Turning Back the Pages

100 years ago — August 1922

SALISBURY — George R. Belcher is off duty owing to a severe attack of indigestion.

Three tank cars of the local freight were derailed at Salisbury last Friday morning. It is said that a rail was found to have turned over.

Walter Hardisty, who received a fractured cheek bone by being hit by a pitched ball in the recent game between the Sharon and Lakeville teams, underwent an operation for the correction of the injured bone at Sharon Hospital on Sunday. He was able to return to his home on Wednesday afternoon.

Thomas Martin left Saturday for a two weeks vacation at Cape Cod. When in Cape Cod Tom always goes shark hunting and it is said that the big fish took to another part of the ocean when they heard he was on his way, for they have cause to remember his work in other years.

50 years ago — August 1972

Small claims sessions of the 18th Circuit Court will resume in Salisbury on Sept. 21, Court Clerk Ernest L. Fetzer told The Lakeville Journal Tuesday. A similar session will be held in North Canaan in October, and thereafter the monthly meetings will alternate between the two towns, Mr. Fetzer said.

The Lakeville Journal’s computer which sets type photographically went stir crazy Tuesday afternoon and laughed itself into a nervous breakdown. For the life of us, we can’t see what’s so funny about the story on the suggestion of the Army Corps of Engineers to dam the Housatonic River to provide water for New York City in the future. But the computer guffawed itself into speechlessness (or typelessness), with the following result: The Roxbury Reservoir and the Candlewood and Lillinonnonaenaanaanaaaaaaahhaaa ahahahahaha hhhhhhhhhha hhhhhhhaahhhhha hhhhhhhhhahahahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh ... (followed by 30+ lines of mostly h’s and other gibberish - Norma)

Kenneth R. Powell of Bristol, the object of a two-day search by divers at Lake Washining, Salisbury, turned up last Thursday in Brunswick, N.Y. The 28-year-old Powell was found hiding in a garage by New York State Police, who charged him with trespassing. Connecticut State Police in Canaan were informed Tuesday by teletype, a week after they gave up the search for Powell’s body at Lake Washining. His clothing and personal effects were found on the morning of Aug. 7 in a boat anchored off O’Hara’s Landing on Between the Lakes Road.

Dr. J. Wesley Mainwaring Jr., a former resident of Farnam Road, dropped into the Journal office last week to say hello to old friends and made some interesting comments on how the town has changed over the years. “I was disappointed to learn the old Holly (sic) Knife Shop has been dismantled,” he said. “I used to work there occasionally.” Dr. Mainwaring, a dentist, spent summers in Lakeville some 20 years. He commented on the absence of the Wononsco House (later the Gateway Inn) and the Stewart Theatre, which were both destroyed by fire; Leverty’s Drug Store, Robert’s store and the Farnam store, which stood on the site of the present barber shop. He also remembered with nostalgia the old swinging foot bridge which crossed Factory Pond.

25 years ago — August 1997

“The Lakeville Journal Centennial,” a keepsake special section celebrating the newspaper’s 100th anniversary, comes with each copy of this week’s Lakeville Journal, Millerton News and Winsted Journal.  Edited by Bernard Drew and richly illustrated with old photographs, the special section recalls not only the newspaper’s century of service but the changes the region has seen since 1897.

The excavation around the Lakeville post office which began last week is the future site of a new handicapped-accessible ramp to be completed next month. There also will be a handicapped parking space and a new single front door to replace both front doors.

CANAAN — Ask the typical teenager what he or she did over summer vacation and the odds are better than good they won’t give you the same answer as Chris Ohmen. The 14-year-old holds the distinction of having graduated from the first Junior Firefighter class at the Connecticut Fire Academy. Mr. Ohmen spent five days in intensive training at the Windsor Locks facility in July, donning 15 pounds of gear in 90-degree weather to train with hoses and ladders, practice interior attacks and search-and-rescue operations.

These items were taken from The Lakeville Journal archives at Salisbury’s Scoville Memorial Library, keeping the original wording intact as possible.