BOUND VOLUMES
May 13, 2020
200 YEARS AGO
It is said that the death of Tamaahmaah, King of the Sandwich Islands, has caused so much dissension among his successors and officers, as to threaten a revolution and civil war. The old King left upwards of $150,000 dollars in specie. The death of this venerable Indian Prince at the present time, is a cause of serious regret among the friends of Christianity in this community. He was very favorably disposed towards the propagation of Christianity among his subjects and their consequent civilization; and last fall, it will be recollected, an interesting Mission family, from New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts, sailed from Boston for Owyhee, accompanied by several natives who have been educated at the Cornwall School, in Connecticut. (Ed. Note: Among the missionary party was Betsey Stockton,
then a young woman of African and Caucasian descent. Although Betsey was the daughter of a slave mother who belonged to the Stocktons, she was raised within the family and considered to be a Stockton. Betsey’s father has never been identified. Betsey received an extraordinary education within the Stockton family whose library was among the largest private collection in early America. In 1826-1827, having returned from the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), Betsey resided in Cooperstown as a teacher with a Stockton-related family.)
May 15, 1820
175 YEARS AGO
Affairs at Washington seem steady-handed and without
excitement. The new reign appears to inspire general confidence throughout the country, nothing doubting that every relation of the great Republic will be looked to with care and molded for the honor and prosperity of the whole Union. The aspect of things in Texas there among the people, is clearly favorable to annexation, and it is believed that no foreign influence will be effective in controlling the action of the Texan Congress at its June meeting.
May 12, 1845
150 YEARS AGO
Local – We took a trip around the lake last week in the little steamer “Mary Boden,” on the invitation of the
“Commodore.” This is no “half-fledged bantling” but a fully developed steamboat. Small it may be in size, but complete in its appointments with engine and boiler, pilot house, cabin and locker (not Davy Jones’s), all in the regular way. The boat, with a party of about 20, including a delegation from the Cooperstown Band, left the anchorage at about half past eleven on Thursday last. After running a few times back and forth in front of the village, we made the tour of the lake, returning to the moorings a little after two o’clock. Thus was successfully inaugurated the first steamboat on Otsego Lake.
May 10, 1870
125 YEARS AGO
Constance Fenimore Woolson’s Grave – In the English Protestant Cemetery and but a few feet distant from the tombstone of the poet Shelley, lies a marble slab over the grave of the well-known authoress. The inscription on the stone is: “Constance Fenimore Woolson 1894.” No laudatory epitaph of high-sounding words is required, for her writings and a beautiful life have reared for her a most fitting monument, which will outlast bronze and marble, which are perishable.” It was the hope and expectation of Miss Woolson to spend the closing years of her life in Cooperstown.
May 16, 1895
100 YEARS AGO
F. William Gruby was released from the county jail on Friday night after a son paid the alternative fine of $25. Gruby was adjudged in contempt of court by Justice of the Peace Vanderwerker and was given the choice of paying a $25 fine or being a guest of Sheriff B.F. Van Zandt for a month. Gruby was hailed before the Justice for his failure to provide recompense to various families to whom his children had been farmed out by Miss Hazel Foster, Otsego County Agent for The Prevention of Cruelty to Children.
May 19, 1920
75 YEARS AGO
EM 3c Stuart O. Howe, age 19, whose wife Ruth Howe, lives in Portlandville, helped take a new yet unidentified cruiser into battle for the first time against the Japanese according to a delayed dispatch from the Pacific. Her guns sent two Japanese bombers crashing into the sea not far from Japan. The Captain of the newly baptized cruiser spoke from his station on the bridge to the men at their battle stations. The planes of returning U.S. airmen speckled the sky as they maneuvered for landings. The Captain’s words were proud: “Objective realized….losses of task aircraft light….damage to the enemy severe.”
May 16, 1945
50 YEARS AGO
Thomas Troeger of Cooperstown, a senior at the Colgate-Rochester Divinity School, has been called as assistant minister of the New Hartford Presbyterian Church. Mr. Troeger, a graduate of Cooperstown Central School and Yale University, will graduate from Colgate-Rochester later this month. He has worked as student assistant during his seminary career at several churches in the Rochester area. He is married to the former Merle M. Butler of Whitesboro. The Rev. Richard Manzelmann has announced that
ordination ceremonies are scheduled for June 14 at the New Hartford church.
May 13, 1970
10 YEARS AGO
A door to a window on 19th century Cooperstown history opened the other day for Roverta Russaw of Morristown, Tennessee, great, great, granddaughter of Joseph Thomas “Joe Tom” Husbands. According to Village Historian Hugh MacDougall, Joe Tom “was a well-liked and somewhat nostalgically remembered character.” Joe Tom was born into slavery in 1808, the property of Joseph Dottin Husbands, the British Colonial Secretary in Bridgetown, Barbados. He was brought to Hartwick from New Jersey in 1815. For 60 years he served his Cooperstown and area neighbors as a handyman, gardener, cook, boatman, fisherman, hunter, tour guide, story teller, musician and entertainer. He was also the Christ Church sexton. His descendant, Roverta Russaw was shown around the village by Hugh and Eleanor MacDougall.
May 13, 2010