Vol. 71 — No. 45
NEWS IN BRIEF
Blast from the past
In celebration of our 70th anniversary, The Riverdale Press has put together this special throwback issue, inspired by classical newspaper design, and also featuring the first time we’ve used our so-called Henry Hudson Bridge flag on the top of A1 since Jan. 21, 1971. Is this a perfect recreation of newspapers past? No, of course not. We didn’t introduce full color, for example, until the 1990s. So just look at this as an homage to the past with a bit of a modern touch.
RIVERDALE, Bx., N.Y., Thursday, December 17, 2020
Published weekly. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize
Where everybody knows your name
Food is what binds a community together
Michael Hinman
Editor
Yes, nukes
Believe it or not, there really was a college inside Riverdale that had one of the country’s few working nuclear reactors. And few blinked an eye. Page A3
Never to forget
Young kids reflect on the Oklahoma City bombing — an act of terror that really hit close to home for many. Page A5
Friendly eulogy
Former CBS News head Fred Friendly shares powerful words after losing a friend and ‘country editor,’ David Stein. Page A13
1 DOLLAR A COPY
FOR DECADES, if you wanted to find the best place for a drink and maybe even a steak, you’re only stop would be Ehring’s Tavern on West 231st Street and Godwin Terrace. Edward Ehring Sr. — who took over the business from his father — lined the tavern part
with authentic German steins, while the restaurant portion was considered a perfect spot to take the one you love, especially when this was captured in 1978. Ehring’s closed in 2000, and Ed Sr., died in 2005. (File photo by Aaron Feinstein)
For decades, news here was delivered Stein way By MICHAEL HINMAN Bernard and Richard — or for just about anyone who has shared at least a hello with them at some point: Buddy and Richie. They grew up in the same house. In the same community. With the same parents. But Buddy and Richie couldn’t be any more different. When one goes left, the other heads right. Smile? Frown. Yet there was one thing Buddy and Richie did agree on quite confidently growing up — neither of them were going to work in the family business. That family business, of course, was The Riverdale Press, founded in 1950 by their parents, David and Celia Stein. Riverdale was rapidly growing in those days from a suburbanlike enclave to a community that left no doubt it was part of New York City. And The Press was very much part of the community, needing to endure long past David and Celia Stein. “Our parents made it very clear to us from the beginning that we were supposed to take over the paper,” Richie remembers. “Buddy, he was the writer. I was the artist.” Buddy’s growing mastery of the written word was exactly what his parents had hoped for. But Richie’s drawing? Not so much. “I would always bring a pen or a pencil to the dinner table,” Richie said. “They’d ask me something, and I would try to sketch it. And my mom would slap my hands, ‘No! Use your words! You talk!’”
Bernard Stein, left, and Richard Stein
From about that point forward, Buddy and Richie were on far different trajectories. Buddy would graduate from Bronx Science, while Richie became an alum of Horace Mann School. Buddy got accepted into Columbia University, while Richie ultimately landed at Cornell. Before long, Buddy had found a great life in San Fran-
cisco, caught up in the free speech movement at Berkeley, and got a job with a group tasked with poring through the world’s most extensive collection of Mark Twain’s writings. What was expected to be a six-month gig ended up being years, and Buddy was as far away from the Bronx and The Riverdale Press as he could get.
