at Adventure Travel in Falconer. “A lot of people refused to go on Eastern,” Weilacher said, adding that many had shied away from Eastern since the airline’s employees threatened a strike in 1988. People calling Certified Travel Tours in Jamestown also had been avoiding Eastern for several months, according to Manager Eleanor Ahlstrom.
The future of fire-ravaged Fairbank Farms in Chautauqua County might be determined the following week. The Blockville slaughterhouse and packing plant was destroyed Wednesday by a fire that caused an estimated $15 million damage to the complex. Company President Joe Fairbank was scheduled to go to Minneapolis to meet with officials of the parent firm, Farmhouse Foods. David G. Dawson, the county’s industrial development director, might accompany him.
In Years Past
In 1914, after about 30 years, what many in Crawford County, Pa., had all these years believed to have been a murder, was in a fair way for final solution. John Turner, living at North Girard, in Erie County, was said to have confessed that he killed his wife at their home near Linesvile about 30 years ago. Turner was an old man, aged 84, and all these years, according to the story alleged to have been told to Rev. J. Cook, also of North Girard, he had suffered the remorse of guilt and as the end of his own life drew onward, he was endeavoring to relieve his conscience by confessing to his pastor.
Modern love a la mode, as it might be termed, was charmingly if laughingly shown in the rich, bright comedy “Seven Days,” to be produced by the Bisbee Players at the Samuels Opera House in Jamestown all the following week. This comedy was one of the most successful stage achievements of recent years in New York City. It was written by Mary Roberts Rhinehart and Avery Hopwood. It played for a solid year at the Astor Theater on Broadway and altogether it was a Manhattan attraction for three prosperous seasons. The authors had shown accurately and amusingly how present-day folk treated sentiment, for the play, with its humor and fun, made it the biggest laughing hit of years.
In 1939, J. William Wade, chairman of the special committee of the Retail Merchants’ Association division of the Jamestown Chamber of Commerce, announced the rules for the Window Treasure Hunt, a feature of the Parade of Spring Colors, March 15-18. Twenty merchants were donating prizes of values from $3 to $5. These prizes were to be hidden in 20 windows in the downtown section. Each article would be in a foreign window; for example, a camera might be found in the window of a shoe store. The articles would be numbered and labeled with cards marked “Prize” and they would be in fairly conspicuous locations in each window.
The federation of churches of Rochester and Monroe County were directing a campaign against bingo and other games of chance. Calling bingo “one of the most flagrant examples” of gambling, the federation urged schools, churches and parents to join in checking it. The group denounced the game as a nuisance and a menace. The federation was receiving the backing of District Attorney Daniel J. O’ Mara who said “there is no question that bingo violates the state penal laws” and promised prosecution of persons arrested for running games.
In 1989, the president of Fairbank Farms near Blockville pondered his company’s future this day as he watched its past go up in smoke. Joe Fairbank looked out the window of an undamaged garage on the premises of the smoldering mass that had been the firm’s main building. The slaughterhouse, packing plant, storage area and office complex were burned out by a blaze that erupted about 2:30 a.m. When asked what his plans might be, Fairbank replied, “We?re going to have discussions on that this morning.” Firefighters from 10 Chautauqua County companies braved freezing temperatures as they fought to quench the flames. Fire investigators would be on the scene later to try and determine the cause of the blaze.
Add the manager of Jamestown’s Paragon Cable TV to those not happy about Federal Communications Commission’s decision to readopt the policy of “syndicated exclusivity.” “I hate to see it happen, because it’ll lead to substantial viewer confusion and frustration,” said Rene Wukich, general manager of Paragon Cable. Under the rule, only local television stations that buy the rights to particular programs might air those programs in the local market. If the stations wanted to, they could prevent a local cable company such as Paragon, from showing the program on any out-of-town station.
In Years Past
In 1914, the Avon Club gave an entertainment benefit in Institute Hall on Friday evening in Jamestown. The proceeds would go for the School Park Association and the reputation of the Avon Club members as entertainers, and the good cause for which they were laboring, worked together to draw out an audience which filled the big hall almost to capacity. The program was in four parts and each part deserved a special story in itself. Part three in particular, the burlesque appearance of Madame Tetrazinni, the world-famed impressionist opera prima donna, impersonated by Mrs. John C. Mason, carried the house by storm and a vigorous encore brought the gifted performer again before the curtain.
