December 2007                         Vol. 131                                              No. 10

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We Wish You a Merry Christmas and

a Happy New Year!

  Snow fun all Winter Long

Alplaus Post Office News

The holiday stamps are in and we are ready for the busiest time of the year.

   Wishing all of you a safe, happy, healthy holiday season, 

From Kathy and the girls at the APO

On the Hill

December 1st and a trace of overnight snow in the yard - a picture post card of the season ahead. I can hardly wait to switch from mowing grass and raking leaves to plowing snow. Hopefully the town crews will have picked up the heaps of leaves on our street by the time you read this.

   This issue of the Home Town News includes a piece by Kirk Herrick about his old friend and neighbor, Ken Coyle. It illustrates the spirit of cooperation and neighborliness that Alplaus fosters in all of us. It also gives newer residents a glimpse of Alplaus past - note the picture of the old Buffalo Fire Engine that accompanies it. That engine is now paraded each year in our 4th of July celebrations by the Harmony Corners Fire Department.

   Judy and I wish all of you and those who you hold dear a Happy Holiday Season and a special New Year……..AWH

Alplaus Fire Department Calls for November 2007

Ladies Auxiliary

                                                                                    by Vicki Watkins

The Auxiliary will finish up this very busy and exciting year with the 3^rd annual Holiday Cookie Sale.  Our delicious home-made holiday treats will be on sale at the Post Office on Saturday, December 8^th from 10 am to 2 pm.  If you don’t have the time to bake during this hectic time of year, let us do it for you!

   Each year during the holiday season the Auxiliary makes a contribution to a local organization and/or adopts a family.  This year we choose to contribute to the Schenectady Battered Women’s Shelter and the Schenectady City Mission. 

   Our 2008 “Homes of Alplaus” Calendar featuring the winners of the photo contest is back from the printers and is just beautiful.  We thank all of you who submitted photos.  These wall calendars are available for $14 at the Post Office or can be ordered by phone at 518 399-8048.  Shipping can be arranged for out of town orders. 

   Please mark your calendars and get out your recipe books for the 3^rd annual Chili Challenge scheduled for Friday, January 25^th.  Details will be in next month’s HTN.

   At our November meeting the Auxiliary voted in a new slate of officers for 2008: Margaret Rockwell and Vicki Watkins, Co-Presidents; Tracie Williams, Vice-President; Pat Beaver, Treasurer and Pat Coppola, Secretary.  We also welcomed Sheri McGovern as our newest member.

   Best wishes to you and your families this holiday season.

   Peace, Vicki

Happy New Year 2008!!!! 

ARA News

                        by Keith Abatto, Pres. ARA

Please make sure to read the Sewer update from Barb Casey.

‘Tis the Season.  Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  Next up is the annual ARA tree-lighting that will be at the firehouse on Saturday, December 8^th from 5-6pm.  I hope you’ll join us for Santa’s arrival, great refreshments from Samuel's and your neighbors, and Christmas carols. 

   For anyone not celebrating Christmas, please feel free to come anyway.  It is a nice way to spend time with your neighbors.  I learned from Barb’s article last year that the lighting of the tree is rooted in pagan traditions, but commonly thought of now as a Christian celebration.  Whatever you celebrate – Enjoy the Holiday Season and have a Happy New Year.

kabatto@eone.com   399-6624

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Sewer Update

                        by Barb Casey 

I'm sure many of you saw the article in the Daily Gazette on Tuesday, November 27th about Clifton Park working towards connecting with the Glenville sewer system. Although that deal has not yet been finalized, there is much optimism from everyone involved that we will have a deal with Clifton Park that will lower our debt service and hopefully bring our costs below the $904 per year petitioned amount from earlier this year.

   I posed a few questions to Glenville Town Administrator Tony Germano earlier this week, and below are the answers I received. Work should be beginning shortly on pump stations, with the bulk of the work to come next spring, as I reported in last month's HTN (see the website for back issues). Any information in brackets was added by me for clarification. Many thanks to Tony for providing the information.

   Question--Are all of the easements finalized?

   Answer--Easements are not yet finalized with [Stan] Kivort [owner of the property where the marina, industrial park, and maritime center are location] and Pan Am Railroad.

   Kivort has all of the necessary info and will need to sign shortly. If we do not hear from him in the next week or so, we will most likely begin the legal proceedings for property condemnation. While that legal process could take upward of a few months or so, I am told it will not delay any portion of the project.

