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This Week in Rockland: Newspaper Excerpts: Flashback Friday: Week of August 2

July 31, 1874 – 150 YEARS AGO
Rockland County Journal

PARLOR MAGIC
        On Wednesday evening last a select audience of about one hundred ladies and gentlemen assembled in the elegant rooms of Rockland Lodge F. and A. M., of Nyack, to witness and enjoy the entertainment which had been provided by the committee appointed for the purpose. The entertainment consisted of slight of hand performances and optical illusions by the Waterbury Brothers, one of whom is a professional and accomplished necromancer, magician or whatever name such men go by.
        The tricks and illusions performed were all well known to the profession and many of the public, but the apparent ease of Mr. Waterbury’s motions and the complete success attending them rendered them very interesting to the spectators. The India Box Trick, which which was the last performed, was simply astounding, and there is no room for conjecture as to how a man with his wrists locked in stocks and the keys in the possession of the audience, and then the box put over him and that locked and tied with ropes, can possibly make his exit therefrom and leave everything us it was at the time it was deemed most secure. This was done, however, in eighty seconds, and his entrance effected to another box that was locked, tied with ropes, covered with canvas and that in turn covered with a rope netting the knots of which would have required more than half an hour to unloose. This great trick was accomplished in just four minutes, to the great delight of the audience.
        After the entertainment, which was one of the most interesting we have ever witnessed, all present were treated to a generous supply of cake and ice cream, an agreeable arrangement by the members of this model Lodge in our county.

July 31, 1924 – 100 YEARS AGO
Pearl River News

DOVE IN HOLE AND RESCUED YOUNG GIRL - MARTY ACKER OF PEARL RIVER QUALIFIES FOR CARNEGIE MEDAL AT BLAUVELT
[Image: Forty-Foot Hole, Blauvelt, ca. 1940. The Forty-foot Hole on Fifth Avenue in Blauvelt was a well-known swimming spot before it was bulldozed into a reservoir by the Spring Valley Water Company. The waters of the Hackensack River flowed under the railroad and under a bridge and into this idyllic scene. Image courtesy of the Nyack Library, via NYHeritage.org.]
        Marty Acker, employed in the Pearl River postoffice, qualified for a Carnegie medal Sunday afternoon when he dove from the bank of the forty-foot swimming hole in the Hackensack Creek at Blauvelt and saved a girl from drowning.
        The girl had become exhausted while swimming in the center of the hole and cried for help as she suddenly sank. Acker reached her as she was going down for the second time and she gripped both arms about his neck.
        Acker, however, shook her off and after a struggle with the assistance of Louis Hulbert got her safely to shore, where she was revived after she had fainted.
        The girl’s parents, who thanked Acker for rescuing their daughter, did not give their names.

1500 ATTEND FIRST MEETING OF KLAN HERE — FORMER J. E. A. MOORE ESTATE SCENE OF LARGE GATHERING FRIDAY — TRAFFIC IS HELD UP — KLANSMEN POSTED ON MAIN ROAD HALT THOSE SEEKING ADMISSION
        It is estimated that 1,500 people attended the open-air meeting of the Ku Klux Klan here last Friday night. The former J. E. Moore estate was crowded with cars and traffic was held up on the Middletown road during the evening while the credentials of those seeking admission to the grounds were examined. Many were turned away, in fact all not holding a card or vouched for by knights of the order.
        The meeting opened at 9:30 o’clock with singing of the national hymn and prayer, after which Dr. Space of Binghamton, N.Y., the orator of the occasion, outlined the principles of the Klan and told of the good done by the organization throughout the country. He made special mention of the patriotism and 100 per cent Americanism of the order and how they wiped out the sale of narcotics and opium in the city of Elmira.
        With reference to immigrants he pointed out how many of them come to this country and try to live as the 100 per cent American. But their ideas and mode of living are those of the old country, he added. The motto of the Klan is “Not for Ourselves but for Others.”
        Dr. Space’s hearers listened intently to his address for an hour and a half. At the close he called for new members and scores of local citizens joined under the burning cross and circled by the knights in white robes took the obligation.
        Many prominent citizens and not a few politicians of the county were seen at the meeting.

Two Other Meetings.
        The following Saturday night another open-air meeting was held at Tallmans and on Sunday evening fifty klansmen in robes marched into the Methodist Church at New City carrying a cross.
        The congregation was singing “Onward Christian Soldiers” at the time. They presented a purse to the pastor and requested that he preach from the twelfth chapter of Romans, which he did.

July 31, 1974 – 50 YEARS AGO
The Journal News

WE HAVE RATS, BUT INFESTATION IS NOT SERIOUS
        Rockland health officials say there is no serious rat problem in the county right now, but warn that residents may be inadvertently creating the conditions on which rats thrive.
        “We do have them (rodents) and we get complaints from residents, but they are not considered a major problem at this time,” said Frank Haera of the Rockland Health Department.
        There are no rodent population figures available, Haera said.
        Haera heads the department’s Housing Section, which handles cases involving rodents, insects, rabies, and nuisance complaints such as sewer overflows in addition to its primary duty of inspecting housing.
        Haera said “rodents are carriers of certain diseases” and disease-bearing parasites, but rats do not now present a health problem in Rockland.
        The Health Department, which makes rodent-control literature available to the public, acts on rodent complaints received directly from the public or on a referral basis from municipalities. The department’s rodent-control program is the only one in Rockland.
        “Complaints originate from all over the county,” Haera said. Rodents do not distinguish between expensive and inexpensive areas. “We receive just as many complaints from newer areas (such as unincorporated areas) as we do from older (village) areas,” Haera said.
        There are precautions that residents can take to guard themselves agains rodents.
        “A rodent needs two things to survive,” Haera said, “a place of harborage and food. If you can eliminate one of these two things, you can eliminate rodents.”
        Storing garbage in covered metal containers deprives rodents of an easy food source while storing building or other supplies above ground denies rodents places to live, Haera said.
        The common suburban practice of setting out feed for wild birds can also attract and support rodents if the bird seed is thrown on the ground instead of being placed in feeders that are inaccessible to rodents, Haera said.
        Many of the older areas of Rockland were the subjects of “extensive surveys” to judge the degree of rodent infestation when the Health Department maintained a separate Rodent Control Section, Haera said.
        When rodents were discovered by the surveys they were “exterminated” and the areas and conditions that had supported them were “cleaned up.” “Presently, we respond to any complaints we receive but only conduct a survey if a number of complaints are received,” he added.
       The now-defunct Rodent Control Section was started in the late 1960s. It was originally 90 per cent state-funded but those funds decreased 10 per cent each year.
       The Rodent Control Section was finally abolished and the task of rodent control was placed under the jurisdiction of the Housing Section.
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