Splash down
Simon Markow
Latest News
125 years ago — July 1900
SHARON — Miss Fanny White will open an ice cream parlor and bakery soon in the northern portion of Mrs. G. Chase’s house.
After October 1st the subscibers of the Sharon Telephone Co. will have a continuous service. This will be a great improvement, as it will do away with all extra charge for night service, and also the two hours, one in the morning and the other in the evening, during which time the central office is closed. This will of course necessitate a slight increase in the subscription tax, as another operator must be employed for night service. The company also intend on enlarging their office.
The different nations are not turning their swords into plow shares at a very fast rate. There are wars and rumors of wars, but let us give thanks that Kentucky is pacified.
From different parts of the state come reports of fierce black bears and dangerous wild men. The regularity of these reports about berry time gives cause for suspicion that they are originated for the purpose of scaring berry pickers away from the fields. As yet we have not heard of anyone being devoured.
The hot weather of the past week has brought out the city people in large numbers.
On Thursday evening a party of 20 of our young people took a ride in Martin’s big bus through Sharon, Amenia Union, Amenia and home via Sharon. While in Amenia the party had refreshments, ice cream, etc. Three of Sharon’s young people were taken into the load enroute. The trip was enlivened by songs, jokes and yarns of different kinds.
The hay is reported generally light, due to dry weather last fall and winter, so the wiseacres say.
J.S. Perkins has this week had his entire residence piped and fitted for the acetylene gas. A new gas lamp has also been placed in front of the house and that particular section of the street is now excellently lighted.
Geo. F. Hall’s minstrels played in the Casino Tuesday night. They gave great satisfaction, but the air was too warm indoors for any enjoyment.
Robert Dufour’s tonsorial parlor is undergoing a great improvement by the application of paper and paint. Robert intends to have one of the neatest shops in this section. A third chair has also been added.
100 years ago — July 1925
A Studebaker car containing four occupants — Daniel Krasney and wife, Joseph Herman and Miss Esther Levine all of New York, crashed through the fence at the ore washer in Ore Hill last Saturday morning. The occupants were all quite severely injured. Krasney received broken ribs, Mrs. Krasney sustained scalp wounds, cuts and bruises, Miss Levine received a broken collar bone, cuts and bruises and Herman a broken collar bone and bruises. Krasney was driving and it would appear that something about the steering gear went wrong, at any rate the car after knocking over several posts of the fence which guards the spot, plunged down quite an abrupt bank and turned on its side, imprisoning some of the party. Dr. Bissell hurried to the spot and gave first aid to the injured after which they were hurried to the Sharon Hospital. State policemen Meade and Ringrose took charge of affairs. The car was badly wrecked.
ORE HILL — Mr. and Mrs. John Bianchi and son visited at Michael Moore’s last Sunday. On July 29th Mr. Bianchi expects to sail from New York for Italy where he will visit his mother and sister, whom he has not seen in eighteen years. He expects to return early in September.
LOST — A rear license plate. Will finder notify Dutchess Auto and Supply Co., Millerton, or Journal Office.
John Garrity and his men are now constructing a new cement floor at the Hose House. The new floor will be six inches lower than the old one, in order to admit the new pumper outfit which is expected in the near future. While the change is being made the present apparatus of the company is being housed under the large shed at Roberts store.
Joseph Stanton has purchased the Sunday newspaper business of Vincent Stuart, and will conduct same at Leverty’s drug store, see his advertisement elsewhere in this issue.
Mrs. Madison Silvernale had the misfortune to fall from her wheel chair last Saturday and received bruises which have confined her to the bed since that time, but she is now improving.
50 years ago — July 1975
The Lawrence Perkins home on Farnam Road in Lakeville was struck by lightning Sunday at about 5 p.m. According to Mrs. Perkins the lightning left a 10-inch burn on the side of the building and knocked a telephone off the wall. The basement lights were also affected but no structural damage resulted, Mrs. Perkins reported. She added that a neighbor’s television reception was also impaired.
25 years ago — July 2000
FALLS VILLAGE — Everyone is invited Friday morning to the dedication of the new accessible section of the Appalachian Trail, not just day-hikers, through-hikers, joggers and others who can easily negotiate the often hilly and root-strewn trails. This one-mile section of trail, half of which is actually on the AT, will be one of the first and only segments of the 2,160-mile-long hike running from Georgia to Maine that is accessible to everyone, including nature-lovers in wheelchairs or on crutches.
