BOUND VOLUMES

April 15, 2021

Compiled by Tom Heitz/SHARON STUART, with resources
courtesy of The Fenimore Art Museum Research Library

210 YEARS AGO

Members of the Commission reporting on the feasibility of constructing a canal, or system of navigation, from the Hudson River and Schenectady to Lake Ontario and Lake Erie are identified as Gouverneuer Morris, Stephen Van Rensselaer, William North, De Witt Clinton, Thomas Eddy, Peter B. Porter, and Simeon Dewitt.

April 13, 1811

185 Years Ago

Editorial Convention – Our brother Chip of the Lockport Balance, who originated the proposition, and who seems to have it under his special charge by general consent of the fraternity, has fixed upon the 10th of May, for holding the Convention at Albany. We should have preferred the 10th of June at Utica, but shall interpose no objections, believing that if good faith shall be practiced among the brotherhood, a much depressed interest may be benefitted by the measure, and character given to a profession which ought to take rank with the most elevated pursuits of men. Health permitting, we shall give our personal attendance at the time and place designated, and hope on the occasion to meet a representative from every newspaper office in the State, to consider the condition of the Press, and adopt measures to elevate its character for usefulness; at the same time that a proper regard shall be had to the rewards of a profession, the duties of which are physically and mentally as arduous as those of any other.

April 18, 1836

160 Years Ago

Proclamation of the President, Washington, April 14 – Whereas, the laws of the United States have been for some time past and now are opposed, and the execution thereof obstructed in the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings or the powers vested in the Marshals by law; now therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, in virtue of the power in me vested by the constitution and law, have thought to call forth, and hereby do call forth, the Militia of the several States of the Union, to the aggregate number of 75,000 in order to suppress combinations and to cause the laws to be duly executed.

April 19, 1861

135 Years Ago

Personal – There is a strong demand that a stop shall be put to the desecration of the Sabbath by parties who gather near the southern borders of the village for ball playing. It is about time for the Village Trustees to put a policeman on duty there.
Gambling – The result of gambling, especially to outsiders, is the same everywhere—ruin. Its effects for evil are so fully recognized, that laws have been passed for its suppression. These laws do not deter professional gamblers from secretly pursuing their vocation. For a year or more past, it has been the practice of a class of young men of this village to meet for the purpose of gambling. No matter how small the stakes, the danger and the demoralization are none the less. Late hours, unhealthy excitement, more or less drinking, are attendant evils – all combining to unsettle, and if persisted in, to ruin most of the participants.

April 17, 1886

110 Years Ago

No play of recent times has achieved the fame of “The Thief,” that stirring drama of love and jealousy, of a wife’s caprice and a husband’s condemnation which comes to the Village Hall for one night on Friday, April 21. A married woman, on a small income, endeavors to dress on a par with the leaders of society, for the one purpose of holding the love of her husband, who often expresses his admiration of the appearance of her more wealthy friends.
She does so by stealing a large sum of money and is found out. Her confession to her husband and his criticism of her sin comprises a scene the like of which has never before been presented in
the theatre. “The Thief” created a furor in Paris.

April 12, 1911

60 YEARS AGO

Where Nature Smiles: Dr. and Mrs. L.A. Curtis and family returned Tuesday from a week at Cumberland, Wisconsin, having visited relatives and attending a two-day post-graduate review for the Foundation for the Advancement of Chiropractic Research at the Toftness Chiropractic Clinic. Miss Dorothy Barck, librarian of the New York State Historical Association, will leave on Saturday for a motor trip to Ohio and Indiana. She will visit Spring Mill State Park in Indiana and then take a two-week trip aboard the Delta Queen stern-wheeler down the Ohio River and up the Tennessee River to Chattanooga.

April 12, 1961

35 YEARS AGO

Bill Sharick, a senior wildlife biologist with the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) says he isn’t sure why the 15-foot-high beaver dam broke last week. However, he did notice that there wasn’t an abundance of beaver food where the pond used to be. And, when he checked the 8-10-acre pond site off Johnston Road last Tuesday, a day after the dam broke – the beavers hadn’t started to rebuild, leading Sharick to believe “they aren’t coming back.” When the dam broke, it unleashed a roaring wall of water that wiped out a section of the West Lake Road along with a bridge on a road connecting Cooperstown and Springfield Center and a portion of Glimmerglen Road.

April 16, 1986

20 YEARS AGO

Charles Christman, commissioner of the Otsego County Department of Social Services, was honored as the 2001 recipient of the Robert S. Sioussat Appreciation Award by the LEAF Council on Alcoholism and Addictions on Friday, April 6 at a day-long workshop at the Holiday Inn. The Sioussat Award is bestowed on individuals whose contributions and service in the field of alcoholism and substance abuse prevention echoes the work of Dr. Robert S. Sioussat, a founder of the LEAF Council. Christman has been the driving force behind such programs as Building Healthy Families, Leatherstocking’s Promise and the Otsego County Drug Treatment Court.

April 13, 2001