The Historians

...Bob saw the documentary

Episode 409 "Down the Page"

James Kirby Martin is executive producer of the documentary Benedict Arnold: Hero Betrayed.  The film is based on Martin’s 1997 book Benedict Arnold Revolutionary Hero.  The documentary is streaming on several TV platforms, narrated by Martin Sheen and stars Peter O’Meara.  Three men from the Mohawk Valley area created the documentary: Niskayuna native Chris Stearns, Saratoga Springs native Tom Mercer and Fort Johnson native Anthony Vertucci. Posted the second week of February

Shawn Duffy’s Amsterdam memories

By Bob Cudmore

   Shawn Kevin Duffy contributed stories to this column on many topics including his family’s East End tavern.

   Duffy, born in Amsterdam in 1949, died last month at his home in Lake St. Louis, Missouri at age 69.  He was a Navy veteran and worked for General Electric and other firms in the turbine generator business.  He retired as part owner of Turbine Generator Technical Services.  His wife Valerie plus children and grandchildren survive.

   Duffy contributed a tale to my 2012 Mohawk Valley stories contest about O’Shaughnessy’s, a tavern once owned by his grandfather Martin J. O’Shaughnessy in the early 1900s.

   Located at East Main and Eagle Streets in a building no longer there, O’Shaughnessy’s patrons included actor Kirk Douglas’s father, Harry Demsky, and my grandfather, Harry Cudmore.  My grandparents lived at 36 Eagle Street, the Demskys lived at 46 Eagle.  

   The historic marker honoring Kirk Douglas’s birthplace created for Historic Amsterdam League is to be placed at the parking lot where Shaun’s Saloon, as it was frequently called, used to be.

   Prohibition in 1920 closed the tavern, at least officially.  The Albany Evening Journal in 1926 reported Martin Shaughnessy of Amsterdam was charged with selling beer.

   Duffy wrote, “I guess it is a bit surprising that the bar survived Prohibition as so many did not.  My mom, Mary O’Shaughnessy Duffy, told me that she used to help make bathtub gin when she was around ten, actually in the bathtub.  Her brother Martin Junior sold the moonshine off the back porch to make ends meet during these hard times

   “Martin Junior had polio and was confined to a wheel chair.  I always wondered if the coppers kind of turned their heads to not see a paralyzed person selling illegal moonshine off the back porch to help an old Irish tavern survive during the hard Prohibition times.” 

   Duffy didn’t ever see Martin Senior or Martin Junior but recalled when his uncle Edward was running the bar.  At that time the “O” was dropped from the tavern’s name and it was called Shaughnessy’s

Historians Go Fund Me https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast-2022

   The family nickname for Edward was Eb while others called him Midge.  Duffy wrote, “Eb was also known as KO because even though he was slight in stature (around 4 foot 5 inches or so), he did have a baseball bat which he used as an ice crusher.  From what I understand he used it more than once on people who got too rowdy. 

   “The story was that if someone got out of line, Eb would grab his ice crusher bat out of the ice bin, jump up on the bar and take a good swing at whoever was out of line, including Harry Demsky.”

   When Duffy was young he visited his grandmother, Rose Mullarkey O’Shaughnessy, who lived in an apartment house next to the tavern.  He was allowed to play shuffleboard at the bar for free.  Rose died in 1961 and Eb in 1973.

   Duffy wrote, “The bar also had one of the first color TVs in the area, so it brought in a big crowd on football Sunday.  Looking back on it from today, it was pretty small, the color was pretty bad and it probably cost a small fortune.”

ROCKY’S COMMENCEMENT

   Duffy said Nelson Rockefeller, who made several trips to Amsterdam when he was governor of New York, was commencement speaker in 1967, the year Duffy graduated from Wilbur H. Lynch High School.

   Duffy wrote, “I don't remember too awful much except the crowd was very large and quite a bit of media types, cameras, etc.  At the time I thought this was only for us graduates.”

Tomorrow, Friday, March 18, 2022

Episode 414-Annette Libeskind Berkovits discusses her historical novel “The Corset Maker” which tells the story of a courageous Orthodox Jewish teen, Rifka, who was living in Warsaw Poland in the late 1920s and early ‘30s.  Rifka is loosely based on Annette’s mother Dora.

March 19, 2022- Focus on History in the Daily Gazette and Amsterdam Recorder-Aviator Amelia Earhart helped Beech Nut advertise chewing gum during 1931 flights in an unusual aircraft, the autogiro.

