August 18, 1995

Peace 50 Years Ago: It came over on the radio, starting around 7 pm. The Japanese had surrendered. World War II had ended. People could finally let go of the anxiety that a brother or husband would be maimed or killed, and people started to celebrate. Albert H. Nichols of Wendover Road was oblivious to what was happening at home. He was sitting in Okinawa airport, preparing for an invasion into the southern tip of Japan. The Japanese, he said, had a reputation for never giving up. But Mr Nichols never found out. In that airport, news of the war ending was announced. Mr Nichols said gun fire erupted from American soldiers rejoicing in the news.

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A major feature film is expected to be photographed in part on Fairfield Hills campus, according to First Selectman Robert Cascella. The movie, which is expected to begin filming in October, will star film actors Robert DeNiro and Brad Pitt, the first selectman said this week. The production, with the working name of Sleepers, also will be shot in New York City.

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The town is again trying to get the Fairfield Hills campus road network open to truck traffic to relieve traffic congestion in the town center while sewer construction is underway there. First Selectman Robert Cascella... met with DOT officials to discuss allowing the use of Fairfield Hills roads as a truck detour around the town center while sewering is underway on Main Street... It was the third meeting the town has had with DOT on the topic.

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The Booth Library will be featuring large sections of history, art, and their largest ever selection of cook books at the library book sale to be held Labor Day weekend... Estimates are that this 20th edition will be the largest sale in Booth history, with 95,000 books under four tents and in the library itself.

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The Board of Selectmen decided Monday night to get a legal opinion on a proposed regulation that would allow the first selectman and the financial director to authorize a departmental transfer of funds by doing a telephone poll of the members of the board and the Legislative Council. “We’re not trying to circumvent the charter — we’re just trying to expedite the process,” said Finance Director Benjamin Spragg... But Democratic selectman Gary Fetzer was troubled by the proposed regulation... concerned about “potential for abuse” which would exist because the regulation “doesn’t give the public the opportunity to comment on the transfer... In addition there would be no public record of how (board and council) members voted.”

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When Mendelsohn’s Video Memories tapes a wedding, everything has to be perfect. When work is over and its time to play — in the Newtown Weeknite Slo-Pitch League — Mendelsohn’s Video Memories’ softball team approaches its task with the same enthusiasm. The result has been a 1994 league championship and a first-place standing in 1995. The team is in first place with three games left to play.

August 14, 1970

Some people may think that collecting road signs and stop signs is a fascinating hobby, but it is a costly and dangerous one — to the town and motorists. Recently there has been an alarming increase in missing road and stop signs around town and what it costs the town for each sign can be put in dollars and cents: cost of sign: $10.80; labor, $5.51; truck, $4; bracket, $3.95; and post, $6.20. Stop signs: $8.20; posts, $3.85; labor, $3.70; and truck, $3. But the cost of what could happen to a motorist or pedestrian because a stop sign is not where it should have been can not be measured in dollars and cents.

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At its meeting August 7, the Planning and Zoning Commission drafted a preliminary statement on the use of the Boyle property as the site for an elementary school. The letter says in part, “At this stage the Commission sees no major problems with respect to the use of area roads to serve this site, and further, based on the preliminary testing, more particularly with respect to the fifth test pit, it seems the requirements for a satisfactory septic system will be met.”

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The Newtown League of Women Voters’ local study group will meet on Tuesday evening, August 18. The purpose of this meeting will be to discuss possible ways of surveying the present and future housing needs of Newtown and to determine whether there is or will be a need for more adequate housing for such special groups as the elderly, single people, and low-income people.

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This week-end Newtown will welcome its new AFS student. She is Irma Del Zurita Garrido from Quillota, Chile, and will enter Newtown High School as a senior. Irma’s host family will be Mr and Mrs Vincent Duffany of Deerfield Drive in Sandy Hook. Their daughter, Lorraine, who will also be a senior this year, applied through school to have an AFS student stay with her family.

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Golden Miss is a two-week old Welsh pony, and if leather boots can be made for her, she will be alongside her mother in the Progress Days Festival Parade on Labor Day. Her owners are Mr and Mrs William Simpson of Pecks Lane, who have a delightful and unusual hobby. They are clowns, and members of the Clowns of America. Judy, who is the mother of Golden Miss, is part of the clown act that the Simpsons do with their son, Robert, and his girl, Sally Walker of New Milford. Golden Miss is too young for shoes, so that is why Mr Simpson is trying to figure out how to make leather boots for her so she can be at her mother’s side in the parade.

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One of the oldest and most charming homes in Newtown suddenly became a summer “theatre” on Sunday, August 9. The patio of Louis and Bryna Untermeyer was the setting for a special reading of “Morton the Patient,” by noted playwright Claude McNeal. Mr McNeal is also a Newtowner and lives on Rock Ridge Road. The purpose of the reading was to polish off final administrative problems and contractual arrangements prior to the start of rehearsals later this month in New York. The play is scheduled to open September 23.

August 10, 1945

Close and spirited competition characterized this year’s Honegger Cup Tennis Tournament, played Saturday and Sunday on Walnut Tree Hill, especially the finals in which the team of H.C. Honegger and J.C. Wilson met defeat at the determined hands of W.A. Prime and H.P. Farrington.

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EMERGENCY FARM WORKERS NEEDED Enlist In The Crop Corps — Now! Food is important in the prosecution of the war... and the production and harvesting of crops is an essential war job. Emergency workers are urgently needed to supplement the regular farm work force. Women... Men... Boys and Girls can all help in spare time. Visit the Fairfield County Farm Bureau, Post Office Building, Danbury.

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Dr Waldo F. Desmond spoke on the discovery, development and uses of penicillin at the meeting of the Rotary Club at the Parker House on Monday evening. Dr Desmond’s fine telling of the opening of this new era in antibiotics, from the time Sir Alexander Fleming first noticed that a speck of mould seemed to be killing germs in a test tray to the present large scale production of penicillin, made a story as wonderful as that of the atomic bomb.

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Martin Sealander, local real estate developer, has recently acquired a tract of land on South Main Street and has started the construction of four houses. These houses will be of five and six rooms and will contain all modern conveniences. Each house will be built on a plot of land one-half acre or more on a private street, and will be offered to the public when completed.

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The New England Committee on Farm Information, a voluntary, informal, unpaid group which came together because of a deep, mutual interest in the importance to the New England region of a sounder city-country understanding, is offering the Connecticut Newspaper Awards to be competed for by the daily and weekly newspapers of Connecticut. The Bee has entered the contest and will welcome suggestions from readers as to the types of articles and editorials it might stress during the next three months which will help city people understand the problems of the farmer, and vice versa.

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Friends will be sorry to learn that “Al” Boysen was stricken with viral pneumonia and is a patient at the Danbury hospital, where he was taken Tuesday night. Everyone hopes “Al” will have a speedy recovery and will soon be home to carry on with his numerous duties.

July 30, 1920

The microfilm containing 1920 Newtown Bee editions is kept at the C.H. Booth Library, which is temporarily closed due to coronavirus health precautions.

Your memories are the ones we want to share! Do you have photographs of people or places in town from a bygone era? The Way We Were is the perfect landing spot so that your photographs can be enjoyed by Newtown Bee readers. Images can be e-mailed as attachments to editor@thebee.com, subject line: Way We Were photo. When submitting photographs, please identify as many people as possible, the location, and the approximate date.