“’La Grippe,’ or the Russian Influenza, is heard from all parts of the world and creates the greatest public interest,” reported the Delaware Gazette January 1, 1890. “The fatal cases are very few, but the number of cases is very great and many of them very distressing. There seems to be none yet in this region.”

Just two weeks later the Delhi correspondent of the Hobart Independent claimed “nearly every family in this community has been suffering more or less with the prevailing epidemic. Several hundred cases have come under the doctors’ care.” At least one proved fatal – Norwood Bowne, the editor of the Delaware Express newspaper for 51 years, died of bronchitis which took over where the flu left off.

Bowne was among one million people who died in the 1889 pandemic, which began in Russia and spread rapidly throughout Europe aided by railroads and steam ships. It reached North America in December 1889 and spread to Latin America and Asia in February 1890.

Locally, the illness claimed bank presidents, teachers, laborers and physicians. In a time when people were accustomed to periodic epidemics – diptheria, meningitis, typhus, scarlet fever – there was a ho-hum, dismissive tone in some of the accounts. Said the Delaware Gazette January 8, 1890, “La Grippe has become such a fashionable disease that very many have already laid claim to the distinction of having been afflicted with it. Many have colds and suffer greatly, but weather is favorable for such cases, and if a new name had not been introduced we would all be suffering in the good old fashioned way and that would be about the end of the matter.”

Then as now, fear and misinformation spread as quickly as the virus. A report about a Sidney man being taken to the Utica Insane Asylum noted “It is said La Grippe is the cause of his mental derangement.” Another article declared “It is no longer good manners for a gentleman to raise his hat when he meets a lady on the street . . . uncovering the head in the open air (has) caused a number of cases of influenza.”

In early 1937, the Catskill Mountain News gave us a glimpse of one man’s efforts to brighten up two local churches and a cemetery.

“The interior of the church of the Sacred Heart at Fleischmanns (now a private home) is being repainted and made ready for the summer. The work is proceeding under the direction of Rev. Edward Gaffney of Arkville. It gives his parishioners here a great thrill to see the learned priest at the work of directing the decoration. At the same time Rev. Gaffney is having the rectory at Arkville and the Catholic church at Arkville decorated. (At that time the church, also named Sacred Heart, was located within what is known as the Maple House, now apartments).”

In the same issue, an article on activities at the Margaretville Civilian Conservation Corps camp reported that Father Gaffney had started a choir among the young men there.

Earlier in the year, Rev. Gaffney had started “the work of remodeling the grounds at the Catholic cemetery at the edge of the village.” (Also known as the Catholic or Irish Cemetery, this burial ground is across the road from the larger Clovesville Cemetery.)

As half the Catskills prepares to load up the car to head to the Sunshine State for the winter, it’s fun to look back half a century or more to see what that trip used to cost. A penciled accounting of the pennies spent on the round trip from New Kingston to Orlando was found in a diary believed kept by Florence Cowan Ruff (wife of Howard, mother of Francis and Floyd, the family that ran Ruff Farms for several decades). The diary was written in the early 1940s; it’s unclear when the trip took place, because it would have been difficult if not impossible to do it during the gas rationing war years.

It took three days to travel 1,237 miles to Orlando. The first day they spent $5.20 on gas, $1.08 on the ferry at New Castle, DE, $3.25 for supper (for two), and $4 to rent a cabin on the outskirts of Baltimore. “Froze stiff,” was the terse comment next to that entry.

OPEN YEAR-AROUND:

• 2 toy/candy stores each with a lunch counter (Gale’s – Max and Shirley Geller, Muller’s – Charles and Luella Muller),
• liquor store (Sid Silberstein),
• small department store (Glen Haderup),
• 2 grocery stores (David Solomon and Sam Lipton and at some point
  there was an A&P),
• 2-3 bars (Cat’s Meow, Monahan’s),
• doctor (Abraham Rottkov and Elwin Champlin in very early 1950s),
• dentist (William Cohen)
• attorney (Gleason Speenburg),
• 2 drug stores (Phillip Miller and Kaplan’s) ,
• hardware store (Paul Shaver) ,
• bank,
• post office,
• barber shop (Anthony Cerami)
• plumbing store (Louis Halpern & Sigmund Halpern),
• restaurant (Anthony Cerami),
• Kosher butcher (Meyer Dlasnow),
• lumber yard (Wadler’s: Herman, Bernard & Arthur Wadler),
• concrete and paving company (Sam & Morris Slavin)
• paint store (Izzy Sliverman) ,
• insurance agency (Flisser-DeGrof),
• 4 motels (Meinstein’s Lodge – Julius and Lori Gross, Valkarian Motel – Milton & June Valk, Delaware Court Motel – James & Geraldine Cantwell, and DePitt’s Motel. The Northland was built in the late 1950s – George Smith
• Laundromat (Sollie Darling),
• 4 garages/gas stations (Meyers’ – Ralph Meyers, Todd’s – Otis & Robert Todd, Lerner’s – Sonny Lerner, and Darling’s – Sollie Darling),
• car dealership (Ford dealership – Todd’s