Fort Plain Museum

https://fortplainmuseum.org/viewevent.aspx?ID=1074

Monday, March 28, 2022 - 7:00 PM  

Councils of War and the Cabinet: How the Revolutionary War Shaped the Presidency

Presented by Lindsay M. Chervinsky

This is a free Zoom Event and Registration is Required

Mohawk Valley Weather and News Headlines, Thursday, March 17, 2022

Daily Gazette

Tedisco: ‘Real’ bail reform needed to end ‘catch and release’
FULTONVILLE — The “catch and release” cycle created by state bail reform laws must be stopped, according to local law…

https://dailygazette.com/

https://www.recordernews.com/

Leader Herald

https://www.leaderherald.com/

Utica OD

Turning Stone kicks off World Series of Poker tournament. Here's when to sign up

by Edward Harris

https://www.uticaod.com/story/news/2022/03/17/world-series-poker-tournament-set-turning-stone-resort-casino/7064646001/

Wednesday, March 16, 2022

Episode 357-Lawyer and historian Jim Kaplan looks at the lives of financier Bruce Wasserstein and his sister, playwright Wendy Wasserstein, key figures in the revival of New York City in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The latest Jim Kaplan story, Wall Street History: The Great Depression & A New Deal For Working People is posted on The New York Almanack https://www.newyorkalmanack.com/

"The family nickname for Edward was Eb while others called him Midge" Tomorrow, Shawn Duffy’s Amsterdam memories 

Friday, March 18, 2022

...the novel is about friendship

Episode 414-Annette Libeskind Berkovits discusses her historical novel “The Corset Maker” which tells the story of a courageous Orthodox Jewish teen, Rifka, who was living in Warsaw Poland in the late 1920s and early ‘30s.  Rifka is loosely based on Annette’s mother Dora.

The Saturday Read

--an odd hybrid craft

March 19, 2022- Focus on History in the Daily Gazette and Amsterdam Recorder-Aviator Amelia Earhart helped Beech Nut advertise chewing gum during 1931 flights in an unusual aircraft, the autogiro. 

New York State Maple Weekend, March 19-20 and 26-27 https://mapleweekend.nysmaple.com/

Maple Weekend is a chance for the public to come to the farm to learn about New York’s maple sugarmaking processes and traditions and to provide a chance to taste pure maple syrup in its many forms – right from the source.

Mohawk Valley Weather and News Headlines, Wednesday, March 16, 2022

Daily Gazette

Schoharie’s Barton exiting from post as boys’ basketball coach
Shane Barton is calling it a career after 31 years of coaching varsity boys’ basketball, the last 16 at his…

https://dailygazette.com/

Improvements coming to Shuttleworth Park from past $200K state grant

AMSTERDAM — While a $200,000 state grant for improvements at Shuttleworth Park will finally pay...

Emergency food, housing programs in Montgomery County to benefit from boost in federal aid

https://www.recordernews.com/

Leader Herald

Comptroller blasts state DOH over nursing home COVID response
ALBANY — The state Comptroller’s Office on Tuesday released an audit highly critical of the state Department of Health and…

https://www.leaderherald.com/

Utica OD

https://www.uticaod.com/story/news/2022/03/16/rome-cemetery-nominated-state-federal-historical-registries/7047014001/

Rome Cemetery looks for placement on historical registries
by Edward Harris

...A great number of sins were committed at the picnic, and a heavy responsibility rested upon the souls of those members of St. Mary’s Church who gave their countenance and support to the affair.”

Tuesday, March 15, 2022 (The Ides of March, 74th day of The Roman calendar)

Two lifetime pastors at St. Mary’s of Amsterdam

By Bob Cudmore

   Reverend John McIncrow and Monsignor William Arthur Browne were both lifetime pastors at St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church in Amsterdam.

   Father McIncrow, a Utica native, came to St. Mary’s in 1878 and was named “irremovable pastor” nine years later.  Nine years after that, in 1896, he died suddenly of heart disease at age 49.

   On McIncrow’s watch, the parish established its cemetery in what is now Fort Johnson.  He founded the parish school, St. Mary’s Institute, and invited the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet into the city to teach at the school.  In 1895, McIncrow installed chimes in the bell tower. 

   In an 1886 sermon, McIncrow took parents to task, “In a country where water is plenty it must be slothfulness of the parents to send their children to school dirty.  If such a child should come to the institute, it will be sent home and not admitted until it comes in proper garb.”

   In its regular account of the priest’s Sunday sermon, the Recorder reported that McIncrow was not pleased that parishioners employed as spinners in local knitting mills got out of control at a social function:

   “In alluding to the Spinners’ Picnic, Father McIncrow asked his congregation to pray for such of its members as had had any connection with the festivities of the day before.  A great number of sins were committed at the picnic, and a heavy responsibility rested upon the souls of those members of St. Mary’s Church who gave their countenance and support to the affair.”

