The Freemans Journal - Cooperstowns Newspaper Since 1808

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Labels: 01-02-09, Sports

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The Freeman's Journal - 2008 Citizen of the Year

Penney Gentile

By JIM KEVLIN

COOPERSTOWN

Usually, Penney Gentile said, she’s OK at the Mass she dedicates monthly to her son, Chris, and three other boys close to the family who died in the past four years.
“Suddenly, uncontrollable tears,” she recalled of one recent such Mass at St. Mary’s “Our Lady of the Lake” Catholic Church. “I didn’t remember crying that hard when Chris passed away.”
She didn’t know Kevin and Rhonda Short particularly well, except that they were also St. Mary’s parishioners. But the couple noticed Penney’s distress, invited her home to – as it happened – a christening party.
Her spirits lifted.
“This is a very caring community,” Penney said.
A single mom with older son Rob away at college, she needed a caring community in the months after her younger son died in a car crash on Route 33 on Holy Thursday 2007 – April 5 – the start of spring vacation, but Penney Gentile did more.
What transpired in the months since then – how grief was transformed into action – has led to The Freeman’s Journal designation of Penney Gentile as 2008 Citizen of the Year.
Her efforts led to the creation of the Special Advisory Panel on Driver’s Education Availability and Curriculum, a first-time collaboration between the state departments of Education and Motor Vehicles, whose commissioners co-chaired an effort to address what they came to recognize as “a public health crisis.”
The day before Christmas, a summary report landed on Gov. David Paterson’s desk, proposing a 13-step reform plan and a blue ribbon comission to find funding and implement driver’s education in New York State schools.
(Penney served on the advisory panel, but is restrained from providing complete details until the report is officially released in January.)
The fight isn’t over yet, cautioned state Sen. Jim Seward, R-Milford, who championed “Chris’ Law,” but “Chris Gentile’s name is becoming a model for driver’s education in the state.”
Like a lot of folks around here, Penney Silvus was raised on Long Island. Her father George, who grew up in Brooklyn, was a manager a Grumman. Her mother Kathy taught piano.
She grew up with three sisters and a brother, learned to play the piano and viola, played basketball and softball.
“I was the kind of person who didn’t have friends in any particular clique,” she remembered, “like Chris.”
She attended public schools – her father, educated in parochial schools, insisted on that – but she had a yearning for religious expression.

In high school, she became involved in the Catholic Confraternity Program, taught on Saturdays by monks, and that cemented her faith.
“I was blessed to have it before crises entered my life,” she said.
Graduating from Smithtown High School East in the ‘70s, she came upstate to SUNY Binghamton, where she earned a B.A. in economics. She considered law, but went on for an M.B.A. in human resources.
During this time she met her future husband, Robert Gentile, an optometrist. The couple moved to Boston, but he had an opportunity in Oneonta, closer to his family in Syracuse.
Relocating to Otsego County, Penney spent the next dozen years as Hartwick College’s human resources director.
The Gentiles had a home at Goodyear Lake, but as sons Rob and Chris approached school-age, the parents discovered an old Victorian on lower Nelson Avenue, buying it in 1991.
As it happened, Penney moved up but Robert never followed and the couple eventually divorced.
Penney decided to turn the home – it did need a lot of work – into a B&B, which kept her close to both her boys as they were growing up.
“As much as I miss Chris,” she said, “I have no regrets. I was always here for him.”
After Chris’ death, more than 1,000 schoolmates and community members attended the wake and funeral in CCS’ Bursey Gym, where former Hall of Fame President Dale Petroskey – Chris’ Little League coach – was among the speakers.
That summer, with Penney still stunned by what had happened, a couple from Georgia spent a night at The Nelson Avenue Pines B&B.
Hearing Penney’s story, they told her of C. Alan Brown of Carterville, Ga., whose son, Joshua, had also died in a car crash.
Fueled by grief, Brown had begun researching crashes involving young drivers, discovered the high mortality rate was being ignored, pushed driver’s ed reform through the Georgia General Assembly, and founded The Joshua Foundation to promote his cause nationwide.
In the dramatic local response to Chris’ death, and in Brown’s example, Penney saw the chance “to change the tragedy into something positive ... There’s a need, and I can help meet the need by doing something.”
Events followed quickly.
Penney called Brown and on Oct. 10 he spoke to a crowd of 100 students and parents at CCS’ Sterling Auditorium, outlining his five-point “21st Century Driver’s Ed Curriculum” that included using simulators like those used in pilot training to teach teenagers to drive.
Among those in the audience, invited by Penney, was Seward, chairman of the state Senate Education Committee.
By spring, he had obtained a $35,000 grant for CCS to initiate a pilot program and Penney, through her friendship with M.J. Harris, had convinced Steve Harris’ Royal Chrysler to provide a training car.
Meanwhile, Seward had gotten a bill through the state Senate establishing the advisory panel and requiring it to report back by year’s end, a very short timeline.
But the bill still needed to pass the Assembly, and aides in the office of Bill Magee, D-Nelson, advised her it was very unlikely that could happen in the two remaining weeks.
Penney sprung into action, advising all her friends to e-mail key legislatures in Albany, and asking them to ask their friends, and their friends to ask their friends.
An avalanche of electronic nudging descended on key legislators in the Capitol.
“It wouldn’t have happened without the Internet,” Penney believes today.
Meanwhile, Seward applied 20-years seniority and a knowlege of the legislative process to expedite his bill. He put it on the Republican caucus’ “must do” list and “we did advocate very, very strenuously.”
“Knowing what Penney and her family had gone through – the loss of a teenage son – I wasn’t about to come back from session and have to tell Penney Gentile we couldn’t get this done,” the senator said.
The bill became law and the advisory panel – it included experts from DMV and Education, academe, Triple A and other interested entities – included Penney as the “parent advocate.”
With bureaucracy’s reputation of moving slowly, Penney feared the worst, but found just the opposite among the professionals in the two state departments.
“The work that they did was unbelievable,” she says today. “They have been working tirelessly since the passage of the bill.”
The facts that surfaced were compelling: 16- to 20-year-olds make up 12 percent of drivers, but they are 20 percent of all drivers involved in accidents, and 32 percent involved in fatal accidents.
The panel quickly concluded the deaths of young people on the state’s roads constitute “a public health crisis,” the mother said.
State Education Commissioner Richard Mills and DMV Commissioner David Swarts “want to see drivers’ training” – now optional – “in all the schools in New York State,” she continued. “That’s ultimately what they want.”
As for Penney, her role expired at year’s end with the panel’s, and life is resuming a guise of normality.
Friends are always wandering in. Rob is home from college for a while. A handful of guests were at the B&B over Christmas.
On a table by the door leading to the B&B’s family quarters are photos of the four boys who died – of Peter Closi, killed in 2005 while learning to fly; of Zak Greene, a nephew, taken by cancer; of Chris, and of Peter Meuller, son of the Cooperstown Country Club golf pro who died last summmer.
“There are a lot of unanswered questions on this side of eternity,” she said. “You have to live with that. All you can do is find joy one day at a time.”

