Turning Back the Pages - October 8, 2026

125 years ago — October 1901

SALISBURY — Mr. Thomas Crowley, a popular young Blacksmith of Torrington, spent a few days last week with his sisters and friends in this village.

LIME ROCK — Herbert Ensign discontinued his milk route in this village the first of the week. Mr. Ensign has supplied the villagers with milk for the past 30 years.

George Ingraham has purchased of the Sharon Valley Iron Co. the house and lot adjoining Adelbert Middlebrooks’ home at Sharon Valley, and expects to move there about Nov. 1st.

LIME ROCK — A few days ago Patrick Farry of Hoppertown climbed a walnut tree for the purpose of shaking the same. He shook himself out during the operation and fell to the ground, a distance of 25 feet, spraining an ankle and breaking his collar bone.

SHARON — Baron and Baroness deLuze of Bordeaux of France spent Sunday at Mrs. H. Simonds recently.

Michael McDonald has ceased resting at the golf links.

Silas Silvernail has a cherry tree in blossom, a rather rare occurrence at this season of the year.

100 years ago — October 1926

Now that the bathing season is over it will be a terrible blow for some of the beauties to again appear in ordinary clothing. In order to soften the shock of too radical a change of clothing we suggest that they try going around in their pajamas till they get more accustomed to the change.

LIME ROCK — Ralph Hunter is in Sharon Hospital with a fractured ankle.

While Garwood H. Belter and his men were drawing ensilage corn for the silo, his sons Henry, 3 ¾ yrs. old, and Willis, 1 ¾ yrs. old, followed unknown to him. There is a stream known as Salmon Creek, between the corn lot and barn at the end of the lane. The boys must have been playing on the edge of the bank, and Willis slid off or fell off the foot bridge which crossed the stream, into the water. Henry, realizing that his brother was in danger, went in after him. Being unable to get him up on the bank on that side, he pulled him across the stream to the other side in water up to his arms. The men, hearing them, went to their aid and reached there as Henry pulled Willis up on the bank through the mud, full of water and blue and stiff with cold.

The cellar of the building the Community Service Co. are putting up is well under way.

M.G. Fenn, the radio man, this week has very generously made it possible for a large number of fans to listen in to the world series games. Mr. Fenn’s radios and loud speakers installed at Thurston’s Barber Shop and the Journal Office have attracted a large number of enthusiasts, who have listened to a play-by-play report of games direct from the diamonds. To Mr. Fenn many thanks are due.

50 years ago — October 1976

U.S. Rep. Toby Moffett has assured Salisbury town officials that he will assist them in obtaining federal funding for a sewerage system the remainder of the way around Lake Wononscopomuc. Mr. Moffett confirmed Tuesday that 100 per cent funding is available, and said he would assist the town in obtaining it.

Frank Markey with his wife, Alice, accepted the good wishes of more than 200 friends last Sunday as he retired after 25 years as manager of the Salisbury Town Grove. Mr. Markey held a display of hundred-dollar bills, part of the $1,500 gift of contributions from well-wishers. Fisherman friends came from as far as Stratford to honor him.

The Stanley Works, which owns some 1,500 acres of land along the Housatonic River in Kent, donated 159 of those prime acres to the State of Connecticut and The Nature Conservancy Tuesday. Gov. Ella Grasso was on hand at the Sloane-Stanley Museum in Kent to accept two parcels — totaling 27 acres — for the state. A 132-acre piece was given to The Nature Conservancy. It includes St. Johns Ledges, a mile-long rock formation, 600 feet high, which overlooks the river. A section of the Appalachian Trail traverses the land.

Pat Erickson of Sharon was awarded $1,237 in damages in Litchfield Superior Court Friday. Hartford Electric Light Co. was ordered to pay her this amount for underestimating the cost of using electric heat in her Williams Road home. The six-member jury was ordered by Judge Harold M. Missal to find in favor of HELCO in the breach of warranty case; she had originally sought $100,000 in damages. The jury decided a contract between the utilities company and Miss Erickson had been created when HELCO gave her an estimate for yearly heating with electric heat. Miss Erickson said that the settlement “didn’t anywhere near cover it,” and that the three years she used electric heat nearly bankrupted her. HELCO had estimated about half what the bills actually totaled, she said. HELCO is planning to appeal the case, said a spokesman, apparently because the decision sets a precedent.