   In September 1896, McIncrow officiated at the marriage of Peter Sullivan and Elizabeth P. Smith, who went on to be the parents of one of America’s first television stars, Ed Sullivan.

   Two months later, McIncrow died and throngs attended his requiem Mass on November 24, 1896.

MONSIGNOR BROWNE

   A native of Watervliet, William Arthur Browne entered the priesthood after his brother Daniel, who had become a priest, died.

   After the unexpected death of Father McIncrow, Father Browne was picked to succeed him as pastor of St. Mary’s in 1897. 

   There is a statue of McIncrow in St. Mary’s Cemetery, dedicated during a crowded ceremony on Browne’s watch in 1902.  Many attendees arrived by trolley car.

   That same year Father Browne purchased the Abram Marcellus home on Guy Park Avenue.  The building became St. Mary’s Hospital in 1903.  Like the parish school, the hospital staff was drawn from the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet.

   In 1909 Browne awarded a contract to J.J. Turner Construction of Amsterdam to build a new school building on Forbes and Maple Streets to accommodate an enrollment of over seven hundred students. 

   It was named Dugan Hall for its chief financial benefactor, Patrick Dugan, an Irish immigrant whose East Main Street grocery business prospered. 

   In 1921 St. Mary’s Hospital Auxiliary was formed and the first nursing school students graduated in 1923.  Father Browne spearheaded construction of a hospital building which opened in 1927 with four operating rooms, an x-ray department and laboratory.

   Like McIncrow, Browne was designated pastor for life.  Browne served 33 years until his death at age 75 in 1933.

   Over 200 priests, headed by Bishop Edward Gibbons, attended Monsignor Brown’s funeral.  The late monsignor’s nephew, Reverend William Browne of St. Joseph’s in Albany, celebrated Mass.

   Downtown businesses were closed as the funeral procession made its way to the cemetery.  There Monsignor Joseph A. Delaney, vicar general of the diocese, blessed the grave.  Delaney had grown up in Amsterdam where his father was a plumber.  He became the next pastor of St. Mary’s, serving three years until his death in 1936. 

Historians Go Fund Me goal for 2022

$6,000.00

At prersent $1,600.00

Please donate online here- https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast-2022  Or send a check made out to Bob Cudmore 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302. Much obliged.

Wednesday, March 16, 2022

Episode 357-Lawyer and historian Jim Kaplan looks at the lives of financier Bruce Wasserstein and his sister, playwright Wendy Wasserstein, key figures in the revival of New York City in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The latest Jim Kaplan story, Wall Street History: The Great Depression & A New Deal For Working People is posted on The New York Almanack https://www.newyorkalmanack.com/

Thursday, March 17, 2022- From the Archives of the Daily Gazette—Shawn Duffy’s Amsterdam memories 

Duffy contributed a tale to my 2012 Mohawk Valley stories contest about O’Shaughnessy’s, a tavern once owned by his grandfather Martin J. O’Shaughnessy in the early 1900s.

We are working out way out of The Winter Woods, Above freezing for the rest of the week.

Mohawk Valley Weather, Tuesday, March 15,2022

Mohawk Valley News Headlines, Tuesday, March 15, 2022

Daily Gazette

Schenectady’s Wedgeway Building recommended for state, national historic registries
SCHENECTADY — A prominent downtown building that in recent years has been the source of numerous city code violations has been…

NYRA expands reach of online betting platform, expects good Saratoga racing meet
SARATOGA SPRINGS — With the COVID pandemic on the wane in New York and no new restrictions on the horizon,…

https://dailygazette.com/

https://www.recordernews.com/

Leader Herald

Gloversville DRI committee set for in-person meeting

by Jason Subik

Make Us Part of your Day

https://www.leaderherald.com/

...but he always wanted it printed this way

New this Friday, March 18, 2022-Episode 414-Annette Libeskind Berkovits discusses her historical novel “The Corset Maker” which follows a courageous Orthodox Jewish teen, Rifka, who was living in Warsaw Poland in the late 1920s and early‘30s.

Thanks to generous donations from Tom Stewart, Jim Kaplan and James Kirby Martin the Historians Podcast 2022 fund drive now totals $1600.  Please donate online here- https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast-2022  Or send a check made out to Bob Cudmore at 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302. 

Thank You

Monday, March 14, 2022-The story behind the story-Collette’s made Mendets, paper clips, sporting goods and more

New York State Maple Weekend, March 19-20 and March 26-27, 2022 

https://mapleweekend.nysmaple.com/what-is-maple-weekend/

We will be there regardless of what the weather does! 10 am to 4 pm each day at most locations. Check your planned destination for any exceptions.