Former Jamestown Postmaster James T. Larmonth came very near being killed at the Main Street crossing by a westbound Erie passenger train this day. The prompt action of the engineer and the efficiency of the air brake was all that saved him. No closer call had been noted in recent years at this dangerous crossing. It was an incident that shook the nerve of all who witnessed it. A freight train was approaching and the crossing gates were down. Larmonth passed under the gate, stepped across the track ahead of the freight train and directly in front of the approaching passenger train. The engineer was fortunately watching the track closely. He acted promptly and the heavy train came to a stop with a jolt that jarred the passengers. The train hit Larmonth in the back but not hard enough to do any injury.
In 1939, Harold Smith, 19, no address given, who threw a paving brick through the window of a Paquin-Snyder store the previous day because he preferred the comforts of jail to homeless wandering on the streets of Jamestown, was sentenced to spend 60 days in Mayville jail when he pleaded guilty to charges of malicious mischief and vagrancy before Judge Allen E. Bargar in Jamestown city court this day. Smith would have been sent to Monroe County Penitentiary except that his presence would soon be desired in City Court as a witness in bootlegging charges against Robert Allen of Taylor Street, where Smith had recently been staying.
George Ira Alexander, 98-year-old Ashville pioneer, died this morning at the residence of his granddaughter, Ellis Soudan, in that village. He was born Nov. 4, 1840, a son of Mr. and Mrs. Simon Alexander and was the last of their nine children. His parents came to Ashville from Tompkins, N.Y., shortly after the birth of their first child and they built a log house on the site of the property which Alexander owned at the time of his death. Alexander raised oxen on his farm and also prided himself on his fine horses, including several teams which he sold to circus troops, including Buffalo Bill. Alexander was honored by the Ashville Grange at a party in the local hall three years previously at which time nearly 300 residents paid honor to the near centenarian.
In 1964, Jamestown City Council would hear another strong plea Monday night for a Police Department pay raise to stop “dissension in the ranks” because of growing “difficulty in maintaining discipline.” The request would be presented in a letter from Police Chief John Paladino who said copies had been sent to all city councilmen and Mayor Fred H. Dunn. He said inadequate pay and forced part-time “moonlighting” was affecting the morale of officers to the point where they were reluctant to accept normal discipline. The chief said police officers “feel they are being neglected – because councilmen demand so much and give so little.” He was referring to salaries which he said were below average.
Emergency crews of three municipal departments – parks, fire and public utilities – joined forces to prevent the toppling of a 100-foot elm tree which would have snapped high-voltage primary power circuits servings homes and businesses in a large area of northeastern Jamestown. The tree, located in front of a home on E. Fifth St., was discovered tilting at a precarious angle as the result of the loosening of its roots in the wet ground by the previous day’s gale force winds. Roots had given way enough to cause a nearby sidewalk to heave nearly a foot. A task of workers quickly halted the tree’s further descent by anchoring it with steel guy wires. The tree’s estimated age was 75 years. It was beyond saving and would be removed.
In 1989, the chief Assembly sponsor of legislation to put New York’s electric chair back into use after a 26-year hiatus said the nation’s second-largest state would have a new death penalty law by Nov. 1. California, the nation’s largest state, already had an operative death penalty statue. Monday night, after an emotionally charged debate that lasted more than five hours, the Democratic-controlled Assembly approved the bill to restore New York’s death penalty. On the strength of the 97-48 vote, chief Assembly sponsor Vincent Fraber, a Buffalo-area Democrat, predicted his chamber would override a certain veto by Gov. Mario Cuomo for the first time.
Plans to resettle the Love Canal neighborhood in Niagara Falls, would be delayed following the discovery of toxic chemicals in an area previously thought to be free of contamination, state officials said. A workman digging a storm sewer extension in a church parking lot smelled the chemicals the past October and gathered a sample for testing. The past week, after several agencies tested the soil, the state Health Department learned it contained toluene and PCBs, which were highly toxic chemical compounds.
In Years Past
In 1914, Brig. Gen. George Rodney Smith, U.S.A., retired and his wife had returned from a trip abroad and were making an extended visit in Jamestown where they were guests of Smith’s sister, Mrs. M.M. Skiff and family of East Fourth Street. Smith had recently retired from active service having been stationed at Washington. It was somewhat unusual for two army officers of the high rank of brigadier general to be entertained in Jamestown at the same time but this was true. The other distinguished guest was Brig. Gen. Charles J. Bailey, who was the guest of his brothers, B.M. Bailey and William S. Bailey of Jamestown. Bailey was still on the active list.
