Page 4 — THE BERLIN DAILY SUN, Thursday, January 12, 2012
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None of us make a living off that refuge, we just pay for it with our federal taxes To the editor: This is the second letter I have read in papers from Jeff Fair. I met Jeff on the Androscoggin River years ago. He was doing a Loon study at the time, working for the Feds. When Jeff was living in the Errol area, the refuge was in the early stages and intended to protect only the shoreline of Umbagog Lake. I stood on a ridge in Errol a week ago and spotted the blue and red flags of the refuge property line. I was about six or seven miles from Lake Umbagog. This refuge was started in secret and when presented to the town of Errol, there was considerable resentment that three or four local landowners had met with the feds and never let on what they were planning. Since then the refuge has grown to encompass over half of Wentworth Location and over one third of Errol. They are currently buying 4500 acres in Cambridge according to Paul Casey. No one including Paul Casey or Jeff Fair has given me an explanation as to how towns and Coos county losing millions of dollars of valuation along with the associated loss of revenue is a good thing. New Hampshire towns depend solely on property taxes to fund their schools and municipalities, Mr. Fair. Gaining some low paying jobs at the local Subway is not going to make up for what we are now seeing in our property tax increases caused by loss of revenue.
Also, as hunting declines due to heavy restrictions and snowmobiling trails become more and more restricted, I doubt Errol will be a tourist destination unless you are a kayaker. We have had no snow this winter and as a result, Errol is dead. LL Cote had four cars in front of it when I went downtown today. No snow, no snowmobile business. As far as a citizen advisory group, that idea was floated by Sen. Gallus and Ray Burton with no response. The feds are masters at open ended answers and keeping their plans secret until they are finalized. Mr. Fair and those at the refuge make their living off environmentalism. That is fine, but when it starts to hurt communities, and forces us to live with restrictive, ludicrous restrictions, it is time to fight back. Mr. Fair lives in a state that is going through its own problems with the federal government controlling its land, natural resources, and destiny. He doesn’t live here anymore and is speaking about something he only saw in its infancy. Like I said before, the people enthusiastic about this refuge either don’t live under its shadow, make a living off it courtesy of the people they destroy, hope to make money off it when they sell off their property, or are wealthy enough to withstand the huge tax increases coming when the amount of taxable property gets swal see REFUGE page 5
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Poof Tardiff
Once upon a Berlin Time
1964 VI
Hello fellow Berlinites. One of the worst automobile accidents in North Country history took place August 23, 1964 on route 16 just 2 miles south of Gorham. This head-on crash claimed the lives of six people. Four were from the Province of Québec and two were from the city of Berlin. The local citizens who lost their lives were Mr. Armand Belval, 62, and Mr. Alfred Boucher, 58. Along with this, five people were hospitalized in serious condition. Dr. Frances Appleton of Gorham, who tended to the injured at the scene, described it as the worst mishap since a Cog Railway accident injured 41 people in 1948. Both he and Gorham Police Chief Anthony Dooan had never seen such a horrific highway accident as this. The Canadian car was traveling north from the Conway area and the Berlin auto was going south when the crash took place. Reports stated that the Quebec vehicle skidded on wet pavement when it rounded a curve north of the Dolly Copp campground. This caused the two cars to collide head-on. Hundreds of people gathered at the accident site and the great crowd was said to have hampered the work of officials. I remember people talking about this crash and every one of them explained that it was the worst one they had ever seen in their lives. A headline, after the start of school in September of 1964, stated that Berlin High School had a record enrollment of 1,143 students. This included grades 7 through 12. The BHS enrollment was 637 and the BJHS was 506. The total amount of students in Berlin’s public schools from grades one through twelve was 1,980. I’m sure that is a far cry from the amount today. In September of 1964 a Berlin man’s gamble of three dollars showed a profit of $7,497. That is when Henry Turcotte went to the races at Rockingham Park in Salem, New Hampshire. Mr. and Mrs. Turcotte had a ticket that matched with a horse named “Bupers”, the word bupers being an Jimmy Dinardo anagram for the word superb. The Turcottes didn’t see the finish of the race and had some difficulty finding out who had one, but when they did find out, they ended up with some pretty good dough for 47 years ago. Mr. Turcotte came to Berlin in 1952 and bought two apartment houses. He worked for some time as a custodian at Berlin High School and retired eight years later, taking care of his apartments. I guess one can say that Mr. Turcotte was one of Berlin’s original sweepstake winners. At last, construction had started on the vocational school and the picture that accompanies this story shows what the site looked like at the start of this project. The end of September 1964 brought with it the election of local union 75 and the results showed that they would have a new vice
Henery Turcotte
president in the name of Vincent “Jimmy” Dinardo. This union election on Monday September 21, 1964 came across with an upset victory, ending Joseph Cheverie’s 11 years in office. A recount of the ballots cast in the vice presidential race showed that out of the 1,190 votes cast, Dinardo received 627 of them. Union President Robert Therriault claimed that this was one of the best voter turnouts in union history, as there were about 1,700 members at this time. I’m not quite sure what happened with this project, but a community swimming pool was making the headlines in the fall of 1964. Mayor Edward Shuette issued a call for volunteers and his call signaled the start of a new Berlin recreational project. Every able bodied man and woman, who was interested in seeing the pool become a fact, was asked to meet at the Bean Brook site at 1 p.m on Saturday, September 26. Shuette said that he would be there to lead the parade of ax swingers and brush pilers, because the first job was to clear the right-of-way into the pool area. The drive for volunteers was spearheaded by the local Lions Club with Roy E. Cascadden as chairman. This club also contacted other organizations to help them round up workers. Volunteer personnel met at the end of Rheims Street at 9 a.m. on that Saturday. Volunteers were not expected to do all of the work on the pool, but there was much they could accomplish to save money when the professionals came. This same project was undertaken in Claremont, New Hampshire and Berlin wanted to duplicate it. The land for this pool was available without cost and was obtained by the Jaycees in the 1950s for a community pool. Then President Larry Favinger said that this parcel would eventually be transferred to the city. The Jaycees also had about $800 saved in the name of the swimming pool project. This money was raised in the 1950s, when they had tried to spike interest in this pool. Plans called for the pool to be 60 x 120’, lined with concrete and fed through a filter out of Bean Brook. There were also funds available for other recreational facilities to be built nearby. Does anybody remember what ever happened to this great project? Finally, a story was written in early October about mail carrier Anita “Blondie” Croteau and I wish that I could have pulled the picture. By October 5, 1964 this mail lady see 1964 VI page 5