John Bullis, Cooperstown Chamber of Commerce executive director, instructs participants in the first Cooperstown “Rotary Ride,” which took off from in front of the Doubleday Cafe for the Adirondacks at 9 a.m. Saturday, July 12. The riders are, from left, Supreme Court Judge Michael V. Coccoma, CCS High School Principal Gary Kuch, Bill Glockler, Tony Gambino, Bill Coleman, and Marc Kingsley, chamber president. The riders got as far as Indian Lake and returned by 5 p.m.

PRESIDENTIAL NOD: Former President George H.W. Bush stopped by Cooperstown native Erin Natasha Curpier Whipple’s table in Yarmouth, Maine, to remark on the beauty of newborn Oliver Boda Whipple, 4 weeks old.

TOP MIDWIFE: Laura O’Shea was recently appointed director of midwifery services at Bassett Healthcare. She joined the Department of Women’s Health in 1996 as a certifi ed nurse midwife. She has a bachelor’s in clinical nutrition from Syracuse University, completed her clinical nutrition internship at the University of Rochester, Strong Medical Center, and received a master’s from Yale. While a graduate student at Columbia, she was part of a team from the School of Public Health that studied re-feeding of famine victims in Sudan. She has published papers in professional journals. O’Shea is co-investigator of the Bassett Mother’s Health Project, a collaboration between Bassett and Cornell University.

COOPER PHOTOGRAPHER: Incidentally, Glenn Linsenbardt took those great photos at Henry S.F. Cooper, Jr.’s testimonial. Glenn is also NYSHA official photographer.

$2,000 AWARD: Ryan Talma, Richfield Springs, has received a $2,000 Merit Award from SUNY Oswego.

ON DEAN’S LIST: Jonathan Breiten and Andrea Roes, both of Cooperstown, are on the SUNY Albany Dean’s List.

WRITER ID’D: “Kauf,” author of an op-ed piece in the June 13 issue of The Freeman’s Journal on a boyhood visit to Cooperstown with his dad turns out to be Jon Kaufman, a columnist for the weekly Roanoke (Va.) Star Sentinel. A selection of his columns appear on his blog.

AT FANFEST: Pati Drumm Grady, second from left, mans the Cooperstown Cookie Company’s booth at the 2008 DHL All-Star FanFest July 11-15 at the Javits Convention Center in New York City. FanFest featured 40 interactive displays, exhibits from the National Baseball Hall of Fame, autograph signings, and more.

A WINNING JERSEY: Kyle Kraham, 18, of Cherry Valley, stands with his cow, Lentsville Kays Top Korkey during a show at the 61st annual Farmers’ Museum Livestock Show in Cooperstown on Sunday. Korkey won fi rst place in the Jersey Cow 5 years and over division and Best Bred owned by the exhibitor. For a list of local champions, see next week’s Freeman’s Journal.



The celebrated Parker String Quarter performs energetically at the Cooperstown
Chamber Music Festival’s Family Fun Fest Saturday, July 12, at Templeton
Hall, and again the following evening at The Farmers’ Museum. The musie festival’s next performance is “Enchanted Baroque,” Bach, Purcell and Telemann at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 23, at Christ Church.

A SIGN OF FELLOWSHIP: Bill Highfield, retired Methodist pastor, was the surprise recipient of a Paul Harris Fellowship presented Tuesday, July 15, by the Cooperstown Rotary Club at its weekly meeting at The Otesaga. With him are, from left, his wife Carol, son Jay Highfield, Johnson City; daughter Ann Lamonaco, past president of the Binghamton Rotary Club, and Cooperstown Rotarian Jim High, a former district governor.

ONE BIG FAMILY REUNION: Hilda McLaughlin of Texas, the last surviving of four daughters born in India to missionaries Wilfred and Mamie Jackson Scott, poses with 13 – of a total 14 – cousins from the next generation who held a reunion this week at John and Linda Smirk’s Cooperstown B&B on Chestnut Street. The cousins, from youngest to oldest, standing from left, are Betsy Hearn, 45, St. Paul, Minn.; Jonathan Hearn, 48, Edinburgh, Scotland; Kristen Kidder, 50, St. Paul; Henry Wong, 51, San Francisco; Emily Wong, 53, Yorktown Heights; Teresa Seitz, 53, Villa Grove, Colo.; Tim Hearn, 54, Plymouth, Minn.; Stephen Hearn, 56, Saint Anthony, Minn.; Elinor Laurie, 59, Willow Grove, Colo.; Katrinka Ebbe-Wheeler, 60, Washington,
D.C.; Joe Scott, 61, Oakland, Calif.; Karen McLaughlin, 62, New York City, and Christopher Ebbe, 64, Claremont, Calif. They are surrounded by their spouses and children; in all, 35 attended. In honor of the family’s heritage, they cooked up a feast of palau, tomato chicken curry and other East Indian delicacies.

Labels: Locals