The prospective caucus of the Progressive Party on this evening and of the Republican Party the following afternoon and the candidacy of Mayor Carlson for the mayoralty nomination in both were occupying the most thoughtful attention of the Progressive leaders of Jamestown. They suspected that the Republican organization was trying to swallow the Progressive Party by taking on their mayor as its own candidate. They did not wish to be swallowed. Late in the forenoon they were proceeding to take definite action in the matter.
In 1939, a nice, warm cell in the jail at police headquarters became such a desirable object in the mind of a 19-year-old youth that he smashed a large plate glass window at the East Third Street store of the Paquin-Snyder Company in Jamestown. Shortly before 1:30 p.m., police received a call from the store saying that a young man had deliberately thrown a paving brick through the large window on the alley side of the store, no more than 100 feet from police headquarters. When police responded, they found Harold Smith awaiting them. He said: “If you’re looking for the man who threw the brick, here I am.” Smith said he had no place to go. He added that he had planned to smash a window to insure his arrest. The particular window had been chosen carefully to “give everyone as little trouble as was necessary.”
With the plans for the new bridge at Niagara Falls nearing completion, the Niagara Falls Bridge Commission announced that the new structure was to be officially named the Rainbow Bridge. The name was both appropriate and significant. Because of the continuing spray and mist that hung gently over the Falls, a rainbow was an old and familiar sight to the thousands of yearly visitors to the Falls. The Rainbow Bridge would replace the old Falls View Bridge or “Honeymoon” Bridge, which collapsed in January of 1938.
In 1964, the task of cleaning up and making repairs in the wake of the previous day’s windstorm and flooding was being continued throughout the entire area. An overnight drop in temperatures checked rising waters in most areas, but a major flood threat still existed in the vicinity of Warren, Pa. The windstorm brought havoc to the entire area, knocking down trees and tearing loose electric wires. Workmen with the Jamestown Department of Public Works were continuing to remove tree limbs from city streets. Winds, estimated at 80 mph, ripped through the city, smashing display windows, ripping out traffic signs and tearing down wiring.
Chautauqua Central School was closed early this day because minor respiratory ailments caused by the absence of seven teachers, 20 percent of the faculty staff. The illness also had caused much absence in the student body, school officials said. The school would open again on Monday. The basketball game with North Collins scheduled for Saturday evening, however, would be played.
In 1989, a plane believed involved in the grisly death of a suspected drug dealer at the Olean Airport had been impounded by police in the central Ontario city of Orillia. The airplane was seized in connection with the continuing investigation into the death of Jorge Luis Paredes, 41, of Toronto, who was found dead on a runway at the Olean airport. It appeared as if the back of his head had been hit by an airplane propeller. A small plane was reportedly seen taking off moments before Paredes was found, police said. Royal Canadian Mounted Police impounded a Grumman Cheetah plane at Orillia’s Lake St. John airport. “There’s a big chunk out of the propeller and there’s blood down the side,” the source said. The plane was under police guard and the owner was under investigation.
Maple syrup producers should be busy stoking their evaporators later in the week if the extended weather forecast held up. Radar Technician Chuck Tingley at the Buffalo office of the National Weather Service said a warming trend was expected to begin in two days and would bring gradually warming temperatures toward the weekend. The temperatures were expected to produce the freezing nights and thawing days that bring heavy flows of sap from sugar maples.
In Years Past
In 1914, Brig. Gen. George Rodney Smith, U.S.A., retired and his wife had returned from a trip abroad and were making an extended visit in Jamestown where they were guests of Smith’s sister, Mrs. M.M. Skiff and family of East Fourth Street. Smith had recently retired from active service having been stationed at Washington. It was somewhat unusual for two army officers of the high rank of brigadier general to be entertained in Jamestown at the same time but this was true. The other distinguished guest was Brig. Gen. Charles J. Bailey, who was the guest of his brothers, B.M. Bailey and William S. Bailey of Jamestown. Bailey was still on the active list.
The prospective caucus of the Progressive Party on this evening and of the Republican Party the following afternoon and the candidacy of Mayor Carlson for the mayoralty nomination in both were occupying the most thoughtful attention of the Progressive leaders of Jamestown. They suspected that the Republican organization was trying to swallow the Progressive Party by taking on their mayor as its own candidate. They did not wish to be swallowed. Late in the forenoon they were proceeding to take definite action in the matter.
In 1939, a nice, warm cell in the jail at police headquarters became such a desirable object in the mind of a 19-year-old youth that he smashed a large plate glass window at the East Third Street store of the Paquin-Snyder Company in Jamestown. Shortly before 1:30 p.m., police received a call from the store saying that a young man had deliberately thrown a paving brick through the large window on the alley side of the store, no more than 100 feet from police headquarters. When police responded, they found Harold Smith awaiting them. He said: “If you’re looking for the man who threw the brick, here I am.” Smith said he had no place to go. He added that he had planned to smash a window to insure his arrest. The particular window had been chosen carefully to “give everyone as little trouble as was necessary.”
