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Flashback Friday Archive 2019-20: Flashback Friday: Week of January 15

January 14, 1871 – 150 YEARS AGO
Rockland County Journal

USE KIND WORDS
       There is a kind way of saying very severe things, and even a sharp rebuke may be given in gentle words. The children of the poor, who form the bulk of our Sunday scholars, are too much accustomed to harshness at home to be much influenced for good by it at school. My idea of a Sunday-school is, that it is a place where a child may come and find refuge from the sorrows, small though they be, of its daily life; that within its walls, children should feel in an especial manner within the Saviour’s influence, because there, holy love reigns as it did and does within His breast. “Suffer little children to come unto me,” the Saviour says. It is not “Bring them to me,” “Make them come;” but “Let them come,” As if He would say, “They will come readily, if you hinder them not.” Now, kind words spoke by the teachers of our Sunday-Schools will draw scholars to the school and may draw their hearts to Christ.

January 14, 1921 – 100 YEARS AGO
Rockland News

BOARD OF ELECTIONS ORGANIZED
       The newly appointed election commissioner for Rockland county met at Haverstraw and organized with Richard E. King as president, and Richard W. Oldfield, secretary, G. C. Joachim, of Haverstraw, was reappointed clerk.

STONY POINT GIRL IS DEAD IN EGYPT
       Word has been received of the death in Egypt of Miss Eugenia Lee, a former Stony Point girl. She was twenty-three years old and a daughter of Thomas H. Lee, former district attorney of Rockland County. For some time, she had been engaged in missionary work in Egypt.

RABBITS RELEASED
       It was announced Friday by A. M. Gage, local game warden, that the Sportsmen’s Game and Fish Protective Association had placed nineteen crates of snowshoe hares in the woods in Rockland county. These hares come under the same protection as cotton tail rabbits. The season on cottontails closed January 1.

January 14, 1971 – 50 YEARS AGO
The Journal News

CHARGES HORRIFY PRIEST
[Black-and-white postcard showing “Shadowcliff,” ca. 1930, Upper Nyack. Shadowcliff was once the residence of Mrs. Eleanor Manville Ford. It later became the National Headquarters of the Fellowship of Reconciliation. HSRC Collection.]
       The president of the Rockland County Priests Council termed charges of a Catholic conspiracy to kidnap a federal official and blow up the heating system in a federal building “horrifying” this morning and a national peace movement leader who lives in Tappan termed it ‘insane.”
       The Rev. James E. Borstelmann, president of the Priests Council, said he was horrified at the charges of a conspiracy of violence since they were made against a man who has always used peaceful means to express his views.
       Anti-war activist Ron Young of Tappan said that indictments against the Rev. Philip Berrigan and five other Catholic pacifists indicate that J. Edgar Hoover must be retired as head of the F.B.I., for “reasons of national security.” Father Berrigan and the others were indicted by a federal grand jury in Pennsylvania for conspiracy to kidnap Henry Kissinger, assistant to President Nixon for national security affairs, and to blow up heating systems of Washington buildings. “
       It seems to me that J. Edgar Hoover has really gone off the deep end,” Young said this morning. “There is nothing in the Berrigans' lives to suggest they would ever do anything to endanger or harm anyone.” Young, who is National Director of Youth Work for the Fellowship of Reconciliation, said that “by going along with this insane decision by Hoover, the Nixon administration shows it is prepared to use any means it can to confuse and frighten American into being silent on the Vietnam war.
       “At the same time, more and more people realize that the war is not ending, and that the President plans to keep us in Vietnam for the indefinite future,” Young said. “Only the strongest pressure from the people will force Nixon to get us out of Vietnam this year.
       Young said the allegations against the Catholic pacifists imply that peace people generally are plotting violence. He accused President Nixon of “manipulating fear of violence to gain support for Administration Vietnam policies, and to divert attention from the course of the war.”
       Fr. Borstelmann said, “The charges are for actions that I would term most un-Berrigan. The Berrigans have always used peaceful means to express their views.” The Rev. Berrigan is a 47-year-old pacifist. He is serving a 3-year term in federal prison for destroying draft records in 1967 and 1968.
       Fr. Borstelmann said he interpreted the government's action as an attempt to destroy dissent. “The action is almost Hitlerian. There doesn't seem to be room for another opinion,” he said.
       “Destroying another person would be contradictory to everything they've stood for. The government has taken to considering dissent evil and is acting to destroy what they consider evil,” he said. “The dawning of the Age of Agnew is over. The Age of Agnew is here,” Fr. Borstelmann said.
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This Week in Rockland (#FBF Flashback Friday) is prepared by Clare Sheridan on behalf of the Historical Society of Rockland County. To learn about the HSRC’s mission, upcoming events or programs, visit www.RocklandHistory.org or call (845) 634-9629.

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