Tomorrow

In its regular account of the priest’s Sunday sermon, the Recorder reported that McIncrow was not pleased that parishioners employed as spinners in local knitting mills got out of control at a social function...

Tuesday, March 15, 2022- From the Archives of the Daily Gazette—Two lifetime pastors at St. Mary’s in Amsterdam 

Wednesday, March 16, 2022-From the Archives- February 12, 2021-Episode 357-Lawyer and historian Jim Kaplan looks at the lives of financier Bruce Wasserstein and his sister, playwright Wendy Wasserstein, key figures in the revival of New York City in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

Thursday, March 17, 2022- From the Archives of the Daily Gazette—Shawn Duffy’s Amsterdam memories 

When Duffy was young he visited his grandmother, Rose Mullarkey O’Shaughnessy, who lived in an apartment house next to the tavern...

   Collette Manufacturing Company Focus on History

...received a letter from Maggie Arnold who worked at a hardware store in Wilmot, Tasmania

by Bob Cudmore

   Collette Manufacturing Company in Amsterdam was famous for making Mendets, paper clips and juvenile sporting goods.  Mendets are bolt-like contraptions to plug holes in pots and pans.

   Marjorie Eckler of Hagaman was 15 in 1925 when a girlfriend of hers was working at Collette’s, packaging Mendets.

   Marjorie’s daughter, Arlyn (Lynn) Smith of West Galway, said, “My mother and her friend thought it would be fun to put their names and addresses in the boxes of Mendets, hoping someone would write to them.”

   A year or two later, Marjorie received a letter from Maggie Arnold who worked at a hardware store in Wilmot, Tasmania, and found Marjorie’s name and address in a box of Mendets.

   Marjorie and Maggie became lifelong pen pals.  In the late 1970s, Maggie Arnold from Tasmania, a large island south of Australia, came to America and visited Marjorie and her family.  By then Marjorie had married town of Amsterdam farmer Leland Johnson.  In 1980 Marjorie and her family visited Maggie in Tasmania.

   Cobleskill native Clarence C. Collette, born in 1876, moved to Amsterdam as a young man and began manufacturing Mendets on the third floor of the Recorder building on Railroad Street downtown.

   Mendets illustrated the philosophy, “Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

   Collette’s was incorporated in 1907 and in 1916 moved to the former Eighth Ward School on Clizbe Avenue near the Rockton Wye.  It subsequently had other manufacturing sites in Amsterdam, Hagaman and other cities.

   In 1921 Clarence Collette patented an improvement to the paper clip to make it hold papers more securely by notching ridges in the clip, which was then called a gripper clip.

   Dave Gordon, who operated Collette’s before it closed, said the patent protected only small size of gripper clips.  The patent did not prevent other manufacturers from making gripper clips of different sizes.

   By the 1930s, Collette’s was making juvenile sporting goods—baseballs, footballs and basketballs.  Many local women and men worked at Collette’s at some point in their lives. 

   The company was among the first to come up with a way to sew baseballs by machine to keep the cost down.  According to a 1940 article by newspaperman Earl O. Stowitts, “The balls which the company sews by machine are not flat-stitched, but have a slightly raised seam.” 

   The balls were covered with inexpensive leather and the cores were made from cotton or felt scraps.

   Collette’s turned from making a million baseballs a year to products that helped the Allied cause during World War II such as canteen covers, cot covers and foul weather clothing.  Mendets continued to be made to preserve cooking utensils in the face of wartime metal shortages.

   Collette’s received government contracts for some years after the war for canteen covers and the like.  In the 1950s, employment ranged from 150 to 300 people.

   Clarence and his wife Edna Collette had two daughters, Edna and Shirley. They owned a house on Locust Avenue and later built a home on Golf Course Road.

   Clarence Collette was still president of the company when he died in 1965 at the age of 88 at his winter home in St. Petersburg, Florida.  Executive vice president Eli Robinson became head of the firm.

   Collette’s moved to a former Mohasco carpet mill on De Graff Street in Amsterdam’s East End in 1976.

   Dave Gordon, whose parents had operated the Toy Tent store in downtown Amsterdam, bought Collette’s in 1978.  Gordon sold it to a Boston investment group in 1983 and left the company in 1984.  The investment firm operated Collette’s until the business closed in 1989.

Mohawk Valley Weather, Monday, March 14, 2022

Mohawk Valley News Headlines, Monday, March 14, 2022

Daily Gazette

Few candidates in village elections in Montgomery County
MONTGOMERY COUNTY — Voters at the polls will have limited choices filling out ballots without any fielded candidates or only…

https://dailygazette.com/

https://www.recordernews.com/

Leader Herald

Make Us Part of your Day

https://www.leaderherald.com/

...while looking for family history

Sunday, March 13, 2022-Michael Doyle is the author of “The Ministers’ War: John W. Mears, the Oneida Community, and the Crusade for Public Morality.”