FALLS VILLAGE — If it is true that people and love make a house a home, then homes built by Habitat for Humanity may be the homiest homes of all. Those ingredients were there in abundance at the dedication Saturday of the newest volunteer-built structure, which will become the home of the Paul and Karen Bartomioli family later this summer.
CANAAN — A piece of prime commercial property long in need of capable business hands was sold during a foreclosure auction last Saturday. A 79-acre lot at the fork of Ashley Falls Road (Route 7) and Clayton Road was bought by Nicholas Mancini, owner of Mancini Construction in Waterbury, for $135,000 in bidding that was long and lively, according to attorney for the sale Brian McCormick. The foreclosure action was brought by the town of North Canaan for back taxes owed by Peter W. Wood of Maine, formerly of Salisbury. A 1,069 square foot building there was last used as a gas station more than 10 years ago. Since then, former Canaan Diner operator Tom Tzelis rented the property and remodeled the building, with plans to open an ice cream parlor and miniature golf course there. That did not pan out and the pastel-painted building has sat vacant for several years.
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Wake boats — nothing like ski boats
Jul 23, 2025
Recreating humans have come up with a new way to thrill ourselves at the expense of water environments by creating artificial waves high enough for surfing behind a boat on inland watercourses (in addition to oceans) without being attached to a tow rope, unlike traditional water skiing. Sounds innocuous, right? It’s not.
The Lakeville Journal has done a yeoman’s job covering the subject of wake boating on Lake Waramaug, which borders the towns of Kent, Washington, and Warren but “recreational wakes” concern all inland watercourses too, especially in the NorthwestCorner where we have a unique strain of hydrilla infestations that permanently endanger the health of all inland lakes and rivers.
Wake boats are a direct conduit for invasives because their fundamental architecture is unlike anything seen in sports boating before. Wake boats employ internal ballast systems and wake-forming attachments like wake plates and wedges to shape waves that are typically 3-4 feet high. The ballasts are designed to take up water and weigh down the boat’s stern much deeper into the water than a ski boat, while raising the bow far above the water line, making it difficult to see other boats/swimmers ahead. Ballasts can retain up to 23 gallons of water inside the ballasts and bilge even after being drained with electric pumps. Because ballasts are internal systems, no physical inspections are possible and sanitation must be extremely thorough using water with temperatures above 1400 F. (This alone will require new inspection infrastructure at every lake since the transport of contaminated water has already been known to spread Eurasian watermilfoil, spiny water flea, and zebra mussels between waterbodies. And invasives are just one concern.
Traditional water skiing boats skim the water’s surface, create relatively superficial waves with little energy and do not destroy fragile lake ecosystems. But wake boats — new on the scene since 2010 — are specifically designed to displace huge amounts of water and sales have recently surged. As usual, the technology is in the field far in advance of our understanding its potential consequences.
Over 300 lakes in the country have banned or limited wake surfing; Wisconsin is in the process of passing statewide ordinances as is Vermont — all based on environmental concerns.
In a detailed report entitled “The Effects of Wake Boats on Lake Ecosystem Health: A Literature Review” by the environmental group “Wisconsin’s Green Fire, Voices for Conservation” in 2024, they note serious environmental damage from wake boating besides invasives:
Wake boats produce wakes that are 2–3 times larger than motorized non-wake boats and transfer up to 12 times more power to shorelines, requiring more than 600 feet to dissipate.
Armoring shorelines with riprap to repair/reduce erosion has high environmental/financial costs, reducing biodiversity/habitat quality, exacerbating invasive issues, and increasing nutrient runoff into lakes.
Recreational wakes, propeller turbulence, and direct damage from deep hulls and propellers can disturb/destroy aquatic plant communities, worsening erosion and habitat loss.
Native aquatic plants help secure shorelines and lake bottoms and are essential cornerstones of food webs and fish reproduction.
Enhanced wakes, noise levels, and turbulence can negatively impact wildlife, including near-shore nesting birds and fish.
Wake boats can resuspend lake sediments at deeper depths than other watercraft, reducing water quality and clarity. The resuspension of lake sediment can also reintroduce stored and previously inaccessible phosphorus back into the water column, fueling algal growth. The latter is of particular concern to Lake Waramaug, which was the country’s first whole-lake, non-chemical field experiment in algal remediation, partly funded by the U.S. EPA. In 1975, a group of concerned citizens formed the Lake Waramaug Task Force — now the Lake Waramaug Conservancy —to address the pea-soup-like conditions of the lake’s water quality caused by intense algae blooms from phosphorus/nutrient accumulation in lake sediment from nearby dairy farms, old septic systems, and general lawn/upland run-off.