   We are still negotiating with Pan Am on the [railroad] easement. They require $3000 non-refundable engineering payment before even considering granting of an easement. We are attempting to convince them that the location of the easement is in an area that will never be suitable for construction of railroad tracks. I suspect we will need to pay them the $3000 to move this easement process. Unfortunately, there are no other alternatives available to us to re-route the pipe.

   Question--Do we know anything more about any additional repairs to the existing sewer system?

   Answer--This year we have spent approximately $5,000 of the $12,000 budget to repair manholes and a pipe leak on 1st Street. There are a few more minor pipe repairs that need to be attended to and we will have them done either this year or next spring. We will need to perform a further assessment of this system for the future-but at present we are not aware of any other work that needs to be done.

   Question--What will our 2008 tax bills be for sewers? [Please realize that the Town of Glenville has already started paying on the 30-year debt for the project, which is why we've had to pay this year and last. Last year, the Town gave us a special dispensation and we didn't pay the full amount. [Those on the extension are only paying the debt service, and don't yet owe usage or operations and maintenance costs, for obvious reasons.]

   Answer--For 2007, users within the new district paid $379 for debt costs. Users of the existing system paid $838 ($458 for operation and maintenance and $379 for debt). For 2008, users within the new district will pay $675 for debt. Users of the existing system will pay $904 (which includes debt, operations and maintenance and usage). We will also be reviewing these numbers with the Town Board this evening [November 28] since it is a part of the budget. Of course, these numbers would also be significantly reduced if we were to receive the Shared Service Grant [from New York State] and/or adding of users from Clifton Park and the Glencliff School. We are working diligently with Clifton Park and the School to do all that we can to facilitate their joining to this system.

   Question--When will our leaves be picked up? [Just kidding, I didn't ask this question, but Tony answered it anyway, telling me that the crews still plan to pick up leaves, weather permitting.]

     bcasey@skidmore.edu or 399-5714

Samuel's Coffee Talk

by Jason Watt

Hello Alplaus, This December brings back many of our holiday specialties such as the Eggnog Latte, Peppermint Penguin and the Candy Cane Latte! We are also still taking Holiday pie/cookie orders. So today is the day to stop in, take a gander and place your order! By the way, for all of you lovers of the Ginger Snap, we are working hard to bring them back in time for this Christmas Holiday!

   Finally, stop in and check out our Art Display. Our December wall features several different artists, each bringing something a little different to the table. From all of us here at Samuels: Thank you for all your support and patronage this past year and we look forward to being able to serve you in the year to come.

   Have a very Merry Christmas and an extremely Happy New Year!!

   December music schedule:

12/01 Mark Kelly                (acoustic rock)
12/07 Catfish Don              (Folk/country)
12/08 Emily Smith              (country rock)
12/14 Emily & Chloe           (acoustic rock)
12/15 Patchass & Scrawny  (instrumental rock)
12/21 The Nightlife            (rock)
12/22 Prostitutes in Suits   (instrumental funk)
12/28 Chaos Con Queso    (rock)
12/29 OPEN MIC!!        

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Alplaus Bird Line

                        by Shawna Thompson

As we transition from fall to winter, now is the time to make seasonal preparations. Many people only feed the birds in the wintertime, and in December the delighted birds are finding full feeders and suet once again. The Brown Creeper has returned to my yard, climbing upward on the tree trunks, and then flying to the base of the next tree.

   Art Harris mentioned that after removing two trees from the backyard, the cardinals seem to have disappeared! Sunflower seeds on a platform feeder should entice them back.

   I received a wonderful e-mail from Vicki Watkins that I would like to share with you here:

I spent ten minutes before my last bike ride of the season checking out what’s at the feeder on this sunny cool Sunday morning. The usual variety of both male and female sparrows, cardinals, bluejays, tufted titmice (mouses…?), black-capped chickadees, purple finches, doves and a few dark-eyed juncos and I think a red-breasted nuthatch. The doves are strutting around at the base of the feeder except for one enterprising lady who figured out how to cling onto one corner of the rail and peck away at the striped and black seed mixture to her stomach’s content. Of course, there are several wannabe flyers with stripes down their backs who scurry around the ground picking up the birds leavings-Chip and Dale and crew.  Occasionally they all fly or scamper away for a period-maybe they sense the red-tailed hawk flying overhead.

   What a nice picture that paragraph brings to mind! If you have spotted anything you’d like to share, contact the Alplaus Bird Line at 399-0490 or swanalaka@aol.com.

