Proposed Sign Law Change: Opposing Views—Statement For by Cooperstown Mayor Ellen Tillapaugh

‘A Face Is So Important’

In this discussion of veteran banners on NYSEG utility poles in the village, emotions have run high. We have heard:

• They will distract drivers and cause accidents, even though there is no documentation that that is the case in any of the communities with banners in place. Oneonta, which has a great deal of signage on their Main Street along with banners on the lamp poles, has seen no increase in distracted driving. Drivers looking at their phones is a more prevalent concern.
• If we open it to these banners, it is open to all. The NYSEG official who handles this program for utility poles throughout central New York indicated that nearly all applications have pertained to veteran banners. NYSEG has turned down a few applications—they were from private businesses or had signage political in nature.
• Other safety concerns and that they won’t be visible with trees. Remember, a non-profit organization must first apply to NYSEG listing the pole numbers requested for banner display. All requests are then evaluated in the field by a NYSEG engineer—who considers sight lines, and safety.
• The Village will lose control. In addition to the NYSEG application, the village—with a permit process—could address other concerns (duration of display, removal of damaged banners, etc.) and, obviously, streets where we would allow banners and where we would not.
• The village has already constructed veteran monuments in our community. No, that is not accurate and nothing for which we can take credit.

As mayor of Cooperstown, it is my honor to be asked to speak every year at our community’s Memorial Day Ceremony.

I often note the memorials in our village to honor and remember those who travelled far beyond our small community to defend the principles and freedoms of our nation.

The Soldiers and Sailors Monument, where the Memorial Day ceremony takes place, was erected in the early 1900s not by the village but by Otsego County in memory of all those in our county who served in the Civil War.

The statue of a WWI infantryman at the north end of Pine Boulevard was installed and dedicated in 1931, 13 years after the 1918 Armistice. Again, not a memorial in any way paid for or installed by the village. For years after 1918, there had been talk of creating some sort of monument, but nothing was done. Finally, “the ladies of the American Legion Auxiliary, No. 579 pledged themselves to properly commemorating…the deeds…and the names of those who made the supreme sacrifice.” These were women who lost fathers, husbands or sons. They enlisted a local resident, former New York State Sen. Walter Stokes, to spearhead the design and fundraising campaign. The campaign was overwhelmingly supported by local residents, particularly those who had lost a family member in the Great War. In just over a year, the Doughboy monument was dedicated on Armistice Day, November 11, 1931. On the reverse is a plaque which lists the names of 27 men from Cooperstown who died in that war. Many of the family names—Coleman, Cooper, Eggleston, Johnson—are still present in our community today, more than 100 years later, as well as one name, Clark F. Simmons, for whom our American Legion Post is named.

In February 1966, the American Legion and VFW Posts announced plans for a new veterans’ memorial and began raising funds for it. Again, not funded by the village.

The memorial was placed on Pine Boulevard at the intersection of Main Street and dedicated that same year, on Memorial Day, May 30, 1966. It was intended to honor Korean and WWII veterans and is inscribed “in lasting memory of the Cooperstown area men and women who served in their country’s wars. They gave their today for our tomorrow.”

The dedication of that memorial occurred before our village lost Private First Class Robert Atwell, who died on March 21, 1968 during the Tet Offensive in Vietnam. Bobby, a CCS graduate, Class of 1966, was 20 years old when he died. When he died, I was 13, and I remember his face.

On Memorial Day, May 30, 2022 a plaque, provided with funding from the VFW, American Legion, local Rotary and Lions clubs, and Bobby’s sister, Neal, was dedicated in Lakefront Park.

Bobby’s name is inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Wall in Washington, D.C. It is the most visited memorial in Washington D.C. Last year, a project to not only remember the name but also the face associated with those 58,000 names was finally completed. It is called the Wall of Faces—it is both a digital site you can access online at home or at the memorial. There are four pictures of Bobby on that site. An image of a face has power and is meaningful.

Just after Bobby’s death, Sgt. John Winslow died in Vietnam in July 1969. John was a CCS graduate, Class of 1964. There is no marker bearing John’s name in our village.

We can say that the stone monument on Pine Boulevard honors all those who died in subsequent wars—but what about terrorist attacks?

I was also in school with Kevin Coulman. He graduated from CCS in 1974, and from SUNY Oneonta in 1978. He then enlisted in the U.S. Marines. He was killed in the bombing in Beirut, Lebanon in October 1983. A terrorist attack by Hezbollah which killed 241 U.S. military personnel, in a region of our world still in conflict today. There is no monument to Kevin in the community where he went to school. Last year, his class held their 50th reunion. Classmates put flowers on his grave in St. Mary’s Cemetery in Hartwick Seminary and then went on and put flowers by the monument in Oneonta’s Neahwa Park, where all 25 New Yorkers killed in that terrorist attack have their names inscribed. But there is no tribute to him in his hometown community.

A face is so important.

In 2020, during the pandemic when George Floyd was killed—one additional person in our nation’s incredibly troubled history of race relations—not only did we say his name, but we also had iconic images of his face painted on buildings. Not just in Minneapolis, but in other cities. In PowerPoint presentations for our village’s Police Reform Plan, his face depicted on those murals was front and center. I don’t know if the murals in those other cities violated sign law. I do know that our communities and cities are a reflection of all those who live there.

A face is so important.

I realize that I am most likely the lone vote for this change to our sign law. I am also the only one sitting here who knew those individuals and will remember their faces. Would I have donated money for banners for Bobbie, Michael and Kevin, so they could be remembered in their hometown? Absolutely. It would be the least I could do.