Alplaus Home Town News June 2002
Editor/Publisher: Art Harris Reporter: Betty Vedder
ALPLAUS DAD'S DAY
For those who guide with a father's hand
We thank you,
For those who encourage with a fathers praise
We applaud you,
For those who sincerely care and love with a
father's heart
We honor you,
Not just on Father's Day ------ALWAYS!
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY
SUNDAY, JUNE 16th!!!
The following was overheard at the Alplaus Post Office on Saturday morning, the 18th of May:
"My husband and I woke up this morning and looked out at the snow with utter amazement. He exclaimed: 'How long did we sleep?!'".
It was an unreal experience to see the new leafed trees and flowering bushes weighed down by wet snow when we usually are setting out tomato plants. This will be another "Remember when it .." story for years to come.
The transformation at the Alplaus Post Office is truly amazing. Check it out on page 4 of this HTN and be sure to visit in person. The new sign also looks great. Kathy and her crew of volunteers are to be congratulated.
The Home Town News takes a vacation for the summer during
June and July, so you may expect the next issue on September 9th. Have a
wonderful summer and share your best (or worst) summer experience with the
rest of us by contributing a story for the HTN...AWH
Remember Flag Day on June 14, 2002!
2002 Alplaus 4th of July Celebration
It seems as though Spring has only just arrived, yet the Annual Alplaus Fourth of July celebration and parade is barely a month away! Representatives of the Alplaus Resident's Association, the Alplaus Volunteer Fire Company, the Ladies Auxiliary, as well as the Alplaus Methodist Church, have all been busily planning their contributions to the holiday festivities!
The schedule of activities is as follows:
Sunday, June 30th 10:30am
Ecumenical Community Church Service at the Alplaus Firehouse Pavilion. This is a non-denominational service, open to all.
Wednesday, July 3rd 8:00pm until midnight
Block Party at the Pavilion. Food, drink, conversation, music and friends. Back by popular demand, music this year will be provided by our local DJ, Tom Bird.
Thursday, July 4th 11:00am
The Parade. Line-up for marchers, floats and vehicles forms at Glencliff School Road promptly at 10:30am (10:15 is even better!). Our Citizen of the Year, Gary Withey, will lead the column as Grand Marshall.
Along with all the fire companies, ladies auxiliaries, marchers, floats and vintage autos, The Glenville Pipe Band will inspire us with their patriotic live music. Trophies and ribbons will be presented after the parade, the ARA will have available an exclusive new tee shirt design, and Andy Coppola & friends will be busy in the cookshack, rustling up the usual great food, including plenty of his infamous, mouth-watering "Alplaus Special".
We still have room for you in the Parade, flyers with details will be out soon, so start making design plans for your float, tuning up your car, and polishing your fire engine! Volunteers are always needed; there is a lot to do behind the scenes. Contact Mike Sheppeck, Parade Chairman, at 399-7115, or via email at sheppeck@earthlink.net with questions, to volunteer, or to let him know you'll be there.
Be sure and invite your friends and relatives to enjoy
the hospitality and charm of beautiful downtown Alplaus during our big Fourth
of July
What a Sign!!!!!!!!
I would like to take this opportunity to thank Gray Watkins for his very, very generous gift to our post office. The traffic goes by a little slower these days, as people admire the newest landmark in Alplaus. Tom Donlon did an outstanding job with the unique design. It fits the village perfectly. Thank you also, Tom.
May turned out to be a very busy month. A lot of restoration and exterior paint work was done to the outside of the post office building. Terry McGovern of Mohawk Avenue came to the rescue replacing some badly rotted boards, and he began painting the exterior. The Alplaus Ladies' Auxiliary Beautification Committee, with the help of Bob Culver, cleaned out and raked the side yard of the building. Bob hauled the debris and donated some grass seed to the project. The yard looks 100% better. Flowers were also planted recently. They were donated by the Schenectady County Greenhouse.
The Art, Craft and Flower Show sponsored by the Ladies' auxiliary brought in many a smiling face to the post office. It was a very enjoyable afternoon for everyone. The artists, crafters and gardeners did a wonderful job. The baked goods were also a tremendous success. A highlight was watching as people viewed the village mural [see below] for the first time. Betty Hopson [top] and Jean Conley [bottom] did such a beautiful, professional job. Their love and pride of residing in Alplaus shows in every detail and brush stroke.
Note: New stamp rates effective June 30th. Kathy Boyle
Scotts Oquaga Lake House is a family owned resort near Deposit, N.Y. Each summer the Scotia Glenville Meal Center sponsors a four day three night vacation with no tax and tipping.