Labels: 01-02-09, Front Page, Penney Gentile

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Locals

BASSETT-HARTWICK GRADUATES 8 NURSES

Eight graduates received advanced nursing degrees through Bassett Healthcare and Hartwick College’s Partnership for Nursing Opportunities Program on Dec. 5. They are, from left, Elletta E. Sagendorf, Karen D. Waterman, Dana L. Peeters, Fariha M. Quereshy, Michele Bodensiek, Christina Bourgeois, Julie Sloan and Annette M. Alexandrea. Under the program, Bassett covers tuition, and the nurses commit to one-year’s employment at Bassett per year of assistance.

...AND THE HOUR NEARS

Committee members pitch in Tuesday, Dec. 30, to decorate “The Mexican Room” for “Around the World,” the Friends of Bassett’s New Year’s Eve Gala at The Otesaga. In the foreground are Maggie Schuermann, left, and Maggie Hall. Co-chair Carol B. Waller is seated at the piano. Standing, from left, are Maureen Schuermann, Kristen Waller, Anne Hall, co-chair Cindy Seward, Liz Parson, Sally Graumlich and Kay Pierro. The decorations were based on the movie, “Around the World,” based on the Jules Verne novel. Decorative highlights included a hot-air balloon in the hotel lobby, as well as a model bi-plane created by John Sanford especially for the occasion. This year’s gala benefits Bassett Healthcare’s in-school health program.

Citi Smith Barney Names McReynolds Managing Director

Erna Morgan McReynolds, senior vice president at Citi Smith Barney, is one of “selected colleagues” promoted to managing director this year, according to Mike Corbat, CEO of Citi Global Wealth Management.
“These colleagues are recognized not only for demonstrating exemplary leadership skills but also for playing a significant role in the success of our business,” Corbat said in a statement announcing the appointments.
McReynolds, who directs the Smith Barney office on Chestnut Street, was raised in the Gilbertsville area and pursued a career in journalism internationally. She became a financial adviser and returned to Oneonta 15 years ago in partnership with her husband, Tom Morgan. The couple lives in Franklin.
In 2008, Barron’s named her one of the 100 Top Female Financial Advisors in the U.S.
Active in civic life, including NYSHA, McReynolds has been the recipient of numerous awards. She was 2008 Woman of Distinction by the Indian Hills Council.

Bill Harra Wins Holiday Contest

Bill Harra, Continental Road, won first place in the Springfield Historical Society’s annual Christmas Decorating Contest.
Mr. and Mrs. Charlie Taylor, corner of Hoke and Bartlett roads, were second; Mark and Mary Williams, Route 20, Puckertown, were third.

Anna Elizabeth Craig, Ahmad Reza Hariri Wed

Anna Elizabeth Craig, daughter of Peter and Linda Craig of Oaksville, was married to Ahmad Reza Hariri, son of Mahvash Shahegh of Elkridge, Md., and M. Reza Hariri of Tehran, Iran, at the First Presbyterian Church of Cooperstown on Sept. 27, 2008. The service was performed by James Atwell of Fly Creek.
The bride wore an ivory gown of Peau de Soie and Alencon lace with a chapel train and fingertip veil. She carried a bouquet of ivory Anna roses and pearl stephanotis.
Maids of Honor were Amy Maier of Madison, Wisc., and Alison Haddock of New York City, friends of the bride. Bridesmaids were Emily Craig of Middlefield, sister-in-law of the bride, and Elizabeth Darcy Lewis of San Francisco, Calif., friend of the bride.
Best Man was John Orefice of Pittsburgh, Pa., friend of the groom. Groomsmen were John Craig of Middlefield, brother of the bride, Aric Prather of Pittsburgh, and Alessandro Tessitore of Naples, Italy, friends of the groom. Ushers were Charles Bradberry of Pittsburgh and Douglas Williamson of San Antonio, Texas.
Flower girl was Chloe Williamson of San Antonio.
Dinner and dancing followed at The Otesaga, where the groom’s mother offered a Persian sofreh of symbolic foods and sweets and readings from Persian literature.
The couple honeymooned in Costa Rica. They are living in Pittsburgh, where the groom is teaching and directing research in neuroscience at the University of Pittsburgh. The bride is in graduate school in clinical and developmental psychology, also at the University of Pittsburgh.