Unbridled passions threatened nineteenth-century America, a vulnerable young nation already feeling beset by foreigners, corruption, and disease. Purifying crusaders like Hamilton College philosophy professor and Presbyterian minister John W. Mears mobilized to fight every sin and carnal lure, from liquor to free love.

Today in The Daily Gazette https://dailygazette.com/

Film continues debate over Benedict Arnold’s legacy
SARATOGA COUNTY — Among history buffs, Benedict Arnold has been a source of debate and division for decades. The release of a…

Keep history alive at The Historians Podcast—where we’re working on Episode 417-Bryan Jackson’s book on why the Titanic was doomed. (A number of passengers did want to get into the life boats)

Thanks to generous donations from Tom Stewart, Jim Kaplan and James Kirby Martin the Historians Podcast 2022 fund drive now totals $1600.  Please donate online here- https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast-2022  Or send a check made out to Bob Cudmore to the now not-so-lonely, but wind battered mailbox at 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302. Thank you and a reminder that The Historians Podcast is on Southern Tier Radio, WBDY 99.5FM this afternoon at 4:30 -A broadcast from Binghamton

Monday, March 14, 2022-The story behind the story-Collette’s made Mendets, paper clips, sporting goods and more

Tuesday, March 15, 2022- From the Archives of the Daily Gazette—Two lifetime pastors at St. Mary’s in Amsterdam 

Reverend John McIncrow and Monsignor William Arthur Browne were both lifetime pastors at St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church in Amsterdam.

Wednesday, March 16, 2022-From the Archives- February 12, 2021-Episode 357-Lawyer and historian Jim Kaplan looks at the lives of financier Bruce Wasserstein and his sister, playwright Wendy Wasserstein, key figures in the revival of New York City in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

Thursday, March 17, 2022- From the Archives of the Daily Gazette—Shawn Duffy’s Amsterdam memories 

Shawn Kevin Duffy contributed stories to this column on many topics including his family’s East End tavern. Duffy, born in Amsterdam in 1949

Friday, March 18, 2022-Episode 414-Annette Libeskind Berkovits discusses her historical novel “The Corset Maker” which follows a courageous Orthodox Jewish teen, Rifka, who was living in Warsaw Poland in the late 1920s and early‘30s.

Collette Focus on History

by Bob Cudmore

   Collette Manufacturing Company in Amsterdam was famous for making Mendets, paper clips and juvenile sporting goods.  Mendets are bolt-like contraptions to plug holes in pots and pans.

   Marjorie Eckler of Hagaman was 15 in 1925 when a girlfriend of hers was working at Collette’s, packaging Mendets.

   Marjorie’s daughter, Arlyn (Lynn) Smith of West Galway, said, “My mother and her friend thought it would be fun to put their names and addresses in the boxes of Mendets, hoping someone would write to them.”

   A year or two later, Marjorie received a letter from Maggie Arnold who worked at a hardware store in Wilmot, Tasmania, and found Marjorie’s name and address in a box of Mendets.

   Marjorie and Maggie became lifelong pen pals.  In the late 1970s, Maggie Arnold from Tasmania, a large island south of Australia, came to America and visited Marjorie and her family.  By then Marjorie had married town of Amsterdam farmer Leland Johnson.  In 1980 Marjorie and her family visited Maggie in Tasmania.

   Cobleskill native Clarence C. Collette, born in 1876, moved to Amsterdam as a young man and began manufacturing Mendets on the third floor of the Recorder building on Railroad Street downtown.

   Mendets illustrated the philosophy, “Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

   Collette’s was incorporated in 1907 and in 1916 moved to the former Eighth Ward School on Clizbe Avenue near the Rockton Wye.  It subsequently had other manufacturing sites in Amsterdam, Hagaman and other cities.

   In 1921 Clarence Collette patented an improvement to the paper clip to make it hold papers more securely by notching ridges in the clip, which was then called a gripper clip.

   Dave Gordon, who operated Collette’s before it closed, said the patent protected only small size of gripper clips.  The patent did not prevent other manufacturers from making gripper clips of different sizes.

   By the 1930s, Collette’s was making juvenile sporting goods—baseballs, footballs and basketballs.  Many local women and men worked at Collette’s at some point in their lives. 

   The company was among the first to come up with a way to sew baseballs by machine to keep the cost down.  According to a 1940 article by newspaperman Earl O. Stowitts, “The balls which the company sews by machine are not flat-stitched, but have a slightly raised seam.” 

