From December 1912 issues of The Andes Recorder
100 Years Ago
Week In and About ANDES
Events of a Week as Chronicled by the Man on the Street——————–—————————
With commentary by Jim Andrews
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[Ed.: Because the issues in our archive for December, 1912 were scant, and the items relating to Andes were very ordinary, we took the liberty to include other front page news items.]
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At a recent meeting of educators of this state there was much criticism of the present educational system. Commissioner Downing said the public school course was topheavy with subject. R. Goodwin, of Packer Institute, Brooklyn, attributed the “notorious lack of interest among students” as due to a lack of coherency in the courses of study. Dr. Lowell said that examinations indicate merely such facts as a student happens to remember rather than the full measure of his knowledge or his lack of it.
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Joseph Denny, a music teacher, dropped dead about 10 o’clock Wednesday morning, December 11, at the residence of Uriah Sprague in Shavertown, while giving music lesson to the young dauter of Will Elwood. Dr. Wakeman pronounced death as due to an apoplectic stroke….He was an excellent instructor and a man liked by all. He was from 45 to 50 years old and leaves a wife. [Ed.: I remember saying to a friend, “If I don’t practice this sonata to perfection my music teacher will have apoplexy.” I wonder if the young daughter had neglected to practice sufficiently.] [Jim Andrews: Cora and Uriah Sprague ran Sprague’s store on Main Street in Shavertown and lived in the apartment above the store. Being that young, he might have suffered a stroke from an aneurysm. Dr. Wakeman would have no way of knowing.]
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Supt. Charles Knapp of Furlough Lodge brought a calf’s head to this office Wednesday that resembled in nearly every particular the head of a bull dog. The lower jaw was undershot and carried protruding teeth just like a bull dog. The nostrils were down on either side of the jaw. It was necessary to take a second look to be sure that it was not the head of a bull dog that he had. The freak elicited much comment on the street here. Margaretville News.
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In an address opening the Pennsylvania Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage, Mrs. J. Gardner Cassatt said: “Women who run afoul of the laws and are known as millitant [sic] suffragettes should not be punished by sending them to jail. They should be taken out into the public squares and spanked before the eyes of all who care to witness their humiliation. Votes for women means neglect of the home. It means the encouragement of race suicide and the loss in the moral influence toward the uplift of society which women now have and which is far more potent than the hysterical speeches and sordid politics.”
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Friday the house of Vernie Whitbeck on the old Walton road, formerly the Isaac Buell place, was burned with nearly all its contents. Mr. Whitbeck saw the smoke issuing from the roof while on the hill plowing, but by the time he reached the house it was too late to save scarcely anything. Mrs. Whitbeck was about the place but did not know the house was on fire until her husband gave the alarm. The fire apparently caught in the second story from the pipe of the sitting room stove. [JA: House fires caused by stovepipes were common. Many old houses had half chimneys that extended from the roof into the second floor where the stovepipe from the first floor connected with them. Having the pipe go through the first floor ceiling into the bedroom above provided some warmth to the otherwise frigid second floor.]
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Michael Miller of Bovina, who is 84 years old, cast his first vote at the election following his 21st birthday in 1849 and since then has never failed to vote each year and every one of his 63 votes have been cast in the town of Bovina. He has voted at 16 presidential elections. He is certainly entitled to be styled “Bovina’s Grand Old Man.”
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For Sale—The Doctor Wight Drug Store property on Main Street in Village of Andes. Good business location. [Ed to Jim: would this be the current Paisley’s?] [JA: Yes it would. I know that George Norton owned it until the Millers bought it and do know that Dr. Wight had an office in the rear of the building. It makes sense. Dr. Wight lived in Mike and Joanne Warner’s house on Lower Main Street. The Nortons later lived in Ron and JoAnn Boerner’s house a little farther down the street.]