With the plans for the new bridge at Niagara Falls nearing completion, the Niagara Falls Bridge Commission announced that the new structure was to be officially named the Rainbow Bridge. The name was both appropriate and significant. Because of the continuing spray and mist that hung gently over the Falls, a rainbow was an old and familiar sight to the thousands of yearly visitors to the Falls. The Rainbow Bridge would replace the old Falls View Bridge or “Honeymoon” Bridge, which collapsed in January of 1938.
In 1964, the task of cleaning up and making repairs in the wake of the previous day’s windstorm and flooding was being continued throughout the entire area. An overnight drop in temperatures checked rising waters in most areas, but a major flood threat still existed in the vicinity of Warren, Pa. The windstorm brought havoc to the entire area, knocking down trees and tearing loose electric wires. Workmen with the Jamestown Department of Public Works were continuing to remove tree limbs from city streets. Winds, estimated at 80 mph, ripped through the city, smashing display windows, ripping out traffic signs and tearing down wiring.
Chautauqua Central School was closed early this day because minor respiratory ailments caused by the absence of seven teachers, 20 percent of the faculty staff. The illness also had caused much absence in the student body, school officials said. The school would open again on Monday. The basketball game with North Collins scheduled for Saturday evening, however, would be played.
In 1989, a plane believed involved in the grisly death of a suspected drug dealer at the Olean Airport had been impounded by police in the central Ontario city of Orillia. The airplane was seized in connection with the continuing investigation into the death of Jorge Luis Paredes, 41, of Toronto, who was found dead on a runway at the Olean airport. It appeared as if the back of his head had been hit by an airplane propeller. A small plane was reportedly seen taking off moments before Paredes was found, police said. Royal Canadian Mounted Police impounded a Grumman Cheetah plane at Orillia’s Lake St. John airport. “There’s a big chunk out of the propeller and there’s blood down the side,” the source said. The plane was under police guard and the owner was under investigation.
Maple syrup producers should be busy stoking their evaporators later in the week if the extended weather forecast held up. Radar Technician Chuck Tingley at the Buffalo office of the National Weather Service said a warming trend was expected to begin in two days and would bring gradually warming temperatures toward the weekend. The temperatures were expected to produce the freezing nights and thawing days that bring heavy flows of sap from sugar maples.
In Years Past
In 1914, Mrs. T.J. Duncan of Olean, received a check the previous day for $10,361.33, as the first installment of a windfall from the estate of her uncle, William Land, a millionaire hotel man of Sacramento, Calif., who died about two years ago and whose estate was just being settled up. Duncan stated to a newspaper representative that with the check came a letter saying that as soon as other parts of the estate were settled and certain properties sold, she would receive a check for between $10,000 and $12,000 more. Duncan had five brothers and sisters living in different parts of the United States who were equally as fortunate.
The Titusville Herald mentioned the fact that Edward Beardsley was to be tried the following Monday for the shooting of Poormaster John G.W. Putnam and in that connection took occasion to speak of the Beardsley children who were taken to Titusville to be cared for by Beardsley’s brothers. It was the understanding that as soon as any demand for aid was made to the poor authorities, the children would be turned over to Chautauqua County, which was chargeable with their support. It was therefore interesting news that no demand had been made on the Titusville authorities. The Herald said: “The Beardsley family of children is still in Titusville and thus far had given the authorities no trouble.”
In 1939, the Jamestown High School affirmative varsity debate team would meet the Niagara Falls negative squad Monday evening in study hall 144 at 7:30 p.m. This would be the first appearance of the Red and Green affirmative team, composed of Richard D. Swanson, Ben Barish and Edward Bradley. The negative team decisively defeated Bradford Wednesday evening by a 3-to-0 judge’s decision. The topic for varsity debate was, resolved, that the United States should enter into an alliance with Great Britain. The Niagara Falls speakers had been the “Waterloo” for the Red and Green speakers during the past few years and the local debaters were intent on a victory.
Oliver French, representative of the National Association of Professional Baseball leagues, said a new six-club class D league for western New York, Pennsylvania and Canada would be formed this year. French said the new loop would be organized the following week with Bradford, Pa.; Hamilton, Ontario; Olean; Jamestown; Batavia; and Niagara Falls, N.Y. in the circuit. Batavia and Jamestown, French said, would probably operate their franchises independent of help from clubs of higher classifications for the present. French said the teams probably would play a 110- to 120-game schedule, starting the forepart of May and finishing on Labor Day. Games would probably be played six days a week.