   The balls were covered with inexpensive leather and the cores were made from cotton or felt scraps.

   Collette’s turned from making a million baseballs a year to products that helped the Allied cause during World War II such as canteen covers, cot covers and foul weather clothing.  Mendets continued to be made to preserve cooking utensils in the face of wartime metal shortages.

   Collette’s received government contracts for some years after the war for canteen covers and the like.  In the 1950s, employment ranged from 150 to 300 people.

   Clarence and his wife Edna Collette had two daughters, Edna and Shirley. They owned a house on Locust Avenue and later built a home on Golf Course Road.

   Clarence Collette was still president of the company when he died in 1965 at the age of 88 at his winter home in St. Petersburg, Florida.  Executive vice president Eli Robinson became head of the firm.

   Collette’s moved to a former Mohasco carpet mill on De Graff Street in Amsterdam’s East End in 1976.

   Dave Gordon, whose parents had operated the Toy Tent store in downtown Amsterdam, bought Collette’s in 1978.  Gordon sold it to a Boston investment group in 1983 and left the company in 1984.  The investment firm operated Collette’s until the business closed in 1989.

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation has released of the Mohawk River Basin Action Agenda 2021-2026, a five-year plan to advance efforts to conserve, preserve, and restore the Mohawk River and its watershed.

https://www.dec.ny.gov/docs/water_pdf/mohawkrbaa2021.pdf

Mohawk Valley Weather, Sunday, March 13, 2022

Mohawk Valley News Headlines, Sunday, March 13, 2022

Daily Gazette

Union’s hockey season ends in heartbreaking fashion with 4-3 overtime loss to Clarkson in ECAC Hockey tournament quarterfinals
POTSDAM — Union senior captain Josh Kosack was still in his uniform when he came out of the locker room…

https://dailygazette.com/

https://www.recordernews.com/

Leader Herald

Make Us Part of your Day

https://www.leaderherald.com/

The 2022 Historians Podcast fund drive needs your help!  To donate click, https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast-2022  Or a check made out to Bob Cudmore, send to 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302. 

... In 1921 Clarence Collette patented an improvement to the paper clip to make it hold papers more securely by notching ridges in the clip, which was then called a gripper clip.

Yes, the latest episode of The Historians will be on Amsterdam Radio today at 12:07PM

Episode 413-The first highlights episode of 2022 with excerpts from seven Historians Podcasts including Evacuation Day in New York City, 100 years of WGY radio in Schenectady, a chat with New York State historian Devin Lander, the case for Benedict Arnold and more.

WCSS 106.9FM and 1490AM

Focus on History, Daily Gazette and Amsterdam Recorder

by Bob Cudmore

   Collette Manufacturing Company in Amsterdam was famous for making Mendets, paper clips and juvenile sporting goods.  Mendets are bolt-like contraptions to plug holes in pots and pans.

   Marjorie Eckler of Hagaman was 15 in 1925 when a girlfriend of hers was working at Collette’s, packaging Mendets.

   Marjorie’s daughter, Arlyn (Lynn) Smith of West Galway, said, “My mother and her friend thought it would be fun to put their names and addresses in the boxes of Mendets, hoping someone would write to them.”

   A year or two later, Marjorie received a letter from Maggie Arnold who worked at a hardware store in Wilmot, Tasmania, and found Marjorie’s name and address in a box of Mendets.

   Marjorie and Maggie became lifelong pen pals.  In the late 1970s, Maggie Arnold from Tasmania, a large island south of Australia, came to America and visited Marjorie and her family.  By then Marjorie had married town of Amsterdam farmer Leland Johnson.  In 1980 Marjorie and her family visited Maggie in Tasmania.

   Cobleskill native Clarence C. Collette, born in 1876, moved to Amsterdam as a young man and began manufacturing Mendets on the third floor of the Recorder building on Railroad Street downtown.

   Mendets illustrated the philosophy, “Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”

   Collette’s was incorporated in 1907 and in 1916 moved to the former Eighth Ward School on Clizbe Avenue near the Rockton Wye.  It subsequently had other manufacturing sites in Amsterdam, Hagaman and other cities.

   In 1921 Clarence Collette patented an improvement to the paper clip to make it hold papers more securely by notching ridges in the clip, which was then called a gripper clip.

   Dave Gordon, who operated Collette’s before it closed, said the patent protected only small size of gripper clips.  The patent did not prevent other manufacturers from making gripper clips of different sizes.

   By the 1930s, Collette’s was making juvenile sporting goods—baseballs, footballs and basketballs.  Many local women and men worked at Collette’s at some point in their lives. 

