HOMETOWN HISTORY, September 20, 2013
125 Years Ago
Of all the articles most interesting to the feminine mind perhaps hats and bonnets hold the first place. In hat shapes, both low and high crowns are worn. The Alpine hat, in felt, has taken a place among the popular hats of the day. A full line of colors can be found at Mrs. J.T. Fox’s millinery parlors on lower Main Street. Both short and long plumes are in vogue and the heads, wings and whole bodies of birds. An elegant assortment of birds and bird’s feathers is now on exhibition at Mrs. Fox’s. Moire and cashmere ribbons are liked and used for ties, as well as tall loops. One of the best assortments of ribbon, at prices that will please, can be found at Mrs. Fox’s; also velvets, etc. A visit to her millinery rooms on South Main Street will well repay the ladies of Oneonta and vicinity.
September 1888
100 Years Ago
Crime and the Clergy – In New York, after two weeks of investigation, it has been found that the mysterious murdered girl whose dismembered body had been dragged out of the Hudson River was Anna Aumuller, and that her death was brought about by Hans Schmidt, a priest of the Roman Catholic faith, who for some time had been supplying various churches in the metropolis. Schmidt from all accounts was eccentric and probably a lunatic, but not on that account or any other does his church stand back of him. On the contrary, it willingly sees him given up to the arm of the law that it may deal exact justice. And so has it been with not a few clergymen of other denominations. The fact is that in the great United States the number of the clergy runs up into the hundreds of thousands. Among so great a number it is not strange that some should be dishonest or in a larger sense criminals. The actual wonder is, since they are of the same flesh and blood as the rest of mankind, that so few instead of so many of them are criminals. The excitement that conviction or accusation of crime on a clergyman’s part occasions is in itself convincing evidence of the almost universally good character of the clergy as a whole.
September 1913
80 Years Ago
Guiding Your Child by Alice Clarissa Richmond: Mildred is 16 and looks old for her age. The other day she drove 40 miles or more, alone in her car, to call on a boy whom she had met a few weeks before. Her father, who would not have approved of her escapade, was out when she made her getaway. According to her mother, he is too strict and old-fashioned, so Mildred schemes to keep him in ignorance of her doings. There are two deplorable features in such a situation. First is the very real danger which the child runs in driving about the country in such a foolhardy manner. Sixteen is quite old enough to drive a car and to have an interest in social contacts with boys. But it is not old enough to have ripe judgment either in a road accident or a social crisis. The other unfortunate aspect of the case is the undermining of the father’s influence. If the child gets into any kind of
dilemma her mother will have only herself to thank for granting excessive freedom to the girl at an age when she still needed supervision.
September 1933
60 Years Ago
Male high school graduates in the Oneonta area can apply today for the “Top Secret” training courses in atomic weapons technician school. Sergeant First Class Anthony A. Angelotti, area Army and Air Force recruiter, announced yesterday that an official release issued by the Department of the Army calls for male personnel to be trained in handling atomic artillery. The call for atomic arms technicians is the result of the government’s rapid strides made in atomic weapons development since WWII. The request also comes a week after the Army Department sent six atomic cannons to Europe to bolster NATO defenses. Applicants for atomic weapons shooting will be sent to Aberdeen, Maryland for eight weeks of basic training before transfer to the technical training detachment 8470th AAU, at Sandia Base, Albuquerque, New Mexico.
September 1953
40 Years Ago
Another Oneonta landmark will be razed next week. The venerable River Street school building, which for the past few years has housed the Sixth Ward Athletic Club, will be torn down. Fred Delello, one of the club’s directors, said current plans call for construction of a new, one-story building on the site. The new structure will house the club meeting rooms, and may be built large enough to house several small stores. The brick school structure was built in 1888. “Vandalism at the site has increased and “the building is becoming an eyesore,” Delello said.
September 1973
20 Years Ago
Fox Hospital racked up another year in the black for 1992 with a profit of about $121,000. However, that sum marked a steep decline from the nearly $1.5 million in profits reported for 1991. For neighboring Bassett Hospital in Cooperstown the financial picture was far worse. Bassett’s balance sheet went from $824,000 in profit for 1991 to a loss of $6.8 million in 1992, the second largest in the state.
September 1993
10 Years Ago
The Oneonta Italian American Club is sponsoring the showing of a video titled “Heaven Touches Brooklyn in July.” The video delves into an incident in Nola, Italy and the legend of St. Paulinius, a fifth-century bishop who engineered the rescue of a group of village children who were kidnapped and held as hostages by Barbary pirates. The first wave of Italians from Nola migrated to Brooklyn’s Williamsburg district in 1887. For 116 years since, residents have gathered outside the parish church every July to witness the raising of the “giglio,” a four-ton, five-story tower of aluminum and wood dedicated to the memory of the bishop who freed the captive children of Nola.
September 2003