In 1964, hurricane force winds up to 80 mph hit the Jamestown area on this morning, setting up an emergency situation as tree limbs fell throughout the city and public utility crews struggled to make repairs. Repeated gusts of high winds tore away electric wires, smashed display windows in downtown buildings and ripped signs from their moorings. Telephone switchboards at police headquarters, the department of Public Utilities and Department of Public Works, were jammed with calls starting shortly after 9 a.m. as utility services were cut off for an unestimated number of homes. Immediate details on the effects of the wind storm were difficult to obtain. A wind gauge at City Hall hit peaks of 70 mph several times in mid morning.
A near-sellout of tickets for the Fred Waring Show to be sponsored in Jamestown on March 25 by the Optimist Club, was reported by Marshall Dahlin, ticket chairman. Dahlin announced that only about 50 tickets remained to be sold. Waring’s “Magic of Music” production would be presented at the Jamestown High School Auditorium. Proceeds would be used by the Optimist Club for its boys’ work including a summer camp program. Waring’s concert reflected the know-how of 47 seasons “on the road.” As usual, Waring would defy typing as he was the conductor of popular, jazz, classical and semi-classical music.
In Years Past
- In 1914, bakers and confectioners from many parts of the state of New York were expected to be present in Syracuse the following morning when the industrial board of the state department of labor would give a hearing on the sanitary code for bakeries and confectioneries that the industrial board would shortly adopt. Once the code was adopted it would have the same effect and force as a legislative enactment and because of this the board had received notice that the attendance at the hearing would be large. Radical changes in the conduct of bakeries would have to be made if the tentative draft of the code was to be adopted.
- A well attended pubic meeting of taxpayers was held in Mayville to discuss the proposition of new electric light equipment in the village. George McKeever of Columbus, Ohio, gave some estimates of the expense of equipping a plant for the use of Niagara power, explaining the difference between buying this power of the Chautauqua Traction Company or direct from the Niagara Power Company. It seemed to be the recommendation of all the experts that it would be a better investment for the village to take the Niagara power than to rebuild the present plant. Many of the citizens took issue with this and with other citizens so that at times the discussion was quite animated.
- In 1939, six hundred dairymen of Chautauqua County and adjacent Pennsylvania counties in the dairy district, attending mass meetings at Sherman, voted unanimously to withhold milk supplies from all dealers who had not signed the specified agreement contracts by the afternoon. Producers at this meeting voted to divert fluid milk from the Metropolitan distributors unless uniform contracts agreed upon at meetings throughout the state during the past week were received from dealer distributors. About one half of the milk produced in Chautauqua County was under New York City inspection.
- As a result of a collision between a car driven by Williams Licals of Windsor Street, Jamestown, and a machine operated by Thomas Meneo of Warren, Verna J. Monella, aged 3, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Monella of DuBois, was treated at the Warren General Hospital for a skull injury. The child was a passenger in the Licals car with her mother and the her grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Charles Saldi of Jamestown. The accident occurred while the Licals car was enroute east, following the machine driven by Meneo when the latter stopped to make a left turn into a driveway. The condition of the child was not serious.
- In 1964, it was wonderful. The previous day’s balmy weather had businessmen skipping off to lunch without their overcoats and there was a brisker step to their walk. Mothers brought out their baby carriages for an afternoon stroll in the sunshine. Office girls dashed out for their coffee breaks, bare-armed with that radiant look that spring could bring. School boys doffed their jackets and walked homeward in their shirt sleeves. Convertibles, with their tops down, cruised about the city. It was a long awaited and happy taste of spring as the temperature nudged the 60 degree mark.
- A 69-year-old Jamestown woman who resided in an upstairs apartment at 824 Cherry St., may have saved her life the past night by crawling out on a porch roof when she found she was be coming ill after detecting unfamiliar fumes in her home. Victim of the mishap, Mrs. Blanche Dominey, was admitted to Jamestown General Hospital where attendants reported her condition as satisfactory. Mrs. Dominey’s grandson, Francis Pangborn, aided her in crawling out on the roof. Firemen reported the grandson was removing a motor from a refrigerator when a chemical line burst. An unidentified passerby, who saw Mrs. Dominey lying on the porch roof, summoned the Fire Department.