   The company was among the first to come up with a way to sew baseballs by machine to keep the cost down.  According to a 1940 article by newspaperman Earl O. Stowitts, “The balls which the company sews by machine are not flat-stitched, but have a slightly raised seam.” 

   The balls were covered with inexpensive leather and the cores were made from cotton or felt scraps.

Monday more information on todays Collette Story. Audio Podcast-March 14, 2022

   Collette’s turned from making a million baseballs a year to products that helped the Allied cause during World War II such as canteen covers, cot covers and foul weather clothing.  Mendets continued to be made to preserve cooking utensils in the face of wartime metal shortages.

   Collette’s received government contracts for some years after the war for canteen covers and the like.  In the 1950s, employment ranged from 150 to 300 people.

   Clarence and his wife Edna Collette had two daughters, Edna and Shirley. They owned a house on Locust Avenue and later built a home on Golf Course Road.

   Clarence Collette was still president of the company when he died in 1965 at the age of 88 at his winter home in St. Petersburg, Florida.  Executive vice president Eli Robinson became head of the firm.

   Collette’s moved to a former Mohasco carpet mill on De Graff Street in Amsterdam’s East End in 1976.

   Dave Gordon, whose parents had operated the Toy Tent store in downtown Amsterdam, bought Collette’s in 1978.  Gordon sold it to a Boston investment group in 1983 and left the company in 1984.  The investment firm operated Collette’s until the business closed in 1989.

Tomorrow, take a break from snow removal

Episode #215

Sunday, March 13, 2022-Michael Doyle is the author of “The Ministers’ War: John W. Mears, the Oneida Community, and the Crusade for Public Morality.”

Listen to The Historians on Google https://podcasts.google.com/search/The%20Historians

Mohawk Valley Weekend Weather, Saturday, March 12, 2022

Friday, March 18, 2022-Episode 414-Annette Libeskind Berkovits discusses her historical novel “The Corset Maker” which follows a courageous Orthodox Jewish teen, Rifka, who was living in Warsaw Poland in the late 1920s and early ‘30s.

Mohawk Valley News Headlines, Saturday, March 12, 2022

Daily Gazette

Amsterdam nets $5 million for ‘transformational’ projects in federal bill
AMSTERDAM — The city of Amsterdam will receive a combined $5 million towards a pair of “transformational” projects improving accessibility…

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Education news in brief

Fonda-Fultonville kindergarten registration begins March 21 FONDA — The Fonda-Fultonville Central School District has announced that kindergarten registration for the 2022-23 school year will begin on March 21. Children must be...

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Leader Herald

GESD struggling with cronic absenteeism

by Jason Subik

https://www.leaderherald.com/

...“It opened with an inmate escaping in the dead of winter from an institution for the mentally deranged,”

Historians Go Fund Me 2022 

https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-historians-podcast-2022  Or send a check made out to Bob Cudmore at 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302.

Thursday, March 10, 2022

Budding moviemakers in the 1940s   

By Bob Cudmore

A recent column with a list of names from the St. Stanislaus School eighth grade class of 1940 provided by Fred Wojcicki prompted class member George A. Tralka to recollect stories from his teen-age years.

Tralka left Amsterdam to join the Army in 1944, later became a medical doctor and now lives in Vienna, Virginia after many years in Washington, D.C.

Tralka’s high school friends included Harold Langley, Donald Blonkowski, Lou Hage and John Donlon.  All attended St. Mary’s Institute. 

The group hung out at various spots—Rapello’s Pharmacy or Kansas Restaurant on East Main, and Brownie’s hot dog restaurant or Wytrwal’s Furniture on Reid Hill.

According to Tralka, Langley was the group’s Civil War authority and filmmaker.  Langley is retired as curator of U.S. Naval History at the Smithsonian in Washington and professor of American History at Catholic University.

Blonkowski was a master of dialects, impersonation and social commentary back in the day.  Blonkowski has passed away and was a graduate of Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. 

Hage provided sage advice as a teen.  He is retired after a long career with the State Department in Washington. 

Donlon sang tenor growing up in Amsterdam in a barbershop-style singing group that could be heard “in occasionally raffish song” under Guy Park Avenue’s streetlights.  He went to the U.S. Naval Academy and a career as a nuclear submarine commander.

Tralka and Donlon had fathers with similar interests.  Joseph J. Tralka was a church organist and Upstate New York correspondent for a Polish language newspaper based in Buffalo.  Hugh P. Donlon was also a church organist and a reporter for the Recorder, who wrote a history of Amsterdam in 1980.