Labels: 01-02-09, Locals

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Editorials

‘Otsego County’ Underscores Local Treasures ... And Possibilities

When you drop down through the Schoharie Valley on I-88 and the hills fold one upon another as far as the eye can see ...
When you cross the county line from the east on Route 20 and look ahead to the knobby terrain ...
When you wander down Route 7 through Otego and Unadilla, or up Route 51 through Gilbertsville and Morris to Garrattsville...
When you happen on the Westford General Store, or Hyde Hall, or the long views from the Hartwick campus, or ...
The point is, you realize you’re in a special place – our Otsego County.
If you’re ever doubted it, pick up photographer Richard Duncan’s latest, “Otsego County: Its Towns & Treasures,” the last of three volumes from The Farmers’ Museum, published – regrettably; it makes a great gift – just a handful of days before Christmas.
The new volume accomplishes for Otsego County what the first two – “Otsego Lake: Past & Present” (2005) and “Cooperstown” (2006) – did for Cooperstown and around: It captures the county’s unusual and distinctive landscapes and architecture and puts them in a historical context.
•
Thumbing through the 297 photos, it’s impossible to have just one favorite: The rowboats stacked at Gilbert Lake, that huge rooster statue in front of Popek’s Used Furniture near Wells Bridge, the town clock at Richfield Springs – “Syracuse Straight Ahead.”
And Duncan’s eye goes to the defining close-up, be it the old wagon’s contrasting red against the Milford Depot’s soft green, or a wrap-around porch in Edmeston – Nectar Hills Farm Store and the adjoining stone storefront (Rose Is A Rose) in Cherry Valley looks better than ever.
The older photos – the photographer sought images from all of the county’s local historical societies – are particularly arresting.
Women buying wares from a peddler’s horse-drawn wagon in front of an unpainted Greek revival near Schuyler Lake, boys swimming in a Worcester creek, elephants lined up on Oneonta’s Main Street when the circus comes to down, the Decoration Day crowd in Unadilla Forks – these are among the most unforgettable.
What captures many first-time visitors to the county is the sense of yesteryear – nostalgia. But it’s living nostalgia, populated by 21st-century Americans and sharing in all the benefits – good schools, good healthcare, good highways, technological access to pretty much everywhere – of the country at large. Win-win.
While the Glimmerglass and Cooperstown books appeal to the tourist trade and people with affection for James Fenimore Cooper and baseball’s mecca, “Otsego County’s” potential as an economic-development tool is much broader.
The county’s Economic Development Office should buy a few cases and give a copy to anyone serious – or semi-serious, this could tilt the balance – about moving a business concern to anywhere around here. It’s captivating.
Credit is due, not just to Richard Duncan, but to NYSHA Vice President/Chief Curator Paul D’Ambrosio, who polished the text as editor-in-chief, to Cooperstown Village Historian Hugh MacDougall, who wrote a trenchant introduction, and to Jane Forbes Clark herself: She championed and underwrote the undertaking; the result gives Otsego County a competitive edge in any venue where it will be helpful to show this is a special place.
Yes, that could be for businesses purposes, but also environmental protection, tourism promotion – you name it.
“Otsego County” proves Otsego County is something to cherish.
•
There’s a caveat, however, that comes through in MacDougall’s introduction.
He quotes Susan Fenimore Cooper: “The advance of this county has always been steady and healthful; things have never been pushed forward with the unnatural and exhausting impetus of speculation, to be followed by reaction.” (The one exception that comes to mind is Oneonta’s selection as a railroad town, which turned out fine.)
The images in “Otsego County,” striking as they are, can’t hide the uneveness of prosperity. To what degree, we might ask, is preservation the flip side of poverty?
“Steady and healthful” progress has brought us to where we are, but progress is not at an end and should not be. The best bulwark against “unnatural and exhausting ... speculation” – 140 natural-gas wells and dozens of 400-foot-tall wind turbines come to mind – is sufficiently wide-spread prosperity to ensure full acceptance of Otsego County’s exceptional assets.
Onward into 2009!

In Defiance Of Tragedy, Penney Gentile Acted

Penney Gentile, after the outpouring of affection for her son, Chris, who died in a car crash in spring 2007, concluded: This is the time that something can be done to slow the scourge of teen-age deaths on the roadways.
Connecting by very real happenstance with Alan Brown of Cartersville, Ga., she learned that states are beginning to adopt “21st Century Driver’s Education” programs, and she was off.
Penney could have suffered her tragedy quietly, sought distraction, tried to forget. But instead she acted, and how.
She brought Alan Brown to CCS a year-ago October to educate the community, she recruited state Sen. Jim Seward to the cause and -- told with two weeks left to go in the state legislative session that it would never happen, stirred up support and peppered Albany with a locust’s plaque of e-mails urging passage.
When a special advisory panel on driver’s ed was formed, she served on it as a parents’ advocate, working side-by-side with the experts in a 13-point plan of reform that landed on Gov. David Paterson’s desk just before Christmas.
The plan, still to be revealed, would be the first updating of driver’s education in a half-century. Who knows how many young lives will be saved.
Senator Seward – he deserves much credit, too – cautions that there are obstacles ahead, and there are.
The point is that Penney Gentile – Carina Frank acted similarly after her parents’ car crash into a farm vehicle – could have done nothing. But she shook off her grief and turned her tragedy into a boon for many people who won’t even realize the agony they were spared.
For that, and for the lesson it teaches to the rest of us, Penney Gentile is The Freeman’s Journal 2008 Citizen of the Year.

Labels: 01-02-09, Editorial, Opinion, Perspectives

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BILL GLOCKLER

IN APPRECIATION

Editor’s Note: This is the citation Bill Glockler read when Jean Wycoff received the Cooperstown Rotary Club’s 2007 Chris Worrell Community Service Award.