But then, in 1973, fate intervened. “We got a frantic phone call that our father had a heart attack and wasn’t expected to live,” Buddy said. “He came back, but he wasn’t able to come back to work. And that was the first time that I sat down at the editor’s desk at
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By ETHAN STARK-MILLER It wasn’t Christmas unless it was Christmas with the Connaughtons. Throughout the 1980s and ‘90s, Connaughton’s Riverdale Steak House just off West 259th Street was the place to be on Christmas Eve. The restaurant’s owners, Terry and Anne Connaughton, would spend a month preparing for their biggest night, when the steakhouse was packed to the brim. “We probably violated every law, every kind of rule there was around capacity … because you just couldn’t move around,” said Terry Connaughton Jr., one of the owners’ five children. “So, there was a line down the street to get into the steakhouse.” The restaurant has been in the family since 1979 when the elder Terry bought it from two brothers looking to get out of the business. More than four decades later, the now 87-year-old Terry still runs the operation with his wife, but now with the help of their children and grandchildren. Today, in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, the steakhouse survives primarily because of the support of customers who’ve pitched in to keep it going through what is likely the most significant obstacles restaurants have ever faced. “They’re a backbone of the community, they’ve effectively become a centerpiece for residents to gather and dine,” said Gary Wartels, president of Riverdale Main Streets Alliance. “It just provides a true sense of comfort. Family members go back with decades and decades of memories.” Restaurants like Connaughton’s spent months transforming from takeout and delivery, to pure outdoor dining, to a mix of outdoor and some indoor. And now, at least as of Monday, restaurants are back to being just outdoors after Gov. Andrew Cuomo shut down the interior options in New York City. The news means the steakhouse will have to rely on those willing to brave the cold, or at least be willing to pick up some food and take it home. It also means added expenses to a year where profits are tremendously low as the younger Connaughton looks to install a heating system outside. Paying for it could lead to staffing cuts. “They’re kicking us while we’re down,” Terry Jr., said. “Not only do we have no business indoors now at all, but we’ve got to spend more money to heat our outdoor unit. And that’s very expensive.” Fortunately, the family finally launched a system on its website allowing customers to order there, and not have to use third-party apps. Unfortunately, with the federal government seemingly unwilling to do anything to help, there’s not much city or even state officials can do to lend an economic hand, Wartels said. There is a chance a President Biden could get some relief
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In memoriam
WAVE HILL was made official Nov. 4, 1965. City parks commissioner Newbold Morris arranges paper for the official signing, joined by Bronx borough president Joseph Pericone and Wave Hill chair Gilbert Kerlin. Also joining the grouop on the far left are Dorothy Parker Freeman, daughter of George W.
Perkins, and husband Edward. In back are, from left, U.S. Rep. Jonathan Bingham, parks department executive officer John Mulcahy, corporation counsel David Kranker, and Riverdale Community Planning Association vice president John Mack. (File photo by Joel Simons)
Wave Hill ready to write history’s newest chapters By MICHAEL HINMAN Of all the famous people who have called Wave Hill home over the decades — Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, even famed conductor Arturo Toscanini — there’s one Karen Meyerhoff wishes was a part of that list: Sherlock Holmes. Yes, yes, Sherlock Holmes is a fictional character. But Meyerhoff — Wave Hill’s president and executive director since 2015 — has a real mystery for the famed sleuth: Where does the name “Wave Hill” come from?
BRIGHT & SPACIOUS 5601 Riverdale Avenue, Apt. 6L 2 BD | 1 BA | 1,050 SQ. FT. // $299,000 ELLEN CURTIN // 718.415.9915
Then & Now “No one really knows where the name comes from,” Meyerhoff said. “We thought maybe this might be the opportunity to finally find out.” That opportunity was a deep dive into the pages of The Riverdale Press, going back to the very creation of what would become today’s attraction. There are some theories and speculation
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A sweet good-bye to Betty By MICHAEL HINMAN Lloyd’s Carrot Cake makes one of the most treasured sweet treats found in New York City. But nothing was as sweet as the woman who kept the legacy strong all these years: Betty Campbell-Adams. The woman who co-founded the business in an East Harlem apartment she shared with her husband died Friday. She was, according to reports, 65. “We are deeply saddened to share the news of the sudden passing of our beloved leader, Betty Campbell-Adams,” according to a statement posted late Friday evening on Lloyd’s Carrot Cake’s Facebook page. “She was a phenomenal woman, and her commitment to serve was unmatched. This was epitomized by the community that loved her so much.” Lloyd’s Carrot Cake moved out of the apartment Betty and Lloyd shared and into a small storefront on Broadway, just across from Van Cortlandt Park, in the mid-1980s. Intended to serve commercial customers initially, it was hard for those living and working around that bakery to not sense the amazing fragrances emanating from the ovens. Before long, Lloyd’s
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