Langley, the Civil War buff, got the group to march in an Amsterdam Halloween parade as Civil War soldiers.  The boys had gray suits that passed for Confederate uniforms.  Tralka won a prize for his portrayal of a wounded Confederate.  He still has the prize, a now battered volume of “One Hundred Condensed Novels” donated by Seely-Conover’s stationery. 

Langley also had a hand-cranked Univex movie camera back in the 1940s and organized his friends in making a movie called “The Mad Mortician.”

“It opened with an inmate escaping in the dead of winter from an institution for the mentally deranged,” Tralka wrote.  “A dark figure is seen vaulting over a brick wall, snow flying. We used the City Hall on Church Street as a stand-in for that institution. This did provoke some brave comments from some of us about the appropriateness of the locale.”

For the shoot, Tralka fashioned a faux brass plaque from cardboard and shoe polish with bold letters reading Insane Asylum. 

“On film it looked like a brass plate,” Tralka said.

The group shot the opening scene during Christmas vacation and the following summer, scenes were acted out along the railroad track near James Street. 

Exterior stone walls of the Langley home on Romeyn Avenue were used as interior walls for those scenes set in an abandoned building where nefarious events took place at the hands of a demented mortician played by Blonkowski.

The group made other films, one called “Professor Bixby and Dr. Leach.”  They used retired Army uniforms with helmets to enact brief scenes for a World War II infantry film on the snowy hillsides of McDonald Drive.

“The National Guard Armory kindly allowed us to use one of their Jeeps, and an exact copy of an M-1 Garand rifle was fashioned by me,” Tralka wrote.  “It looked like a grand project until Harold Langley's camera was stolen in the course of a bus ride and we never really resumed our filmmaking after that.”

Tomorrow, Friday, March 11, 2022 Episode 413 with Bob Cudmore

The first highlights episode of 2022 with excerpts from seven Historians Podcasts including Evacuation Day in New York City, 100 years of WGY radio in Schenectady, a chat with New York State historian Devin Lander, the case for Benedict Arnold and more.

Saturday, March 12, 2022

Mendets, paper clips, sporting goods and more

Focus on History in the Daily Gazette and Amsterdam Recorder-Collette’s

Sharpin your shovel and hone your skill at snow removal, or pay the plow guy

Mohawk Valley Weather, Thursday, March 10, 2022

Mohawk Valley News Headlines, Thursday, March 10, 2022

Daily Gazette

Mark Morris explores music and movement; dance group at The Egg Friday
Celebrated choreographer Mark Morris is thrilled to bring his company, Mark Morris Dance Group, to The Egg on Friday.

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Leader Herald

Johnstown officials failed to issue proper responses to March 2021 audit

by Andrew Waite

https://www.leaderherald.com/

Wednesday, March 9, 2022-From the Archives-Episode 187, November 3, 2017, Gus Kappler, M.D., recounts his service in Vietnam as described in his book, “Welcome Home from Vietnam Finally: A Vietnam Trauma Surgeon’s Memoir.”

Historians on The World Wide Web and Radio with updates seven days a week, on the radio three days a week and a new Episode every Friday

Go Fund Me

Send a check made out to Bob Cudmore 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, NY 12302.  Keep history alive at The Historians Podcast—where we’re working on Episode 416-Neil Lanctot’s book on the debate that took place over whether America should enter World War I.

Thursday, March 10, 2022-From the Archives of the Daily Gazette—Young filmmakers in 1940s Amsterdam

The group shot the opening scene during Christmas vacation and the following summer, scenes were acted out along the railroad track near James Street. 

Friday, March 11, 2022

Episode 413

The first highlights episode of 2022 with excerpts from seven Historians Podcasts including Evacuation Day in New York City, 100 years of WGY radio in Schenectady, a chat with New York State historian Devin Lander, the case for Benedict Arnold and more.

Saturday, March 12, 2022

Focus on History in the Daily Gazette and Amsterdam Recorder-Collette’s made Mendets, paper clips, sporting goods and more

The Rome Historical Society will host “Conception of the Erie,” a virtual program on the start of the construction of the Erie Canal, Wednesday, March 16, 2022

Facebook and Zoom

https://romehistoricalsociety.org/

Derrick Pratt, Museum Educator at the Erie Canal Museum, will discuss the long-winded planning and highly anticipated start of Erie Canal construction. This talk looks at the early efforts to harness New York’s natural waterways and the political wrangling that almost kept the “Eighth Wonder of the World” from happening.

Mohawk Valley Weather, Wednesday, March 9, 2022

Mohawk Valley News Headlines, Wednesday, March 9, 2022

Daily Gazette

EDITORIAL: Suspend state gas tax to help New Yorkers
It’s probably not a coincidence that we use a car-related term — jump-start —

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Leader Herald

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