The recipient of the 2007 Chris Worrell Community Service Award, is somewhat of an anomaly.
In the presentation of someone for this honor, one would think the nominee would be quite well known for his or her “good deeds,” but in this case the person is well “below the radar.”
She is a tireless worker, one who seeks no recognition, but richly deserves the praise. She is a very courageous cancer survivor.
You may find her at The Farmers’ Market with her goodies that she makes up in her kitchen, or at the spring “chocolate” sale at the same Farmers’ Market where she organizes (actually recruits) others in the raising of monies for the National Cancer Society’s Relay for Life.
Or you may find her off to the side at her church’s various activities, again selling her homemade wares for the benefit of her church.
In the past she has diligently put together teams for the overnight Relay for Life marathon that was held annually at Iroquois Farms, or at the old Cooperstown airport, again raising monies for the American Cancer Society.
People may also find her at Saturday’s Bread at the Oneonta United Methodist Church. She has held, for many years, the lead role in putting together the monthly volunteers and working to serve the meals to those who need it most.
You may also view her handiwork at the entrance to the Cooperstown High School in the form of the Memory Garden. She was the instrumental lead in the founding and construction of this project, which is dedicated to Nick Alicino, Mary Murdock and Henry Nicols.
You may also find her voluntarily working with high school students in the yearly publication of their Prose and Poetry Journal.
You might also see her at the garage sales she holds, again for the benefit of the Cancer Society.
We have tried to list all the qualities that make her worthy of Chris Worrell Community Service Award and most are from my own recollections. We are also sure there are other attributes not observed, because she is that type of unrequited person.
She has affected, very positively, the lives of many people who will never know her name. She wouldn’t want them to. Words that we would use to describe her are tireless, dedicated, understated, extremely praiseworthy, driven, generous, and most of all – humble.
We are absolutely sure she will think she does not deserve this recognition, but most assuredly, she does!

Labels: 01-02-09, Columns, Guest Column, Opinion, Perspectives

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Letters to the Editor

Lake View Shed Still In Danger

To the Editor:
The proposed Walker development will severely alter the face of the one tall western mountainside just below Five Mile Point, directly above Otsego Lake. It continues to progress, however, through the application stages with the Town of Otsego Planning Board.
All residents of Cooperstown and the Otsego Lake area who wish to preserve and protect this beautiful mountain face and the Glimmerglass National Historic District should voice their opposition now.
In addition to previous concerns, there are new issues that make this subdivision even more undesirable and the Planning Board must address them.
The current private road off Browdy Mountain Road intended as access to the proposed new homes is illegal. It does not conform to Town of Otsego subdivision requirements and greatly exceeds the 10 percent grade requirements in several areas. Regrettably, these requirements were waived by the Planning Board in 1994 when the road was built to serve existing houses.
Every member of the Planning Board knows this road is illegal and adding more houses will compound the problem. That alone should have prevented acceptance of the preliminary application last spring. Town regulations, especially regarding steep slope development, must be adhered to.
Another important issue continues to be the destruction of a large section of steep-slope wilderness of the historic district, which will happen if three new homes are built. Are residents aware that there are no steep slope regulations specifically designed to protect the historic lake view shed? This means that its future is presently in the Planning Board’s hands. The proposal’s approval would set a dangerous precedent for other steep slope development around the lake.
The Watershed Supervisory Committee recommends zero runoff into Otsego Lake from new development. After seeing preliminary revisions in the lans regarding runoff, the DEC did not accept his new plans, including the Storm Water Pollution Prevention Program. It has required further changes and more tests.
One of the requirements is to lay out specific SWPPP plans for each of the houses that are to be built on the three new lots. The applicant plans to build one house and sell the other lots, so all he will send the DEC is a simulation of a “typical” plan, not actual plans for two of the houses. There thus is no way to gauge if the actual future houses will actually meet specific DEC requirements.
Although the applicant is working on several revisions of his plans required by the DEC to reduce silt and other deposits, the runoff will never be zero.
I am especially concerned, since the first two houses built in 1994, if presented to the DEC today, would not be approved because the runoff provisions are not in accordance with current requirements.
Since the construction, the runoff from the torrential rains in 2006 washed out part of Route 80 and completely overwhelmed a culvert under a garage which had for 40-50+ years before never had a flooding problem. Any additional runoff from this new development would seriously exacerbate the flooding problem, spilling even more road chemicals and silt, etc. into the lake.
Another major problem in this regard is that there will be no future oversight of infiltrators, etc which he plans to install. They will need regular maintenance. But in years to come, there are no provisions for checking to see that the DEC requirements are adhered to.
Although there are limits of sorts on tree cutting of “30 percent, in addition to the house foundation, per acre,” there are no laws regulating clear-cutting of trees, and because of that, the applicant would be permitted to clear up to 4½ acres of land for his houses and their views, creating huge open, treeless areas on the mountainside. There need to be regulations relating to the density of trees.
A new issue just raised is in regard to ecology in the area intended for development: Bald eagles have been spotted over the lake. Perhaps they nest in this area.
No one really knows as Otsego Lake is “poorly mapped” by the DEC when it comes to its “natural resource inventory.” For all we know, there may be other endangered species on this land such as spotted salamanders. Clearly, taking this amount of acreage out of the ecosystem could have an adverse effect.
Ethics issues regarding the two board members who have had business dealings with Mr. Walker need to be given further thought. The residents of the Town of Otsego deserve an unbiased vote on this vitally important, precedent-setting application for development.
There have been a couple of small positive developments in recent weeks.
My sister and I and other opponents attended the November Otsego town board meeting, and brought some of the above issues to their attention. The Town Board then asked their attorney, Martin Tillapaugh, to speak to the Planning Board attorney to clarify the current subdivision regulations on private roads.
The town board also received a letter from Jane Forbes Clark, expressing her concern about the Walker proposal and its negative effect on the Otsego Lake view shed.
Citizens of the Town of Otsego and of Cooperstown who don’t want to see our beautiful western mountainside on Otsego Lake lose its wilderness to a development chopped into the middle of it, need to act now. They need to write letters, make their objections known to the town Planning Board at: Town Hall – Walker application, Route 26, Fly Creek, NY 13337.
The next Planning Board meeting is 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 6. E-mail letters by
Monday, Jan. 5 to the town clerk at dizdeane@peoplepc.com.
For more information, I can be contacted at savethemountainside@gmail.com.
All those who don’t want to see houses high on a mountainside above Otsego Lake are urgently encouraged to join our group opposing Walker’s application. Our Lake is worth the effort to protect!
CAROL B. AKIN
Cooperstow