Over the last 50 years, via innovative limnology designs, education, in-lake zooplankton farms (zooplankton eats algae), precise year-to-year monitoring/reporting and many millions of dollars from a supportive community, the group was able to steadily increase water clarity from zero in 1968 when the lake was in a state of quickening eutrophication to depths of 19 feet by 2019. However, since 2020 that success has backtracked somewhat and coincides with the increase in wake boats (estimated to be 40+ now). But since (in science parlance) ‘correlation does not equal causation,’ a detailed study was commissioned by the Interlocal Commission via the LW Task Force and funded by the three towns. Terra Vigilis Environmental Services, a nationally recognized science/engineering group with a focus on protecting infrastructure and environmental ecosystems, was commissioned. Their work took months to complete and included in-depth analysis during several seasons at numerous locations, supported by underwater and aerial drone technology. They created two highly detailed/critical analysis reports for the community that can be seen at www.lakewaramaug.org. The reports are decisive studies in underwater sediment disturbance as deep as 26 feet from the wake boat they employed in “normal use” conditions.
If ever there was a lake with scientific documentation to eschew wake surfing, Lake Waramaug — too small, narrow, shallow, and studied — is it. In the recent information meetings at town halls in the three towns, lakeside residents have reported significant shoreline erosion (repaired at private expense), plus damage to docks and moored boats. People report not sitting on their own docks on weekends due to waves rocking and crashing over them. There was one report of a child being slammed into shoreline rocks and numerous reports of capsized kayakers. (For perspective, Lake Tahoe, at 120,000 acres, has a 600 feet buffer for wake boats versus Lake Waramaug’s 640 acres with an unenforced voluntary 200 feet buffer for all boats.)
Referendums are scheduled in the three towns on July 31 to vote on a proposed ordinance put forth by The Lake Waramaug Authority and endorsed by numerous environmental groups, including the Protect Lake Waramaug Coalition. (Check town websites for times and to read the ordinance.) It’s a common sense proposal that bans wake surfing, not boats. It’s been reviewed, edited, and approved by the CT Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP), which has general jurisdiction over watercourses but partners with municipalities in which they are located.
Polluting for pleasure by a handful of wealthy residents, especially regarding dangerous whole-lake algae blooms, cannot be allowed to undo what the Lake Waramaug community has spent five decades to fix. Time for all voters to show up and protect the Commonweal. This is coming to a lake near you soon.
B. Blake Levitt is a science journalist who writes about how technology impacts biology. She is the Communications Director for The Berkshire-Litchfield Environmental Council and lives in Warren.
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Several Kent residents who served in the Peace Corps speak at the July 16 ‘People and Places’ session co-sponsored by the Kent Senior Center and Kent Historical Society. From left are Barbara Psarakis, Irene Coe, Denis Curtiss, Barbara Curtiss and Catherine Bachrach.
Photo by Ruth Epstein
KENT — Heeding the words of President John F. Kennedy when he urged citizens to ask what they could do for their country, five current residents joined the Peace Corps back in the 1960s and’70s.
On Wednesday, July 16, they spoke about their experiences at a session of “People and Places” co-sponsored by the Kent Senior Center and the Kent Historical Society. Moderator was Marge Smith of the historical society.
Established in 1961, the Peace Corps is an independent US government agency that sends American volunteers to serve in communities overseas, working on projects in areas such as education, health, and economic development. They work at building relationships, exchanging cultures and contributing to sustainable development. A key aspect is to promote world peace and foster friendship and understanding between Americans and people of other countries.
Each of the participants gave a glimpse into their time in the corps. Barbara Psarakis said in 1964, at age 24, she had been through college and “wanted to go overseas in the worst way. I’d never been out of the country.” Her first choice was Africa and she was fortunate to be sent to West Cameroon. She was assigned to teach four courses at a girls’ school and said, “I had a wonderful two years. The students were eager to learn.”
Living conditions were primitive, with electricity available only two hours a day. Kerosene was used for heat and there was cold running water. “The Peace Corps had a great influence on me. It was life changing. I got to take two long trips. I consider myself extremely lucky and was glad the Peace Corps was there when I wanted it.” She went on to be a social studies teacher and found that experience to be very helpful in her career.
