Bound Volumes, Hometown History
October 24, 2024
90 YEARS AGO
Plans for the Fourth Annual Halloween Festival under the auspices of the service clubs of Oneonta are complete. Capt. Lewis M. Baker, general chairman of the affair this year, presided at a meeting attended by representatives from the Kiwanis, Rotary and Lions clubs. The marchers will assemble in Walnut Street and proceed down Elm Street to Main, Chestnut and Academy streets beginning at 7:30 o’clock. The parade will consist of three or four divisions of school students and one of adults and floats. Persons planning to enter vehicles must register with Capt. Danforth D. Bolton at the Building & Loan office not later than 10 a.m., Wednesday, October 31. Prizes will be given for 12 different types of costumes and floats. As the parade disbands on Academy Street, the younger students will be taken to the gymnasium at the Academy Street School where a special program will be held.
October 1934
70 YEARS AGO
Mrs. George Quimet, 475 Main Street, says she saw a big woodpecker the other day gracefully, but mechanically, pecking four holes into her pear tree. Mrs. Quimet believes it is the same pileated woodpecker that caused such a stir in the East End earlier this spring. “He’s the biggest I ever saw. He looked larger than he was last time we saw him. He had a long black back, gray beak and a large red tuft across the back of his head. And he was gray underneath. He looks like a big duck.” Mrs. Quimet recalled that a similar woodpecker wreaked havoc with Vernon Collins’ pear tree on Valleyview Street many months ago. And, she added, significantly – Woody flew away from her pear tree headed in the direction of Seventh and Valleyview, toward the Susquehanna River.
October 1954
50 YEARS AGO
The Oneonta segment of Interstate 88, the Oneonta bypass, will be opened promptly at 11 a.m., Thursday, with ceremonies to take place at the Grand Street approach to the new highway. Ceremonies will include speeches by Oneonta Mayor James F. Lettis, and 113th District Assemblyman Peter S. Dokuchitz. NYS Transportation Commissioner Raymond T. Schuler, and Binghamton district highway chief James Connors will be present and Governor Malcolm Wilson might attend as well. The Oneonta High School band will play. Mayor Lettis will cut the ribbon opening the highway whereupon the officials will take a first, formal tour of the road by automobile. Local merchants, schools and the general public are invited to attend the ceremonies.
October 1974
30 YEARS AGO
Hartwick College, in conjunction with the State University of New York at Oneonta, will present a performance of William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” by the Open Hand Theatre of Syracuse and the Skomorokh Theatre of Tomsk, Russia, at 8 p.m. in the Goodrich Theatre on the SUCO campus. Two theatres from opposite sides of the world collaborate in a blend of language, dance, music and puppetry, masks, music, mime, and dance. The theatre combines fine arts with folk arts by using ancient forms of puppetry and modern theatre with contemporary topics.
October 1994
20 YEARS AGO
In a recent national survey half of the college students polled admitted that they had gone on at least one drinking binge in the previous two weeks. Thirty percent of surveyed students admitted driving under the influence and 34 percent missed classes because of drinking. “At SUNY Oneonta, I’d like to believe it’s not one of our top issues,” said Stephanie Gross, president of the New York student assembly and a SUCO senior.
October 2004