Sacred Trees Sacrificed To Gods ... of Parking?

To the Editor:
Most people haven’t noticed, but the tree huggers actually cut down two trees in the Doubleday parking lot that have probably been there for 25 years so that our tourists pulling in can see the parking-meter ticket machine.
It’s unbelievable how far these keepers of the gate will go to justify their existence.
Every year I think they have done as many dumb things as they possibly could, then they exceed my expectations.
I always thought trees were the most sacred chattel that they could possibly own. Guess what, not so.
It has also come to my attention that once again they have raised the price of playing baseball on Doubleday Field.
It must be that the money they lost last year by not booking the field wasn’t quite good enough.
The village might consider hiring an accountant who understands subtracting all the costs from revenues raised. I can’t imagine Tallman removed those trees for free.
When all the costs are subtracted from the monies our village fathers said they took in, the bottom line is not anywhere near what they want us to believe.
Would you think that it is necessary for this village to have 100 employees? We do!
TED HARGROVE
Cooperstown

Shoe-Throwing Incident Inspires Means of Protest

To the Editor:
When an Iraqi journalist threw a shoe at the President, shouting, “This is from the widows and orphans” (created by his unjustified invasion of the country), Mr. Bush responded by saying, “I don’t know what his beef is.”
Concerned citizens will want to assist Mr. Bush in his understanding.
I propose that each of us mail a shoe to the White House, together with a brief explanatory note. Flat-heeled shoes will mail best: suitable mailers may be obtained from the post office.
MARY ANNE WHELAN
Cooperstown

Labels: 01-02-09, Letters to the Editor, Opinion, Perspectives

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Bound Volumes

175 YEARS AGO

The following excerpt is from a poetic address purportedly from the carrier of The Freeman’s Journal to its village patrons: “Broke is the despot’s wand; the chain that bound our race is burst in twain; the charm dissolves; and Reason’s ray is chasing Error’s mists away; Even now, the Fire of Freedom glows from Quito’s Plains to Zembla’s snows; and soon perchance ere round the Sun again the circling year hath run – The News Boy’s joyous song may be ‘O’er half the Earth, mankind are Free!’”
January 6, 1834

150 YEARS AGO

How to get to New York – Passengers leaving this village by the morning stage, arrive in Albany at 2:20 p.m. At 3:30 a train leaves that city for New York, via the Harlem Railroad, arriving at 9:30 p.m. – fare $2.00. The cars on the Hudson River road leave at 5:40 p.m., arriving at 11:20 p.m. – fare $3.00. Persons taking the Harlem road arrive in N.Y. about two hours earlier and save $1.
December 31, 1858

125 YEARS AGO

The shadows of the “grey old year” gather about us; and profitably employed are they who are inclined to recount with thankful hearts the benefits and the mercies which have come to them from the hand of “the giver of all good gifts.” The afflictions, the sorrows, the trials, which have made hard the lot of some, it is to be hoped, have been tempered by blessings easily recognized. The light of the glad New Year is about to dawn upon us. May it bring to the readers of the Freeman’s Journal peace and prosperity, with the opportunity, the ability, the willingness, the motive, to make it a year of good to others, and of benefit to society. May it be a year of progress and increasing greatness to our common country.
December 29, 1883

100 YEARS AGO

The Otsego & Herkimer Railroad was organized last week in New York City by Herbert T. Jennings and others interested with him for the purpose of operating the Oneonta, Cooperstown & Richfield Springs Railroad, later known as the Oneonta & Mohawk Valley road. The new company is said to have a capital stock of $1,500,000.
December 31, 1908

75 YEARS AGO

Advertisement – Jean Harlow stars in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s “Bombshell” with Lee Tracy, the dynamite-loaded inside story of a famous screen siren, at Smalley’s Cooperstown Theatre on January 3, 4, and 5 – “it’s the year’s loudest laugh explosion – it’s the picture you’ve been waiting for.”

