Full Text:

WAY WE WERE

MARCH 30, 1973

Challenger Maxine Ginn trounced GOP-endorsed candidate John D'Addario in

Wednesday's Republican primary for a spot on the ballot for Planning and

Zoning commissioner. In a light voter turnout, Mrs Ginn became the Republican

candidate, tallying 599 to 342 for Mr D'Addario for a shot at a five-year term

on P&Z. Mrs Ginn also will fill a one-year vacancy on the commission, for

which she also challenged Mr D'Addario. She won that contest by 585-337 votes.

Mr D'Addario, who has been a P&Z alternate since January 1971, was endorsed by

the Republican Town Commission at a caucus in February.

In an interview Wednesday night, First Selectman Frank DeLucia reaffirmed a

statement he made at a meeting of the Newtown Beautification Committee last

week citing the need for a full-time professional planner for Newtown. Mr

DeLucia said he felt that by hiring a $12,000- to $14,000-a-year professional

planning officer, the town could continually update its town plan. The planner

would review all subdivisions, do the legwork for the Planning & Zoning

Commission, and help businesses coming into the community. Newtown presently

uses a professional engineer to consult on subdivisions and roads but Mr

DeLucia said Newtown is a growing community of 17,000, with a projected size

of 50,000, and this growth should be in an orderly fashion.

In response to Mr DeLucia's comments of last week, P&Z Secretary Arthur

Spector said the commission has budgeted for a professional consultant for a

number of years but the selectman cut the budget request. He said Mr DeLucia

has attended very few P&Z meetings and apparently is not aware of the desire

of the commission to protect the environment and the town's rural atmosphere.

"Mr DeLucia's over-simplified statement regarding the P&Z Commission having no

architectural guidelines and that the commission's function is to say only

"yes" or "no" is erroneous and irresponsible," Mr Spector said, referring to

Mr DeLucia's comments at the Beautification Committee meeting. Most of the

eyesores in town preexisted zoning, Mr Spector added.

The Newtown Jaycees held their second annual Health Day for the benefit of

Newtown residents on Saturday at the high school. Opening ceremonies were

attended by state and local officials including the state commissioner of

mental health, Ernest Shepherd, acting as representative for Gov Thomas

Meskill. When the doors opened, a large crowd of Newtowners was on hand to

take advantage of the free health information and tests offered.

The Newtown Police Department spent a busy week, primarily responding to the

increasing number of bomb scares. Since The Bee went to press last week there

have been eight more calls reporting bombs at Heise-Bourdon, St Rose School

(twice), DeSherbinn Lamp Products, Hemis Paper Company, Hawley School, the

high school, and the Batchelder plant. In each case, the buildings were

evacuated and a search of the premises was made by police.

The Newtown League of Women Voters will celebrate its 25th anniversary on

April 3 during its annual meeting at Trinity Church. League members will

receive a booklet which briefly outlines the history of the Newtown League

since its inception as a provisional league in March of 1948. In its first

year, the LWV did a study of Newtown's tax structure and assessments, and also

did a research project on roads and streets of Newtown authenticating names

where confusion existed. In 1952 the league published a map of Newtown, the

first such map since 1905. Many other achievements were made by the league

during its brief history and these are mentioned in the booklet.

For a while last week it looked as though a newly repaired and gilded ball

would be back atop the flagpole, but now it looks like the only thing that

will be sitting up there for some time will be a flock of roosting pigeons.

The ball was toppled this fall, falling literally into the hands of Police Sgt

Michael Fekete. It was repaired but when workmen attempted to replace it atop

the pole, they discovered that they had been given the wrong measurements and

the crane was too short. They got a larger crane, and returned the following

day, only to discover that the seat for the ball was broken and the work could

not be done. They now are looking for a metalworker who is not afraid of

heights to do the repair.

APRIL 2, 1948

The Newtown chapter, United World Federalists, met at the library on Tuesday

evening and reported that approximately 1,400 signatures have been secured so

far by the 50 canvassers who worked in town last week. The petition drive is

attempting to get support for a stronger United Nations and eventual world

government.

Despite the fact that this is the first year of the St Rose basketball team,

the team went to the Western Connecticut basketball tourney and bested the

Sharfman team of Winsted in the opening round before falling to the

well-coached, poised, tourney-experienced Red Raiders of Torrington High

School on Saturday, March 27. Crippled by the loss of Kowalkowski, Miekle, and

Cannon, St Rose still managed, by resorting to their early season zone

defense, to hold the speedy Raiders to a half-time deficit of 17-10. But in

the second half, the Torrington sharp-shooters had too many guns for the

Churchmen and went on to win, 48-22. Matty Mihalek of St Rose was picked for

the All-Tourney third team and also won a prize for the most spectacular shot

of the tournament.

Mrs Antoinette Daniels, music teacher in the Newtown schools, will retire from

teaching at the end of this school year in June. Her services have extended

over a long number of years, her entry into the field of teaching having been

made in 1915 when she started to teach music in the old high school building

which stood opposite St Rose Church and later burned down. Mrs Daniels was

soloist and choir director at Trinity Church in 1915 and, with only train

service for transportation, spent the weekends in town rather than go home to

Newtown. The late Bee publisher Allison Smith, who was then chairman of the

Board of Education, realized that Mrs Daniels passed the high school on the

way to the train so one day he asked her to stop off and help the pupils with

a song for graduation. That was the start of her long and successful career as

a music teacher in the schools.

All children in the local schools will be given chest x-ray examinations on

April 8 and 9 in a program sponsored by the Newtown Visiting Nurse Association

and the Board of Education. Case-by-case testing for the detection of

tuberculosis has been widely recognized as the most satisfactory health

insurance there is. Until recently it was an expensive procedure. Now, thanks

to the foresight on the part of public health officials, it is brought to

large groups free.

Newtown's Ksh I La La and Tanda Camp Fire groups held a food sale recently to

raise money for the national Crusade for Children. Under the leadership of Mrs

H. Gould Curtis, the girls raised $51. The national drive is attempting to

raise $60 million to provide at least one year's nourishment and relief for

some 10 million of the worst cases in Europe.

At last Monday's meeting of the Newtown Rotary Club in the Parker House, Col

Robert N. Mackin, retired Army intelligence officer, gave an interesting

off-the-record talk on President Roosevelt's visit to the Middle East

following his Yalta Conference. Col Mackin's headquarters were in Cairo at

that time and, as head of the American intelligence in that sector, he was

responsible for all of the VIPs visiting in that part of the world.

At a meeting of the Charles H. Peck Sr and Jr Post No 308, VFW, Joseph C.

Hanlon was elected commander. Alfred H. Jurgens was elected senior vice

commander; William L. Slocum, junior vice commander; George A. Jackson,

chaplain; William Weiss, quartermaster; William K. Daniells, trustee for three

years; Winfred J. Carmody and Alfred H. Jurgens, delegates to the Fairfield

County Council; William L. Slocum and Benjamin G. Ferris, alternates.