The Board of Ethics and the Planning & Zoning Commission were both set to gather in separate meetings Thursday night to consider offshoots of the same subject — an application by Planter’s Choice Nursery on Huntingtown Road to build a one acre irrigation pond on its property.

***

Lyndon D. Thomas and Wendy Bausch were honored as Newtown’s outstanding young man and woman for 1978 during festivities at the annual Newtown Jaycees and Jaycee Wives banquet last Saturday at Danbury’s Embassy room. They were selected from a field of nine candidates by the judges, Dr Raymond O. Craven, Dr B. Jean Gretsch, and William J. Lavery. They received handsome plaques at the banquet.

***

Newtown police have under investigation the incident of a school bus having a window shattered by what is believed to have been a pellet. The shooting took place on Monday afternoon around 2:50 in Sandy Hook Center, as bus driver George Oberstadt was transporting a load of Sandy Hook Elementary School children home for the day.

***

A tentative date of Monday, February 26, has been set for the Planning & Zoning Commission’s hearing for two subdivision plans encompassing over 140 acres of land and water off Walnut Tree Hill Road in Sandy Hook. Chairman Arthur Spector requested that the planners hold a hearing on Bridge End Farm, which fronts on the Housatonic River, and Bridge End Farm West. The two plans would initially result in 27 building lots.

***

The state Department of Environmental Protection has sent a letter of apology to the Newtown Conservation Commission for asking it to remove setback requirements from its regulations when there were none there.

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Dr Douglas Fox, a professor of public administration at William Paterson College and a Sandy Hook resident, is the author of a recently published book, “Managing the Public’s Interest.”

***

Chieppo Bus Company buses were rolling again Wednesday on their normal routes between Bridgeport, New Haven and Danbury, following an order Monday by the Public Utilities Control Authority that the company resume service which was terminated Friday, January 26. Chieppo informed the PUCA in mid-December that it would terminate all intrastate routes, citing a lack of ridership and loss of revenue. But following a hearing in Hartford, Monday, at which Newtown State Rep John Anderson and First Selectman Jack Rosenthal were among speakers opposing discontinuation of the routes, the PUCA ordered the company to resume routes or face the possibility of $5,000 a day fines.

FEBRUARY 5, 1954

The Council of Mental Health declared last week that the state of Connecticut could save “upward of $50,000,000” by converting the facilities for the housing of transferable mental hospital patients to relieve overcrowding. The council said in a report to Governor John Lodge that the patient population of Connecticut, Norwich and Fairfield State Hospital on the last day of September, 1953, was 9,118, 40.5 percent above rated capacity. It termed this situation “dangerous and indefensible, but hitherto unavoidable.”

***

Henry Johnson of Sandy Hook was elected vice president of the Candlewood Shrine Club at a monthly dinner meeting last Thursday evening, January 28, at the Hotel Green, Danbury.

***

Robert J. Qubick, son of Mr and Mrs John J. Qubick, The Boulevard, was discharged from the Marine Corps last Friday, January 29, after serving a three-year enlistment, at Quantico Marine Base, Va. He was with the First Marine Division in Korea for 14 months, in motor transport, and was rated staff sergeant, at the time of his discharge.

***

The Newtown Board of Education voted at a special meeting last Thursday, January 28, to re-open Sandy Hook School for the 1954-55 school year to provide for an increased number of elementary school children and to alleviate some crowding which exists at Hawley School. The action was based on a survey based on school census figures which, projected over the next several years, indicates the need of an increase in elementary school facilities from the present 19 rooms to 30 rooms for grades one through six, for the 1958-59 school year.

***

A turnout of nearly 100 dairy and poultry farmers to meetings held last week in Newtown and Stepney was proof of the popularity and of the benefits derived from the efforts of the Fairfield County Farm Bureau and Extension Service to provide expert advice on technical subjects and to stimulate the exchange of ideas. The dairy meeting, held Wednesday, January 27, in Edmond Town Hall, Newtown, drew 40 dairymen to hear Robert Putnam and Rufus Munsell of the University of Connecticut discuss the management of a hypothetical dairy farm.

***

Members of the Women’s Auxiliary of the United Fire Company of Botsford are asked to come in work clothes, ready to clean and polish chairs, this Friday, February 5, at the fire house.

***

Sixty young people of St Rose parish, meeting Monday night, February 1, in St Rose Hall to organize a club, elected a full slate of officers and made plans for initial activities. Those named to office were: Donald Ryan, president; Richard Maye, vice president; Kathy Milot, secretary; Lorraine Keating, treasurer; and Kathleen McMahon, reporter. Mrs Kenneth B. Smith presided.

FEBRUARY 1, 1929

A new industry has begun operating on the lower floor of the Plastic Molding factory at Sandy Hook, to be known as the American Brush Wire Company. The gentlemen comprising the firm are John McCarthy of the Newtown Coal and Grain Company and Martin McNamara.

***

Thermometers in the Sandy Hook district showed a record of two degrees below zero, Tuesday morning.

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St Rose’s Players will begin rehearsals Friday night for the three act farce, “The Whole Town’s Talking,” which will be produced at St Rose’s casino during April.

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Carl Rasmussen is changing his store in Dodgingtown into a flat, which will be occupied by Mr and Mrs Joseph Harker.

***

John J. Keane has accepted the agency for the Philco Radio for Newtown and vicinity.

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Walter L. Glover, Newtown’s popular radio dealer, had the pleasure of listening in to the Byrds’ Antarctic expedition one morning this week at 4:30. The messages being sent out were in code and were received by Mr Glover on a short wave set.

***

Hon Charles G. Morris and Mrs Morris are leaving New York on the Fabre Line steamship, “Providence,” bound for the Mediterranean.

***

F.W. Andrews and R.D. Fairchild of Taunton filled their ice houses Wednesday.

FEBRUARY 5, 1904

Selectman S.A. Blackman informed a Bee reporter that the town of Newtown had not expended a dollar for shoveling snow this year. Several men presented bills for shoveling snow but Mr Blackman declined to pay them all. One man claimed Mr Duncombe had ordered it done. “Then he’s the man you should look to for your pay,” remarked the selectman with a wink of the eye.

***

W.C. Johnson is building a large addition to his ice house at the Foundry pond, where he will store ice for the Borden Milk Company.

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The American Tobacco Company shipped on Wednesday from Hawleyville to Richmond, Va., a car of tobacco. Many of the farmers about town sent their crops in this car load.

***

There were about 50 who attended the Japanese social at G.R. Wilson’s Wednesday evening, which was greatly enjoyed by all. W.A. Canfield took a sleigh load over to assist in carrying out the program.

***

It is reported that the engine that had been kept at Sandy Hook for helping the freights up grade toward Southford had been moved from Sandy Hook to Hartford.

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William Wheeler has taken a position with the Reclaiming Works at Sandy Hook.

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Mrs Annie Walters and daughter have moved from Great Barrington, Mass., into the house of Edward Walterndorf in Huntingtown district.