Five more Tenderfoots were awarded their Trefoils and enrolled at the recent meeting of Boy Scout Troop 12. They were Willard Warren, George Field, William Field, America Russo, and Robert Gorton. Soon, Troop 12 will have 32 regular Scouts, or four full patrols of eight each. C.B. Johnson, the District Commissioner, was present and gave a short talk on “The Value of Time,” with reference to the second scout law – “A Scout is Loyal.” Prof. A. deJ Allez charged the candidates: “The eyes of the community are on you new scouts, and they are waiting to see if you will take advantage of this character-building organization, and what paths of life you will take.”
January 3, 1934

50 YEARS AGO

Arson is the suspected cause of a fire that destroyed the 125-year-old Swiss chalet on the Fernleigh Farm a mile north of Cooperstown overlooking Otsego Lake. The chalet was once used as a retreat by James Fenimore Cooper when the famed American novelist made his home here. A few minutes after 2 a.m. early Monday morning the Cooperstown Fire Department was called to fight the chalet fire on the bluff 75 feet from the east lake road behind Camp Fenimore. Firemen fought the blaze with water from Otsego Lake where a portable pump was set up on the ice. Of frame construction, the chalet contained five rooms. Investigators found automobile tire marks and footprints at the fire site along with the remains of unfrozen sandwiches.
December 31, 1958

25 YEARS AGO

Students may have trouble coping with their alcoholic peers. Parents may have trouble coping with an alcoholic child – and vice versa. To help them all and to deal with a community problem, the Cooperstown School Community Association (CSCA) is sponsoring a free program at 7:30 p.m., Monday, January 9, in the school cafeteria. This year, more than other years in the recent past, there is interest in solving the problem, according to Sharon Oberriter, program co-chairman. “Parents seem to be aware and they want to do something about young people and alcohol,” she said.
January 4, 1984

10 YEARS AGO

Never mind those frostbitten ears or the ice on your windshield – 1998 was the hottest year in recorded history in Cooperstown and perhaps on the entire planet. And, if it’s snowing or sleeting by the time you read this, consider yourself lucky, because the latter half of the year was bone dry, lowering the water table and forcing local communities like Milford to institute water conservation measures. As of Tuesday morning, the mean annual temperature in Cooperstown for 1998 was 48.6 degrees, or nearly a degree higher than the two previous record-setting years, 1990 and 1946, according to Harold Hollis, National Weather Service cooperative observer in Cooperstown. “The year’s average temperature was about 3.5 degrees above normal, and December 1998 was positively balmy, averaging between 7 and 8 degrees above normal,” Hollis said.
January 1, 1999

Bound Volumes is compiled from resources provided courtesy of the New York State Historical Association Library. Tom Heitz is the Town of Otsego historian.

Labels: 01-02-09, Bound Volumes, Columns

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Keep Power Close To People, Says Powers As Year 1 Ends

By JIM KEVLIN

Jim Powers took the helm of Otsego County’s government a year ago espousing small government, close to the people, and nothing’s happened in his first year as chairman of the Board of Representatives to change his mind.
“If you want to have some fun,” he suggested in an interview as his first year neared an end, “check the New York State Association of Counties web site; see the counties that are in trouble with their managers and administrators.”
In one recent news clip on www.nysac.org, a county administrator was suggesting $600,000 for new offices, Powers said.
In Iraq, U.S. generals are deploying tens of thousands of troops from desks made of plywood boards on a couple of saw horses, said the veteran representative and dairy farmer from South New Berlin.
“I’ve had absolutely no second thoughts,” he said, a view he expressed most recently when county Rep. Sam Dubben made a surprise motion to put $80,000 in the 2009 budget for a county manager. The move was rejected.
A high point of Powers’ first year – he took the top job back from maverick county Rep. Donald Lindberg at the start of 2008 – was Federal Aviation Administration approval of a 157-foot communications tower near the Oneonta Municipal Airport on Blend Hill.
Work was to get under way any day, and the $6-10 million project is expected to take three years. (The goal is to assure emergency communications; Powers said he is less enthusiastic about expanding it to provide broad-band Internet access countywide, a $25 million undertaking.)
“It took all year to get the sayso to put the shovel in the ground,” he said, “but once you start doing something, the rest will come easy.”
Another highpoint: He attended the county Fire Advisory Board the other day and was pleased to be told no board chairman had ever done so before.
A low point? The failure to achieve a contract with county workers, who have been working without one since 2005. Powers said, after state-mandated fact-finding, he expects a contract to be imposed by the end of 2009.
The freshman chair – now moving into his sophomore year – pointed out that the November 2007 elections – a Republican romp – brought in “a lot of brand new legislators, who have a much better handle on how things work.”
His decision to bring back long-time county attorney Jim Konstanty, the Oneonta lawyer – it was controversial at the time – turned out to be the right one, Powers said, for three reasons: “Experience, experience, experience.”
The biggest challenge facing county government, Powers said, is MOSA – the Montgomery-Otsego-Schoharie Solid Waste Management Authority – which handles locally generated trash under a contract that expires at the end of 2010.
“It’s more than financial,” said Powers – MOSA takes trash to a landfill in western New York and has little control if the landfill decides to raise tipping fees.
“It’s taking responsibility for our own garbage in a way that we haven’t in the past,” he said. “It says something about your business and government when we say: ‘This is our problem, and we’re going to take care of it.’”
The first step, he said, is a master plan for garbage disposal, and the county will continue to work with MOSA Executive Director Hans Arnold in understanding the complete garbage stream, from start to finish.
In the end, said Powers, he would like to see a landfill within the MOSA district under the control of the county governments.
As for the budget, always a topic of much debate on upper Main Street, the chairman said he prepared a budget he could live with, with the expectation the representatives would reject it.
They did, and the budget – it contains a tax increase of an estimated .25 percent – went into effect automatically.

Labels: 01-02-09, Front Page, Otsego County

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Cooperstown and Around

Director Named At Sports Center

Dion Wade, assistant director of facilities for the Division of Recreational Sports, University of Texas, has been appointed director of the Clark Sports Center, effective Jan. 16.
Wade has an undergraduate degree from Trinity University in San Antonio, and a master’s in educational leadership from the University of Central Florida at Orlando. He played varsity football at Trinity
He and his wife, Anna, currently on their honeymoon, will reside in Cooperstown.