- In 1989, state police would close down their command center at the Olean Airport, where they had spent the week probing the suspicious death of a Toronto man. Senior Investigator J.T. Stofer said the investigation was centered around the death of Jorge Luis Paredes, 41, whose body was found near a runway shortly before 7 p.m. Monday. Police were focusing on the possibility an airplane propeller struck Paredes in the back of his head, causing his death almost immediately. Police have had little luck in tracking down the plane. Assisted by the Federal Aviation Administration, they were checking all airports and landing fields within a 400-mile radius. They were also contacting any support services which a pilot might have used to make a flight of that nature. The investigation, being treated as a homicide, had led about 15 state police officers into Canada where they were checking Paredes’ apartment and other aspects of his lifestyle. They had identified his occupation as an importer-exporter.
-Any day a pile of about 5 million discarded tires near Sinclairville off Route 60 could turn into a mountain of fire, filling ponds with hot oil and the sky with black smoke for months, fire officials said. But fire and government agencies in Chautauqua County said they were ready and residents near the site had nothing to fear. Concerns about the dump had escalated since a pile of about 1 1/2 million tires in the Catskills caught fire the past Saturday. Billowing black smoke from the fire temporarily closed nearby schools and businesses and forced the overnight evacuation of about 200 families.
In Years Past
In 1914, fire shortly after two in the afternoon destroyed the seven room frame dwelling house on Forest Avenue Extension owned and occupied by Alfred Anderson. It broke out in large volume and the house burned very rapidly. The auto chemical made a hurried trip to the scene of the blaze but was too late even after their fast run to do much good. The house was located nearly two blocks south of the Jamestown city line on the Busti Road. It was built about two years previously. The loss was a very heavy one to Mr. and Mrs. Anderson, although it was understood to be partially covered by insurance. The house and contents was valued at about $3,000.
Those who were at the Erie passenger station in Jamestown on Monday when the trains from New York arrived were treated to what old railroad men said was the greatest sight in the way of ice-encrusted trains they had ever seen. Train 3 was the first to wheel in from the frozen east and it was a spectacle. The train, to use the expression of an old Erie man, looked as though it had been dipped into a river about a dozen times and kept out just long enough for a good freeze each time until it was covered with ice. Every car of the train was encrusted with ice to a thickness of several inches.
In 1939, Howard Carter, who with Lord Carnarvon, was the first man in 32 centuries to cast eyes on the burial chamber of Boy King Tutankhamen, was dead. The past night, 16 years after the tomb of the Egyptian Pharaoh was opened in disregard of an ancient curse, “Death shall come on swift wings to him that toucheth the tomb of a Pharaoh,” the Egyptologist died. He had been ill for some time and it was understood that heart disease caused his death. He was 66 years old. Carter scoffed at the curse which was recalled when Lord Carnarvon, who financed the Tutankhamen expedition, died six weeks after the crypt was opened. A mosquito bite caused his death.
Charles Oscar Swanson, 73, of Falconer Street, died at Jamestown General Hospital the past night, the first victim of a fatal automobile accident in the Jamestown area this year. Death came to Mr. Swanson about an hour and a half after he had been struck on the Lakewood Road, near Beechwood, by a car driven by Tracy M. Herrick of Frewsburg. Coroner Samuel T. Bowers, who assisted Chief of Police Max Ehmke of Lakewood in probing the tragedy, said no verdict would be issued until his investigation was complete. Mr. Herrick was not held. Mr. Swanson had been visiting his son, who lived in the area and was believed to be crossing the road to wait for a bus that would have returned him to his Jamestown home, when the accident occurred.
In 1964, a 13-month battle to recover from burns was lost by Mrs. Marguerite L. (Peg) Hitchcock, 24, when she died March 2, in the WCA Hospital. She was severely burned while attempting to save her four young children during a house fire in the early morning hours of Jan. 29, 1963. The fire leveled their two-story frame home in Ellington in 22 below zero temperature. Three youngsters perished in the fire. The victims were: James Hitchcock, 2; his brother, Albert Hitchcock, 3 and their sister Cindy Lou Hitchcock, 4. The other child, Michael Drew Hitchcock, who was then 8 months old, suffered a slight burn on the bottom of his left foot. While Mrs. Hitchcock was at the hospital another daughter, Janette Rochelle Hitchcock, was born June 27, 1963.
A complaint that an inadequate amount of dirt was being used to cover garbage and refuse at the City Dump under the new sanitary landfill system inaugurated the past year, was registered with City Council’s Highway Committee by Richard Vance, Jamestown sanitarium. In a message to the committee, Mr. Vance reported that an area approximately three-quarters of an acre in size where garbage had been deposited at the dump in Fluvanna Avenue was not properly covered. Mr. Vance suggested that the condition should be corrected “before warm weather sets in.”