Irene Coe had just graduated with a bachelor’s degree in education in 1973, but there were no teaching jobs in Hartford. So, she turned to the Peace Corps and chose Central America with a goal of learning Spanish. She was sent to Honduras, and was immersed in speaking Spanish, which she said was tough.
Her position was to teach science, but they needed someone to go to a small town to teach beekeeping, carpentry and sewing. “I was selected,” she said, “But that didn’t last long. My abode was broken into, so they moved me back.” She then traveled around to many small towns teaching science, all the while speaking Spanish, in which she eventually became proficient.
When her stint was up, the Honduran Education Department asked her to stay another two years, which stretched into three. Then it was time to go home. “Within two weeks, I had a position teaching in Hartford because I could speak Spanish,” she said. She still returns to Honduras where she is very close to a family, who are like her own. She speaks lovingly of her “brothers” who have all done well.
“It was the best experience of my life,” Coe said emphatically.
The story of Barbara and Denis Curtiss was a bit different. They had been married for seven years in 1976, when he saw an ad for the Peace Corps that described it as “the toughest job you’ll ever love.” They signed up and had two weeks to prepare. Their home for the next two years was Figi. She said the training part was difficult and they had to pass a language test or be sent home.
They, too, had primitive living conditions, residing in a grass hut with no electricity or running water, “but we had the South Pacific out the door,” said Barbara Curtiss. At first, she was kept busy with the native women, but because men were essentially stripped of their duties, there wasn’t much for her husband to do. Eventually they were assigned teaching jobs at a high school on the main island (Figi had 300 islands), but she said boredom was a big problem. There were long periods with nothing to do.
They later moved to a place near an orphanage, where they were embraced by 57 children and kept very busy.
“The Peace Corps changed our lives hugely,” Barbara Curtiss said. When they completed their time there, they spent the next 20 years teaching at schools around the world.
Catherine Bachrach joined in 1965 immediately after college. “It seemed like the most exciting thing to do,” she said. Her assignment was Turkey. Her training focused quite a bit on the cultural aspects of going to a Muslim country. She was dropped off by herself in a small town on the eastern shore of the Black Sea, which was just across the street from the school in which she taught.
She interacted mostly with women and children and had to dress and act conservatively. Hazelnut shells were the source of heat, she had a squat toilet, and two-burner gas stove, but no refrigerator. She, too, did a lot of traveling during her stay. “Echoing the others, she said, “It was a great experience. I gained as much as everyone else did.”
During the comment period, when asked what the citizens of the countries thought about Peace Corps volunteers, Barbara Curtiss said “We taught them so much about Americans and they taught us so much. The Peace Corps was not imposed on countries. They asked for us.”
Asked if they thought they did good, all responded in the affirmative. Several said their students flourished because of their influence.
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Attendees of the clambake helped shuck corn at Satre Hill Saturday, July 19.
Photo by Patrick L. Sullivan
SALISBURY — Three hours before the official start of the annual clambake fundraiser for the Jane Lloyd Fund, Satre Hill was a busy place. Saturday, July 19.
Barbara Bettigole was helping Brian Bartram with the food scrap management.
She started pulling apart a stack of five-gallon buckets, only to discover they still smelled like last year.
On the plus side, the labels designating the buckets for “food scraps only” survived intact.
Eliot Osborn was setting up the equipment for the informal group of musicians who regularly show up.
He rigged an umbrella to shield the public address board from the sun.
“This modern stuff, it doesn’t like heat and if it gets too hot it shuts down,” Osborn said.
Tanya Tedder, who didn’t need a PA system, shouted for cornhusking volunteers, and in short order eight or 10 people were hard at it.
The clambake professionals from Turners Falls Schuetzen Verein in Gill, Massachusetts, led by Ray Zukowski, lit the fire at 2:10 p.m.
By this point the band had been playing for 45 minutes and what had been a trickle of hungry ticketholders became a steady flow.
In addition to the lobsters, clams and corn in the fire, there was also a raw bar, clam chowder, burgers, chicken, ice cream and beer from the Norbrook Farm Brewery.
The clambake fundraiser is an annual tradition, now in its 18th year.
Jane Lloyd of Salisbury died of cancer in 2005. The Jane Lloyd Fund was established by her family to help families who are struggling financially with the costs of cancer treatment. It is an endowed fund within the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation.
Lakeville Journal Intern Theo Maniatis contributed to this story.
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