An Appreciation of Kenneth Coyle   (1911 - 1983)

by Kirk Herrick  12-8-04

When I first met him 56 years ago, Kenneth Coyle was a major personality in Alplaus. He was an Alplaus boy who grew up in the family home on Maple Ave. While he was Ken to his contemporaries, he was Kenny to the older folks who all remembered him as the teenager who delivered coal to their homes for the McKain and VanVranken Coal Company located down along the Delaware and Hudson railroad tracks.

   In adulthood Ken lived on Hill Street in Alplaus with his wife Harriet and sons Kenny and Donny.  As a graduate of the GE Apprentice Program Ken was concerned with tool room standards, a skill that moved him to Syracuse in later life. The Coyles were our directly-across-the-street neighbors when we moved to Alplaus in 1948.

   Ken was friendly and gregarious in his personal relationships.  He was the champion volunteer; what ever task needed to be done in the village could always count on his participation. His can-do attitude and handy-man skills were always welcome, whatever the project.

   A line officer in the Fire Company, Ken was also the custodian of the Fire House. The interior was always clean and neat as a pin and the equipment was always shiny.  He knew how to use it too.  One night in February, at 20 below, we were called to the annual chimney-clearing, Roman Candle simulating, fire at the old Kline farm house on Glenridge Road.  The two of us responded on the back-up vehicle, the old Buffalo truck, which had the stars for a roof.  It ran as far as Maple Avenue and then quit. Quick as a flash Ken disassembled the water accumulating sight glass in the gasoline line.  After cleaning out the accumulated ice, and sucking up a mouthful of gasoline to refill the gas line, we were quickly on our way again and the farm house survived.

   Ken and I became friends while we participated in the Alplaus church choir where we sat next to each other in the back row.  Ken had a lovely base voice and favored us with a solo on occasion. He was a faithful member, rarely missing a rehearsal or a Sunday.  When the church built a kitchen and Sunday school room addition, he was in the middle of the construction effort.

   Later on when Ken found out that I was building a house and was about to pour concrete floors, a real measure of his friendship became evident.  Every evening for a week he came to the construction site to help finish trowel the wet concrete which I had spread out during the day.  It was a job where I had bitten off more than I could chew alone, and each night Ken stayed around until midnight to see that we got it right.

   Another reading on the depth of our friendship came during the school crisis in Alplaus in the early fifties.  The community was divided over the problem of how to deal with rapidly increasing school enrollments.  Quite a number of young parents with pre-school age children had moved to Alplaus after World War II.  For them a local grade school was number one on the agenda.  In support of that idea Ken and I together canvassed most of the homes in the community on weekday evenings.  The canvas took roughly a year and I have written about it in a previous article.  Not mentioned before however is Ken's contribution to the enterprise. He was welcomed into each home without reservation and once inside the door we were off and talking school matters, whereas as an unknown and alone I could never get inside the door.  I believe it is quite accurate to say that without his entré the formation of a Niskayuna Central School District (and our neighborhood Glencliff School) would have been delayed for years.

   Ken's desire to serve others was also very evident at the Fire company annual weekend outings at Hadlock Pond up above Fort Ann. One prominent feature was the two-day nonstop poker game.  About a dozen of the members were either playing or watching the play. They never slept, and barely took time off to eat. That brings up the other prominent feature -- food.  Lee (Livingston) Hayes cooked two meals a day for two dozen men.  He loved to cook but he needed help and Ken was right there every time.  So was I by virtue of the coat tail effect.  We fetched food for the stove, set table, peeled potatoes, flipped flapjacks, served, cleared away, washed, dried, and put away, all accompanied by a continuous flow of good natured banter. In time the three of us developed a special feeling of camaraderie. 

   One last thing.  Ken could be tempted into a little mischief once in a while.  One particular Hadlock Pond outing was the first time for two fire company members, Don Olsen and his neighbor Eddie Orminski. In the evident (and mistaken) belief that it was safe to retire for the night before the rest of the gang was utterly exhausted, Don and Eddie picked out the best bedroom with the best bed and jumped in between the sheets by 10:00 p.m..  Well, that was more temptation than Ken could resist.  About half an hour later the two of us walked in, grabbed the foot of the bedspring frame, disconnected it from the foot of the bed, and dropped the springs on the floor.  That left Don and Eddie lying in a bed with the head elevated at an uncomfortable 20° angle.  Ken and I departed hurriedly expecting wrathful pursuit.  I don't remember whether we took the foot of the bed with us, but I do know that today Eddie is still telling his extended family about the episode.

   There is more, a lot more, but I think you get the idea by now. Ken Coyle was an Alplaus original. His presence enriched the village beyond measure. It was a great privilege to be his friend.