In 1989, state police anticipated the homicide investigation involving the death of a Canadian man who was hit by an airplane propeller would not go quickly. They were probing the details which led to the death of Jorge Luis Paredes, 41, of Toronto. His body was found Monday evening along a runway at the Olean Municipal Airport. The airport was in a remote area of Cattaraugus County north of the city of Olean off Route 16. While the facility was manned during the day, no one was on duty after 5 p.m. but small planes often flew in and out unassisted. An autopsy performed at the Erie County Medical Center showed he died of a skull fracture which could have been caused by striking an airplane propeller.
Firefighters battled a roaring blaze at the home of Gayle Mescall on Randolph Road, North Harmony, at about 11 a.m. the previous day. Chautauqua County Fire Investigators said that an overheated furnace blower motor caused the blaze that gutted the building. Mrs. Mescall, who rented the house, said her 17-year-old son was the only person there at the time of the fire and he was unhurt. However, Panama Fire Department firefighter Dawn Sheller was treated for smoke inhalation at WCA and released. About 50 firefighters from Chautauqua County, Lakewood and Ashville battled the blaze for about three hours.
In Years Past
In 1914, Arthur Edward Beardsley, the famous Chautauqua County outlaw, who a few weeks ago had the attention of the entire country by reason of his successful defiance of the law power of Chautauqua County, was briefly in the limelight this day. Four indictments had been returned against him, two for assault first degree, one for burglary and larceny and one for receiving stolen property. He was arraigned on this afternoon before Supreme Court Justice Bissell at Mayville on one of these indictments – the first and presumably the strongest – the shooting of Overseer of the Poor John G.W. Putnam. To this indictment, Beardsley’s attorney, C. Frank Chapman, pleaded not guilty. It followed, therefore, that Chapman believed that he had a defense and the only defense he had to offer was the one outlined by Beardsley himself in his exclusive interview with The Journal a long time ago, that a man’s home was his castle and he had a right to defend it.
The whereabouts of Mrs. Margaret Tompsett, wife of George Tompsett, who left her home in Sinclairville about two weeks ago and disappeared, had been learned. Mrs. Tompsett was located in Pittsburgh at a rooming house and placed under arrest there. It was learned that she was found in company with a man who gave his name as Carl Hallitz, who was believed to be a man with whom she had been friendly in Sinclairville. It was suspected that she eloped with this man after leaving her husband’s home in this village. After leaving her home, Mrs. Tompsett, it was alleged by her husband, went to some of the local stores and bought a large amount of clothing, etc., which she charged to him. Mrs. Tompsett also sold a family cow to get money to get away with, it was stated.
In 1939, “It all seems like a bad dream,” commented Clyde Randall as he walked through his home at Greenhurst on this morning after fire had done an estimated $15,000 damage. Randall had spent many hours repairing and redecorating his home during the past several years, planning to start work shortly on another upstairs room. At a point on his tour of the ruined home he commented, “And I thought this could never happen to me.” Fire ruined the tourist home and destroyed the contents when flames broke out around the furnace about 8 in the morning and spread throughout the structure. Fluvanna firemen brought the fire under control.
Genuine factory-made parts for Indian motorcycles would be found at Marion L. Keith’s sales and service in Sherman, which was an important thing for owners of Indian machines to remember. Keith was the distributor of Indian motorcycles in Chautauqua County, selling used machines as well as new ones. His place of business was open evenings and on Sundays for the convenience of motorcycle riders. In addition to selling machines on terms, this dealer would take used ones in trade. Many persons had found that a motorcycle provided the most economical means of transportation, being speedy and easy to operate.
In 1964, Jamestown’s entire detective force was searching for bold burglars who apparently stole a Department of Public Works truck Saturday night to cart away a 400-pound safe containing $195. The safe was taken from the S.M. Flickinger warehouse at 16 Holmes Street, and the truck was stolen from a rear parking lot at the DPW garage on Steele Street. Both had been recovered. Detectives were attempting to unravel a web of circumstances starting with the theft of a marked DPW truck. The same thieves also might have been involved in another burglary near Flickinger’s which was reported Sunday morning. Three large display boards containing $236.81 worth of hand tools were taken some time during the weekend from Jamestown Industrial Supply Inc. on Holmes Street.
Federal aviation officials were looking into a Mohawk Airlines report that a plane carrying 44 persons crashed on landing at Broome County Airport at Binghamton because the pilot pushed the wrong lever and retracted the landing gear. No injuries were reported in the crash Saturday night. The plane skidded 2,000 feet before the crash. The passengers and crew of three escaped from the badly damaged plane through emergency exits.