Reasonable prices include your three full meals a day with all recreation and entertainment.
There is unlimited free golf, tennis, water skiing along with many other sports and activities.
The dates this year are Friday, August 16th until Monday,
August 19th. Anyone can attend because it is sponsored by the county Meal
Center. If you would like more information, please call Betty and Bill at
399-0427.
I grew up living in Alplaus on the other side of the street from Benjamin and Lydia Foot & Gene and Dorothy Van Vranken. The recent article by Charles Foot brought back memories of living on Mohawk Ave. I remember when Gene built their house and Gene taught me Biology and Physics at BH-BL HS. He helped me get into the house painting business during the summers after I graduated from high school. The first building I painted was Francis Bundy's barn while Gene painted their house. Another summer I painted Foot's house. I remember attending Alplaus UMC when I was a child and Mr. Foot singing in the choir. I think Nina Bieber taught a children's Sunday School class that I attended.
I cannot remember exactly when our family moved from Grooms Corners to Alplaus, but it must have been around 1940. My father, Ted, was a warden on our street during WW II and during air raid warnings, he was to check that the lights were off in the houses or did not show anyway. He worked at the GE Company for about 36 years. Then retired with my mother to Bradenton, FL. Dad died in 1988. We had a 24-ft. cabin cruiser docked in Alplaus Creek not far from the Mohawk River. We took a lot of cruises up and down the Mohawk River during those years. In the winter, we pulled it out of the creek with the help of several neighbors. One of the neighbors was R. D. Putman (Rhea) and another was Benjamin D. Foot (Ben). I graduated from BH-BL HS in 1954 and received a BS degree in Electrical Engineering in 1958 from the University of Kentucky. I married a girl from Kentucky in 1958 and went to work for the Tennessee Valley Authority for nearly 35 years. We lived in Chattanooga, TN most of the time and still live there. We have a son living in Atlanta and a daughter living in Chattanooga, where we can enjoy her two daughters as they grow up.
My sister, Ruth, received her nurses training in Orlando, married Phillip Mosher and they spent about 31 years as missionaries in Brazil. In July of 1998, they retired to Bradenton, FL where they could look in on my mother, Mildred, who is 94 and lives in an apartment in a retirement home in Bradenton. Our mother gave up driving in 2001 and is slowing down some, but has had remarkable good health. During a recent trip to Florida, I visited Lynn Stote in Pompano Beach. He and Patty have a real nice condo there and we were able to talk about the people we grew up with in Alplaus and some of the things we did there. We concluded it was a good place to grow up. He had recently visited Leon Rubin.
I want to send greetings to all the people that I crossed paths with in Alplaus. I talk with my mother every Sunday evening and she wanted to send a special "hello" to Charles Foot. She thought a lot of his
parents. Me too.
Ken, a longtime resident on Hill Street, died on May 18th, 2002 after a short illness.
Ken was born in Amsterdam, NY and was raised in Schenectady. He graduated from Schenectady High School and attended Union College until the depression forced him to leave.
Ken and his wife Nina resided on Hill Street in Alplaus for more than 70 years. Ken and Nina celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary on February 14th of 1997, just four months before her death in June 1997.
Ken leaves behind three nieces, Mary Jane Ross of Bloomfield, CT, Betsy Baker of Potsdam, NY, and Karla Kennedy of Colonie as well as six great nieces and nephews and his sister-in-law, Mary Van Riper.
Ken worked first as a cabinetmaker. He then became a surveyor of roads and for making the Erie Canal more navigable. He planned roads for NY State and even worked for the NY State Health Department helping hotels in the Catskills upgrade their septic facilities. Later he went to work for General Electric where he rose to the level of Foreman of the Piping Section for Steam Turbine. He retired from GE in 1972 after working for more than 25 years.
He was a 50+ year member and a former officer in the Alplaus Fire Company. He was affiliated with the Alplaus United Methodist Church for more than 50 years as well. He was an active member of the Raquette Lake Fish and Game Club where he and Nina built a summer home on the lake.
Ken enjoyed every part of life. He loved being outside, gardening, hunting, fishing and, in later years, he loved mowing his large lawn. He was an excellent cook and woodworker. He built cabinets for many and refinished furniture for his many friends. He rebuilt several Adirondak Guide Boats. Ken remained active and alert up until one month before he died.
A memorial service and celebration of the rich life Ken
lived will be held on June 23rd at the Alplaus United Methodist Church.
It's hard to believe how much we've done in the past month! We held our first Alplaus Spring Women's Art Craft and Flower Show. It was a nice event with lovely things to buy and great stuff to eat but we sure would have had a better turnout if the weather had been nicer! (Although we were quite thankful we didn't have the 4 inches of snow we'd had the day before!)
