HOMETOWN HISTORY

Dec. 6, 2019

150 YEARS AGO

Miscellaneous: There are to be ten executions for murder in the United States during December.
The very latest style of boot has the toe turned up like an old-fashioned skate.
The gay young people of Henderson, Kentucky eat peanuts in church.
“Bugmaster General” is the popular name for the state entomologist in Illinois.
Mr. Fiske, of the Galveston Bulletin, has been shot at 23 times in three years.
“Ned” a modest young man in Buffalo, has been courting 14 young ladies at once, and has got himself into trouble in consequence.
Nineteen miles of sewers have been built this year at Chicago. The total length of sewers is now 130 miles.
A Hartford man, thinking he smelt gas in his rooms, lighted a match to see about it. He was found in the street immediately afterwards, all ablaze. A policeman kindly rolled him in the gutter and put him out.

December 1869

125 YEARS AGO

The Hudson River and New York Central railroads have been consolidated under the new name of the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company. The roads have for some time been practically one concern with Vanderbilt and his friends controlling a majority of the stock in both. The change will have no effect either on their business or arrangements. That the ultimate result of the amalgamation will, however, be damaging to the public there can be little doubt. It virtually throws the power of those vast corporations into fewer hands, thus enabling them to use with better effect their lobbying influences, in procuring special legislation.

December 1894

100 YEARS AGO

Local: W.H. Koch, D. & H. Road Master left last evening accompanied by his daughter Dorothea, for Carbondale, Pennsylvania, where the latter will have the pleasure of attending the concert given by Fritz Kreisler, the distinguished violinist in the Town Hall at Scranton. Miss Dorothea is a violinist of unusual talent for a child of her years.
James Young, a small boy residing at 26 London Avenue, Oneonta, was struck by the River Street bus while playing last evening near the corner of Main and River Streets. As a result of the accident he is confined to his home suffering from a broken leg. It appears that the lad was playing with some other children on the corner and without looking dashed into the street and hit the side of the bus, falling down as the rear wheel passed over his leg. The boy was taken to his home and was attended by Dr. Brinkman, who found the right thigh bone had been broken and the left leg bruised. His condition is not considered serious.

December 1919

80 YEARS AGO

A new Super Market opens today at 37-39 Broad Street. Market Basket Corporation of Geneva, New York has added Oneonta to its group of more than 250 stores, largely located in New York State. The company recently took an extended lease on the former Broad Street garage, owned by J.A. Dewar. Extensive alterations and renovations have been made. The front of the first floor has been transformed into an attractive store, with a green and white color scheme, with storage space for surplus stock at the rear.
Arrangements have been made with Mettress Crandall for parking for an hour at the rear of the Twentieth Century Restaurant for customers of the market. The market is of the self-service type with groceries and packaged goods conveniently displayed with prices so shoppers may buy in a
hurry or select at their leisure as they wish. Four exits, each equipped with a calculating
register have been provided for service without delay.

December 1939

40 YEARS AGO

Oneonta High School graduate Mark May has been named as an “Honorable Mention” on the Associated Press All-America football team. May, a 6’5”, 280-pound junior at Pitt, was one of the honorable mention offensive tackles. He is the man the University of Pittsburgh’s offensive line was built around this season as he anchored the right side. May got his first start in the Gator Bowl in 1977 as a freshman and has been a mainstay ever since. He is also the biggest lineman in the history of Pitt football. “He has played extremely well for us and I would be very disappointed if he doesn’t develop into one of the best, if not the best offensive lineman in the country by the time he’s a senior,” Pitt Coach Jackie Sherrill said recently in evaluating May.

December 1979

20 YEARS AGO

Hillary Rodham Clinton attacked New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s policy of arresting people who sleep on the street and pledged, if elected, to secure federal funding for affordable housing and mental-illness treatment.
“Criminalizing the homeless with mass arrests for those whose only offense is that they have no home is wrong. Locking people up for a day will not take a single homeless person off the street. It will not make a mentally ill person who should be in an institution any better. It will not find a job for a responsible person who is willing to work.” Clinton’s audience of 85 black ministers interrupted her talk repeatedly with strong applause. Giuliani, who was in Houston Texas, defended the policy.
“We do more for homelessness than the city has ever done before. The only people who get arrested are wanted for crimes, or have committed a crime.”

December 1999

10 YEARS AGO

New York lawmakers rejected a bill Wednesday that would have made their state the sixth to allow gay marriage, stunning advocates who weathered a similar decision by Maine voters just last month. The New York measure needed 32 votes to pass and failed by a wider-than-expected margin, falling eight votes short in a 24-38 decision by the state Senate. The Assembly had earlier approved the bill, and Governor
Patterson, perhaps the bill’s strongest advocate, had pledged to sign it. After the vote, Paterson called Wednesday one of his saddest days in 20 years of public service. He criticized senators who he said support gay marriage but “didn’t have the intestinal fortitude to vote for it.” During debate, Senator
Ruben Diaz, a conservative Republican from the Bronx led the opposition.

December 2009