SWEARINGS-IN: John Lambert was to be sworn in as the new Otsego County judge at 1 p.m. New Year’s Day at the county courthouse. State Sen. Jim Seward, R-Milford, was to be sworn in for a new term.

FOND FAREWELL: A retirement party was held for Charlotte Koniuto on Tuesday, Dec. 30, at the county Board of Elections. The former county GOP chairman is also stepping down as elections commissioner, to be replaced by Sheila Ross.
PAPERS SOUGHT: The call for papers has gone out from the James Fenimore Cooper Society in preparation for the 17th International Coopers Conference & Seminar, planned July 12-17 at SUNY Oneonta. It is held semi-annually.

ON THE BOARD: Teri Barown, Frank Capozza and Ralph Snell were elected Tuesday, Dec. 30, to the Cooperstown Rotary Club’s board of directors. Bruce Markusen, the writer, was recently inducted as the club’s newest member.

IN PAPERBACK: Lauren Groff’s “The Monsters of Templeton” is out in paperback,and got a nice plug in The New York Times Book Review.’s “Paperback Row” feature over Christmas weekend.

Labels: 01-02-09, Cooperstown and Around, Front Page

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Backwoods Beat

EVAN JAGELS

NIGHT LIFE

There is a certain feeling of locality in bluegrass music, even in the more well known recordings of Bill Monroe, Earl Scruggs and Lester Flatt. I say this in the sense that no matter how accomplished or impressive the players may sound, it is easy to imagine hearing their music live in a downtown gathering or backwoods party.
This may be in part because the music was born and bred in local America and while Bill Monroe is commonly thought of as the father of bluegrass, it nonetheless developed throughout the country after the Second World War. It is without doubt part of what ethnomusicologist Alan Lomax refers to as the “American patchwork” -- the banjo has its roots in Africa and was prevalent in early country blues, the fiddle style is of Irish and Gaelic culture and the vocals are reminiscent of European yodeling.
Boxing Day, a packed Autumn Café hosted the Horseshoe Lounge Playboys and their blend of what they call “blubilly Americana” -- “the mixing of acoustic bluegrass with hillbilly.” Though they have also been described as playing “backwoods Americana,” I would just call it a more modern continuation of the American roots tradition in music.
Notably, their performance was one of the rare occasions when a band mentions to the audience they are “welcome to dance” and the audience actually takes them up on the offer, pulling back tables and chairs to create space. The Autumn is a fitting environment for such an event, with red lights casting on the stage in front of a lake and mountain wall mural with mounted pearl colored white ovular lights.
Based out of the Oneonta, Treadwell and Jefferson area, the Horseshoe Lounge Playboys are Will Lunn on mandolin, Randy Miritello on acoustic guitar and vocals, Dennis Walrath on upright bass, Darin Trass on fiddle and Sam Doyle on drums. Some may remember them from their performance at the Concert for the Oneonta Theatre earlier this fall.
This past Friday night also saw guest musicians Phil Salvaggio, a skillful guitarist and Oneonta native, Ed from the High Street Boys, and opening act Micca and Britt, with acoustic guitars and close harmony reminiscent of Bob Dylan and Gillian Welch.
The Playboys opened their set in the traditional bluegrass key of G major with a light shuffle from the single snare drum. “Going to Arizona, just a rider in the rain,” sang Miritello and although he was recovering from a recently lost voice, his vocals were in solid pitch. Lunn took the first solo of night and proved himself a worthy mandolin player. Although he admits to playing the mandolin “on and off” for the past 30 years, it doesn’t sound as though he has ever gone long without practice.
It is the cumulative sound which ought to be achieved by a good musical group and a solid rhythm section must be so good that one doesn’t even know they are there. Take them away, however and the structure has no foundation. It was in this taste that Walrath and Doyle played. Nothing outstanding, except for the fact that they provided a base that could be rested on all night by the other pickers – a task which is much harder than it sounds.
The Horseshoe Lounge Playboys play mainly originals, a worthy accomplishment in a genre with many standards and are currently finishing an album at Dryhill Studios in Oneonta. They will be performing Feb. 14 at the Pourhouse in Trumansburg, N.Y., before embarking on a tour of the Southeast United States.

Labels: 01-02-09, Columns, Evan Jagels, Glimmerglass, Night Life

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Roll ’Em

SAM GOODYEAR

ART BEAT

Something there is about a film series that draws crowds from far and wide.
Schedule a chamber music concert on a balmy Sunday afternoon in spring, and you’re lucky if eight people show up.
Show an old movie on a freezing midwinter night and the house is packed.
Last winter, your columnist went to a showing of “To Kill a Mockingbird” at The Fenimore Art Museum and he is still feeling the chills of pleasure.
It was part of the annual Cabin Fever Film Series generously offered gratis to the public by Glimmerglass Opera, The Fenimore and the Baseball Hall of Fame to liven up those cold winter nights.
The series is back in 2009 with an exceptionally varied array of choices spanning the years from 1940 (“The Philadelphia Story” with Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and James Stewart – wow!) to 2006 (“Marie Antoinette,” rated PG-13 for sexual content, partial nudity and innuendo – wow!).
There’s music (“La Traviata” via Franco Zeffirelli, and the addictive ragtime idiom of Scott Joplin in “The Sting”), fun for smaller fry (“Toy Story,” “Shrek” and “The Goonies”), as well as more serious material (“Life Is Beautiful”) and some mordant murder mystery satire (“Gosford Park,” with Maggie Smith pricelessly applying cucumber slices to her eyelids).
All films begin at 7 p.m. Doors open at 6:30. Venues vary so check listings in the paper you are now holding in your hand. Augur’s of Cooperstown is once again offering a generous raffle opportunity.
•
Inspired by UCCCA and the Cabin Fever Film Series, Foothills Performing Arts Center is launching its Birthday Film Series, beginning with “Nobody’s Fool” in tribute to Paul Newman on Jan. 26, his birthday.
The final Monday of each month throughout the year will celebrate the birthday of a different film star – e.g. Peter Fonda, Dixie Carter, Brigitte Bardot, Maggie Smith (cucumberless) and, in October, Felix the Cat along with Jackie Coogan.
A short film chat will precede each movie. Brenda Reeser will say a few words about “Nobody’s Fool” on the 26th.
She and her husband, Foothills board president Doug Reeser, were intimately involved with its production: their house served as one of the main site locations. Doors open at 7, chat at 7:15, film at 7:30.
For future listings check the pages of the paper you are now holding in your hand.
Happy 2009 to one and all!

