HOMETOWN HISTORY, May 16, 2014

125 Years Ago
The postponed games of the Oneonta baseball club will surely be played next week Thursday and Saturday afternoons. The Cooperstown and Oneonta game will be the first one and Abbott will be in the box for the home team. The Saturday game between the Afton and Oneonta clubs will undoubtedly be the best game of baseball ever witnessed on the home grounds. On this day, the Oneonta team will be made up as follows: Wilson, lf; Giles 2nd; Holmes c.; Cox, 3rd; Bowen, ss; Rogers, cf; Abbott, rf; Scully, 1b; Tobin, p. Each game will be called promptly at 3:30 o’clock p.m. Admission 25cents; ladies free. Grand stand 10 cents extra to all. Ed. note: Ball players on this team were paid to play.
H.P. Cheatham, the only Negro member of Congress, is a light mulatto, 32 years of age. He graduated at Shaw University, Raleigh, North Carolina and became a school teacher. He was afterward made register of deeds, and was about to take out his license to practice law when he was elected to Congress. Mr. Cheatham is said to be a ready speaker and to have the better interests of his race at heart.
May 1889

100 Years Ago
The Onahrenta Camp Fire Girls took their first tramp on Friday, meeting at the home of Mrs. Weaton and hiking to the Rocks, where the first council fire was lighted by Mrs. Georgia Weaton, the guardian of the order. Here, eight members received the Wo-he-lo degree, and around the fire were read the Indian legends of the spring blossoms. Then supper was cooked in true Indian fashion and was enjoyed as only a meal cooked in the open and eaten after a good tramp can be enjoyed. The pine tree symbol of the organization was dedicated to the Onahrenta which was, and the Oneonta, which is to be, progressive, prosperous and patriotic.
May 1914

80 Years Ago
The Oneonta Little Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of Stuart Pratt, made its debut before an audience of approximately 350 persons in the Oneonta High School auditorium last night. The audience was composed of members of the faculties and student bodies of Hartwick College, the Normal School and the high school. The affair was sponsored by the Student Association of Hartwick College. “Fingal’s Cave Overture” by Mendelssohn was the opening number. Also on the program was “Symphony in B Minor” by Schubert, the unfinished symphony. A medley of dances from “Henry VIII” by Edward German struck a lighter vein. The orchestra reached its peak with the ever-popular “Blue Danube Waltz by Strauss. This was the only appearance that the orchestra will make this year. Numerous concerts have been planned for the next year and the orchestra will start rehearsals early in the fall, Mr. Pratt said.
May 1934

60 Years Ago
Heart disease is now the prime agent of death in Otsego County according to the annual report of the county’s Tuberculosis & Public Health Association. “While we are winning the fight against TB” the report states, “we are losing it against heart disease, which is now the number one killer, taking 402 lives in Otsego County in 1952. The report shows the success of anti-tuberculosis programs, such as mass chest X-rays. Of the 10,127 X-rays taken in the county last year, TB was found in 61, lung cancer in 47, heart disease in 320, and there were 392 other conditions for a sum total of 820 ailments. Only 96 ailments were discovered from 5,700 pictures taken during the Oneonta Community Survey. No cases of tuberculosis were discovered during the Oneonta STC survey and only one case of lung cancer and heart disease. Although it was once the number one killer in America, tuberculosis has dropped from first to sixth in cause of death ranks. Still 400,000 Americans have the disease and it costs 350,000 a year.
May 1954
40 Years Ago
Rape victims will now have access to a counseling service in the City of Oneonta which would provide post-assault information on medical and psychological care. Public Safety Board members discussed the idea at a meeting Monday night. Last night the Common Council implemented the program and set up a fund to pay counselors. Safety Board members and Police Chief Joseph DeSalvatore agreed that such a service would be invaluable. The availability of women counselors, trained in psychology, would ease the anguish for rape victims who are reluctant to relate the details of their assaults to policemen. The knowledge that they would not have to undergo a police interrogation might encourage victims to report rapes and later to prosecute. A rape hotline is currently being formed at SUCO. Statistics quoted by board member Margaret Hathaway claim that only between 10 and 25 percent of rapes are ever reported to police.
May 1974

30 Years Ago
After 37 years of helping local boys stay physically fit and teaching them to “play fair and square,” Carl Delberta has been selected as the Hartwick College Outstanding Citizen of the Year. Delberta, a retired professional boxer, founded the Oneonta Boys Club in 1947 and continues to run the club from his ringside seat overlooking the River Street gymnasium named after him in 1981. Philip Wilder, Hartwick College president, said, “Carl is an example of the kind of leadership available to the young people of Oneonta. He has been unselfish in his commitment to the Boys Club for 37 years, while helping his wife raise a family, serving the city as a police officer, and using his boxing talents to help others represent our nation.” Prior to military service in WW II, Delberta was a leading welterweight contender.
May 1984

10 Years Ago
State University College at Oneonta faculty members Patrick Meanor of the English Department and Emily Phillips of the educational psychology department have been selected as co-winners of the college’s 2004 Outstanding Advisor Award. The honor recognizes SUCO faculty who provide exceptional academic advisement and mentoring services to students. Meanor’s advisees are largely undergraduate English majors. Phillips works primarily with graduate students in the college’s school counseling program.
May 2004