Salisbury Tax Collector Denise Rice, former chairman of the Republican Town Committee, was the winner of two round-trip air tickets to Bermuda given as a door prize at the Republican fund-raising cocktail party for Tim Upson and John Gawrych last Wednesday at the White Hart Inn. Mrs. Rice, who has never flown before, is excited about the prospect of going to Bermuda with her husband John, sometime in November.

NORFOLK — Edward Childs, owner of Great Mountain Forest, which covers 6,500 acres on Canaan Mountain, received the American Tree Farmer of the Year Award from the American Tree Farm System last Saturday. The presentation, held at Childs’ home on Windrow Road, followed a tour of the forest. Childs was presented with a Charter Oak seedling, a certificate from Gov. Ella Grasso, a plaque commemorating the event, a small chain saw and other items.

The Service Pharmacy in Canaan is getting a facelift. The old black glass facade shattered over the years, creating possible danger and affecting the appearance of the town’s center. This week pharmacy owner Andy Phair had the old glass peeled away and replaced with stained cedar siding. The glass had been in place since the building went up in 1937. Newspaper accounts from that era remark on the way the new building bettered the appearance of downtown Canaan. The pharmacy replaced a building housing Parson’s General Store.

William C. Clarke of Cornwall Bridge and his dog Tippy were honored by about 65 fellow workers recently at a party given by the men of the Sharon garage of the state highway crew. The party for Clarke and the garage mascot, known there as “Shadpoke,” was at the VFW hall in Cornwall Bridge. Clarke has been working out of the Sharon garage for almost 20 years and Tippy has been the unofficial garage mascot for about half that time. Clarke said he was pleased about his retirement, but said he will still feel a longing to be with the men of the Sharon crew when they begin moving the trucks for the winter’s first snowstorm.

SHEFFIELD — Maurica Paul, 14, of Boardman Street, and her horse, Black Creek, took top honors in the intermediate jumping class at the Eastern States Exposition horse show in West Springfield recently. Maurica, who has been riding since she was five years old, is the youngest person ever to win that award, and the only one to win it two years in succession.

John F. Campbell of Rudd Pond Road, Millerton, has won a one-week trip to Italy, as one of 125 appliance dealers nationally who have exceeded their quota for Frigidaire products. Mr. and Mrs. Campbell plan to leave Oct. 12 and will spend the week in the Lake Como area of northern Italy. While in Europe they hope to see their son John, who is stationed with the U.S. Army in Germany.

Sam Posey, the internationally famous professional race driver, has designated Sharon Hospital as the recipient of his share of the prize purse in a special charity match race to be held Sunday, Oct. 10, at the Watkins Glen, N.Y., road circuit. Posey’s competition will include Charles “Pete” Conrad Jr., the former astronaut and commander of Apollo 12, now a vice-president of the McDonnell Douglas Corporation, Joy Wilkerson of California, Arlene Hiss, a native of Derby, Conn. who competes in both SCCA and USAC events, and Bobbie Ann Cooper, a California-based driver and racing instructor.

25 years ago — October 2001

Local dairy farmers are cautiously optimistic despite the demise of the Northeast Dairy Compact which officially expired at midnight Sept. 30. “It wasn’t reauthorized but we’re still hopeful,” Robert Jacquier said. Owner of Laurelbrook Farm in East Canaan, Mr. Jacquier is one of five Connecticut representatives, including a consumer, a milk dealer and an individual from the WIC program, to the compact. “We had an emergency meeting of the compact on the 28th,” Mr. Jacquier said. As a result of that meeting, the compact’s legal affairs were terminated, pending reactivation by Congress.

CANAAN — It may well be that the classic cars that passed through Canaan a recent Sunday afternoon were contemporary when the Canfield Building last looked as good as it does today. The new owner, Considine Properties LLC, is nearly finished with more than a year’s worth of renovations that have put business tenants on the second and third floors, where apartments had been vacant for quite some time. The latest work, and most notable, is the recently completed exterior paint job.

LAKEVILLE — Peter H. Levy has been appointed branch manager of Arnoff Moving & Storage Inc.’s New England operations. The firm operates in two locations in this region, Lakeville and Great Barrington, Mass.

SHARON — Kelly and Eric Golden are the parents of Farmington’s University of Connecticut Medical Center’s largest baby ever. Karleen Ann Golden was born prematurely Tuesday, Oct. 2. She weighed 13 pounds, 11.6 ounces and was 22 ¼ inches long. Not only is she the largest preemie born at the facility, she outweighs all of the full term babies ever born at UConn. The baby was actually due Nov. 3.

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