Sam Goodyear’s column on the arts in Otsego and Delaware counties appears weekly.

Labels: 01-02-09, Art Beat, Columns, Glimmerglass, Sam Goodyear

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Preparing For The Gala

Award-Winning Otesaga Chef Takes It In Stride

By JEANNINE BOHLER

Hosting an intimate New Year’s Eve cocktail party for a few close friends is doable. Creating an elegant dinner party for 12, a challenge. But a culinary extravaganza for 650? Impossible.
Unless, of course, you are The Otesaga’s award-winning executive chef, David McLean Lockwood.
Together with his staff of culinarians, Chefs de Cuisine, Sous Chefs and stewards, many called back from seasonal retirement just for New Year’s Eve, Lockwood was hoping to make the last dining experience of 2008 a great one for 360 guests of the Friends of Bassett’s New Year’s Eve Gala and 250 patrons of the Hawkeye Grill.
It would take three days of non-stop activity in The Otesaga’s kitchens to prep for the night.
But if Lockwood was feeling a bit of anxiety in an interview a few days before the event, he didn’t show it. More then 20 years of experience, much of it at resort hotels, have helped him gain the expertise and leadership to run the hotel’s elite dining facility.
His office overlooks the kitchen. Cookbooks, of course, flank the shelves. Award plaques honoring his excellence cover the walls.
The newest honor, The 2008 Hermann Rusch Commemorative Medallion, is given by the Resort Food Executive Committee and was awarded to Lockwood by 40 of America’s top chefs.
Out of 10 eligible chefs, Lockwood was one of four chosen by the committee for this year’s honor. More than just an award for culinary expertise, the award recognizes the special qualities needed by a resort’s executive chef.

“It is a unique award,” Lockwood said. “Pedigree and professionalism over the years are taken into consideration”
The challenges of meeting the culinary needs of a successful resort hotel are many, but Lockwood says it is the challenge and the multi-tasking duties of the job that keep him going.
The seasonal nature of the resort population presents one challenge. The other comes from the diversity of the fare and customers served. From the simplest food, served beachside or at the golf course, to the most exquisite wedding banquet or New Year’s Eve gala, Lockwood has overseen it all.
He signed on as The Otesaga’s executive chef in 2005 after an extensive career in resorts throughout Florida, including the Ponte Vedra Resorts, Portofino Bay Hotel and The Peabody Orlando. Having grown up in Oriskany, the position allowed Lockwood an unexpected move back to Upstate New York.
“I always told my family I wouldn’t be able to move because there aren’t many luxury hotels up here,” he said. But The Otesaga position turned out to be just the thing.
The switch from corporate-run facilities to this local, independent operation has allowed a freedom and a line of communication with management and patrons that was missing in the larger resorts where Lockwood has worked.
“This is the smallest property I have worked for, but it is the most challenging in the sense that most resorts are not so local. I didn’t hear the feedback. I hear it now with regular calls and e-mail. The Otesaga is unique in its local interaction.”
He describes his cuisine as “modern, regional American prepared with classical cooking techniques,” and his philosophy is shaped by an insistence on the freshest ingredients and quality products available.
Aside from orchestrating The Otesaga’s main dining room and the more casual Hawkeye Grill, Lockwood oversees catering events that include conferences, wedding and more.
Preparations for this year’s Bassett New Year’s Eve Gala, “Around the World,” began early in the summer when Lockwood met with Friends of Bassett committee members to discuss the concept and come up with the menu. A tasting and critique of the menu was done later in the season with all details finalized after Thanksgiving.
The smooth presentation revelers will enjoy at the gala includes a series of buffets, from an American cocktail and hors d’oeuvre reception in the lobby, to dinner stations featuring French, Italian and Indian cuisine, and finishing with a European dessert selection.
Overseeing the gala, like the day-to-day operations, takes a large measure of common sense and people skills and a dash of professional respect, according to Lockwood.
When he began his career, most executive chefs ran their kitchens like dictatorships, and were highly critical and often belittling to their staff. Lockwood works differently. He attempts to empower his staff, looking for the positive, encouraging excellence with respect for his employees.
The strategy is working. Many members of his seasonal team have been returning year after year.
Lockwood knew early in life he wanted to be a chef. When got his start in the culinary program at BOCES, his family discouraged him and asked him to try other trades before settling on his dream.
The American world of professional cooking had a poor reputation and most kitchens were dominated by European chefs. Lockwood admits the reputation was deserved. But today, things have changed.
“Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine American star chefs or a Food Network. The reputation of the American chef has gone up two-fold in the last 10 to 15 years,” he said.
After 20 years, Lockwood still enjoys the challenges of his work.
“I love the type of people who enter this industry,” he said. “I enjoy working with the young apprentices. I enjoy the glimmer I see in their eyes when I teach them something. I am at the stage now in my career when I can focus on giving back.”

Labels: 01-02-09, Glimmerglass, The Otesaga

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