In 1989, New York Gov. Mario Cuomo and Vermont Gov. Madeline Kunin talked business Wednesday in Manhattan, where Cuomo addressed a conference on the subject of global warming. Cuomo, Mrs. Kunin and New Jersey Gov. Thomas Keane organized the four-day conference in conjunction with Cornell University and the National Governors Association.
Budget cuts to the National Weather Service would not affect service in the Buffalo Regional office, according to Deputy Station Chief Thomas Dunham. Budget cuts had forced the National Weather Service to eliminate a forecasting unit in Kansas City. The service to be cut was used by news media to get public information. Dunham said he had heard no talk of budget cuts and was, in fact, preparing to update the radar system to be used by the Buffalo office. He said the Buffalo office would be part of an upgrade for the National Weather Service. The upgrade program was called NEXRAD and would bring the newest Doplar radar to Buffalo. “It’s the next generation of radar. We’re scheduled to get it and it probably would be an improvement (in service),” Dunham said. He added the system would also give more severe-weather watching responsibilities to the Buffalo office.
In Years Past
In 1914, a good-sized audience assembled in mass meeting Friday evening in the Jamestown City Hall to listen to able speakers on the subject of Women’s Suffrage. The hall was attractively decorated with the national colors, that blended beautifully with the purple, white and green banners of the Women’s Political Union, the organization under whose auspices the speakers appeared. Lucia T. Henderson presided and in her introductory remarks reviewed something of the history of the equal franchise movement in Jamestown. It was in 1885 that a little band of earnest women founded the first club for the cause in this city and shortly afterwards a full county organization was effected. There were enthusiastic meetings at the local opera house as well as the great amphitheater at Chautauqua.
A crowd of between 700 and 800 fight fans witnessed the program of boxing bouts staged at the smoker held under the auspices of the Jamestown Athletic Club in its gymnasium on East Second Street Friday evening. With the exception of one, all the bouts were exceptionally good and the affair was a complete success. The main attraction was a six-round go between Clarence Carling of Jamestown and Joe Hogan of Buffalo. This was a top notcher from start to finish. Hogan was an old-timer at the game with years of experience against some of the best preliminary men in the country and for this reason and this alone he was able to win over the local lad.
In 1939, following a February that brought a record snowfall of 27.8 inches for the month, March entered upon the scene like a lion, bringing cloudy and colder weather with additional precipitation predicted, checking possible flood conditions in the Stillwater section. The past month’s snowfall broke a previous mark of 24.3 inches set in February of 1937. The 16-year report being compiled by Gilbert C. Olson, in charge of the local weather station, showed that the 35.5 inches of snowfall in January was the second largest ever recorded for that month in the area. Other interesting figures obtained from the report showed that there were only three months out of the 12 in which snow had never fallen in Jamestown.
A fight to abolish New York state’s 18-year-old movie censorship board was opened by metropolitan film exhibitors. Director of the drive was Harry Brandt, president of the Independent Theater Owners, who called an emergency meeting of 400 city theater owners. His action followed the censorship board’s recent temporary ban against the Warner Brothers production, “Yes, My Darling Daughter.” A cut version of the film had since been approved by the state board of regents. Brandt said the theater owners would campaign to abolish “all bluenose organizations which make their livelihood out of what the other man shall see.”
In 1989, police had identified a man found dead Monday at the Olean Municipal Airport as Jorge Lewis Paredes, 41, of Toronto. Paredes died of a skull fracture. Police said the fatal injury was believed to be the result of a massive cut near the skull, the type of injury consistent with being struck by an airplane propeller. The man’s body was found near a runway at the Olean airport, off Route 16 in the town of Ischua. Investigators said they found the man’s body and signs that an airplane had recently taken off from the airport. Police also said they found blood in a nearby phone booth. They were treating the case as an apparent homicide until they could determine the identity of the owner and pilot of the plane.
He rolled into Persell children’s lives blaring Bon Jovi and bringing a message about self-esteem, love and the million dollar machine. His name was Punchy the robot. He stood about 4 feet tall, had a mop for hair, scopes for eyes, pink and blue metal for skin and an orange nose. He also had a way with children. “I thought he was pretty neat,” said one of the students, Jerry, as he exited after Punchy’s show to fifth and sixth-graders at Jamestown’s Persell School. Asked whether he thought the show was worth it, Shawn said, “Oh, definitely.” The million dollar machine was the human body. Punchy was at the school to encourage students to take care of their bodies and to say no to drugs.
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