But we did luck out on the weather for the Annual Alplaus Village Wide Garage Sale especially considering the hail, thunder, lightening and torrential downpours of the night before! We had a great assortment of vendors for the flea market and a record number of home garage sales.
We are so thankful to all of you who put your house on our map as this is our major fundraiser for the year! Our cookshack did an outstanding business fueled by the delicious salads and desserts made by our members. As I always say for any event put on by the Auxiliary - you can be sure we will bake! But no rest for the weary as we plan, prepare and serve the annual dinner for the fire company and get our float ready for the 4th of July parade. But other than that we'll be taking the summer off and return in September for our meeting when we will be planning a blood drive and the Halloween party and parade.
After many years of loyal and untiring service, Betty Vedder has decided to become a social member. So we extend her our heartfelt thanks and hope she will still join us from time to time. Many people asked for "Betty's pies" at the flea market so we're not the only ones who will miss her!
Come the cool of September if you have an hour or two to
spare, come join us at our meeting. We have lots of plans for the fall!
If you're interested, call Robin at 399-4911.
On Wednesday, July 24th the Scotia Glenville Seniors will once again hold an outreach picnic here in Alplaus at the Firehouse Pavillion.
This program was started many years ago and is the only picnic that can be held outside. It has become a very popular event with more than a hundred people attending. We from Alplaus are pleased and proud to host it.
Roger will be there with music to sing and dance to. There will be bingo or cards with prizes and Harry will have his blood pressure clinic. It's a summer afternoon with fun food and fellowship.
The picnic is given by the Meal Center. Reservations can
be made by calling 393-1946 or Betty at 399-0427.
Samuel's is ready to go! We have our plans and approval from the Town to move forward. A local business has volunteered to paint the exterior. Cooperative Extension has also donated flowers for our flower boxes. Exciting changes are coming.
Stop by for a tour when our work volunteers are there! They continue to be working on Saturday mornings and Tuesday evenings
A sweet baby girl was born to Michelle Nappi Saffer and Joel Saffer of Lake Rakonkana on Long Island. She came into the world at 8 pounds and seven ounces on May 17th in Smithtown. She has been named Gabrielle and is as yet an only child.
The maternal grandparents are Carl and Diane Nappi, our
neighbors from St. Jude Lane. The paternal grandparent is Linda Saffer.
We congratulate and offer the best of wishes to the happy family.
A darling baby girl was born to Tammy and Matt Hopkins from 33 Hill Street. She was born in early May and named Lucia Tibbets. Lucia had two sisters, Emma and Maddy and a brother, Ben, waiting at home. Many of us know her Dad, Matt, who works for Youth for Christ and is volley ball coach at Niskayuna High School.
Her Mom, Tammy, can be seen most every day with a beautiful loving smile walking her precious little ones up Alplaus Avenue.
Lucia's maternal grandparents are Jim and Brenda Tibbetts from New Hampshire. Her paternal grandparents are Tom and Elizabeth Hopkins.
We friends and neighbors are fortunate to have this lovely young family to live by and work with through the years.
Alplaus Fire Station
The clinic for June will be held on Thursday, June 13th. Harry will be at the Firehouse in the afternoon from 3 until 5 PM. He will be taking July and August off as well as the HTN staff also.
We're wishing you all a happy and healthy summer and will
return to duty in September.
There will be no luncheons at the Alplaus Church during June, July and August.
They will resume in September with further notice.
From Harry Casey's Home Page: Alplaus Weather
(Harry's weather data will be back on the web in September.)
June Moon Phases
The Old Farmers Almanac for June 2002
Forecasts for Region 6: Upstate New York
The Rexford Players will present their fourth Cabaret Night at the Rexford Methodist Church on Saturday, June 8th at 7 PM.
Everyone is invited to attend.
Alplaus
Fire Department May Calls
Date Alarm Time Situation Found Street Respondents Fire-Fighter Hrs
05/03/02 11:54 Other Rescue Governor Drive 4 3.2
05/03/02 13:38 Other Emergency Hill Street 4 1.3
05/05/02 14:22 Medical Emergency Glenridge Road 10 4.0
05/12/02 21:20 Vehicle Accident C/O Hetcheltown
and Bruce 11 12.3
05/16/02 08:55 Vehicle Accident Hetcheltown Road 5 7.5
05/17/02 13:19 False Alarm Fire Glenridge Road 6 2.4
05/27/02 16:46 False Alarm Medical First Street 11 2.0
05/30/02 09:47 False Alarm Fire Glenridge Road 4 1.5