Bound Volumes, Hometown History

December 26, 2024

90 YEARS AGO

The Post Office yesterday delivered some 500 gift packages to Oneontans, who, but for a recent order of Postmaster General James A. Farley, otherwise would have had to wait until today for their presents from relatives or friends. Delivery of packages on Christmas day is a new idea with the Post Office department according to Oneonta Postmaster Chester A. Miller. Letters and parcels were also dispatched on Sunday in an effort to expedite the handling of the volume of mail which otherwise might not have been delivered before Christmas. Postmaster Miller stated that a few hundred cards remain to be delivered. A force of 21 otherwise unemployed men augmented the regular employees in handling the mail this year.

December 1934

70 YEARS AGO

George E. Judd, a graduate of Oneonta Normal School, has retired as manager of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Judd has bought a farm near Cannonsville and will return to his alma mater on February 6, when the Boston Pops Orchestra plays at the Oneonta State Teacher’s College under the direction of his friend Arthur Fiedler. Mr. Judd will sit in the auditorium where he once sat as a student, and listen to an orchestra that he helped create during his nearly forty years of association with its parent orchestra, the Boston Symphony. Mr. Judd was born in Stamford, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Tunis Judd. He has numerous relatives in this area. A nephew, Judd C. Archer, lives at 30 Ceperley Avenue. Another nephew, Howard Archer, Jr., has a store in West Oneonta. His sister, Mrs. Howard Archer, Sr., resides in Walton. Another sister, Mrs. Clifford Shackelton, lives at Cannonsville. As a student here, Mr. Judd resided at 48 Maple Street. He graduated from the Normal School in 1906 and took his B.A. at Harvard in 1911. He was first employed in Boston by the Henry Lee Higginson investment house. Mr. Higginson, the founder of the Boston Symphony Orchestra transferred Mr. Judd to the orchestra’s business office in 1915.

December 1954

50 YEARS AGO

Oneonta’s environmental board has submitted a 66-page report on “open-spaces” in the city. The report recommends that six areas in the city be preserved in their “present state.” The six areas are Big Island; portions of Morgan Heights and Table Rock Area, off Chestnut and West Streets (encompassing portions in the Town of Oneonta); the D&H swamps at the foot of West Street and west of Cliff Street; the Fair Street property, a small parcel of land north of Fair Street, east of Grand Street, and west of Oneonta Creek; the Silver Creek area, from north Ravine Parkway along West Street into the city; the Swart-Wilcox property in the Sixth Ward, site of the oldest house in the city, built in 1807. The report suggests that the area around Swart-Wilcox be used for the “Gardens for All” program.

December 1974

20 YEARS AGO

At a time when community need for donated food has skyrocketed, nine Hartwick College students jumped in to help. On Thursday morning, in a warehouse-sized food bank off Fonda Avenue in the city’s rail yard, the students packed cans of soup and vegetables, bags of noodles and boxes of cereal into distribution containers. The goods will be distributed to needy people as holiday baskets. Hartwick professor Sandra McKane said the students had also begun a project to collect prepared food from restaurants. “They made calls and approached restaurant owners about donating their excess food,” McKane explained. Opportunities for Otsego workers then take the donations and freeze them for later distribution, or refrigerate them for the next day. OFO food pantry distribution is up 300 percent from last year.

December 2004