Weather prophet Cousin George

 By Bob Cudmore, Focus on History for Daily Gazette and Amsterdam Recorder 

  Weather prophet George Henry Casabonne was once described in a newspaper story as "cocky as a blue jay and scrappy as a bantam rooster."

Casabonne, five foot two, worked as a stonemason, farmer and General Electric factory hand. His 1974 obituary stated he was born in Northville in 1886. In 1959, though, he told the Gazette he was born in Tribes Hill.

He married Lydia Kruger and they had four children. Starting in 1917 the family maintained a farm on West Line Road in the town of Charlton in Saratoga County.

Casabonne burst onto the local media scene in the 1930s, following in the footsteps of a weather prognosticator called Uncle George Van Derveer of the town of Florida.  Amsterdam Recorder managing editor Bill Maroney was reputedly the first to call Casabonne "Cousin George."

Widely published historian David Pietrusza grew up over A. Lenczewski’s Bar and Grill at the corner of Reid and Church Street in Amsterdam.  Cousin George was a regular at the bar and sometimes entertained the patrons by playing his fiddle.

Pietrusza said Cousin George was famous for his weather predictions but also well known for his ability to douse for water.

Pietrusza recounts in his Amsterdam memoir "Too Long Ago" that Cousin George accurately predicted the end of a summer drought and Pietrusza witnessed the event by getting soaked walking home from the library.
    

Cousin George said he based his forecasts on lunar phases, the size and prevalence of woolly bear caterpillars and his own weather records.  He maintained that "satellites and Sputniks" zooming through space led to unexpected wind currents and rain here below.

He delivered seasonal forecasts to local media and was known for coming up with creative explanations for prognostications that went awry.

Cousin George was a favorite of newspapers, radio and then television. He performed on the Pete Williams country and western television show on WRGB.

He did not comment on global warming and was a media star before development of social media.

Cousin George did take some ribbing because of the squeaky sound of his violin. He could clog dance and tap dance.  As a show-stopper he would do a high kick.

Toward the end of his life Cousin George moved to his daughter Georgianna Chirickio's home on Lyon Street in Amsterdam.

Former Recorder reporter Steve Talbott's desk at the paper was closest to the door in the 1970s when Cousin George was ending his run. Talbott tended to receive walk-in news releases first, including visits from Cousin George with his seasonal forecasts.

In 1973, Cousin George's daughter drove him to the paper. When asked about her father's health, she looked down sadly and said he was not well. Cousin George died the next year.

Talbott said, "Stan Silvernail, the managing editor, a great guy and good editor, was the keeper of the Cousin George memory file. He would tell us young reporters about how Cousin George would admit to his occasional mistaken forecasts. There was a picture in the Recorder files of Cousin George shoveling shoulder-high snow in the Recorder parking lot on a day when he had said there would be no snow."

On March 16, 1974 he sent his granddaughter to the Recorder with his spring forecast the day before he was admitted to Amsterdam Memorial Hospital.

The newspaper reported, "Cousin George's last forecast was among his best, and right on the button." He died March 21, 1974 the first day of spring.

Snow turned to rain as Cousin George had predicted. He was buried at St. Mary's Cemetery in Fort Johnson.

Bob Cudmore is a free lance writer.

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