Category Archives: Friday Flashback

Friday Flashback #520

Today — on the 25th anniversary of September 11, 2001 — we remember and honor 4 men with Westport ties.

All were in their 30s, working at the World Trade Center. All lost their lives in the terrorist attack.

All were bright, energetic, and well-loved. All had already accomplished a great deal, and looked forward to doing more. All had much to live for.

All left behind families and friends, who will miss and mourn them forever.

Keith Coleman and Scott Coleman were brothers — 34 and 31 years old, respectively.

They had gone through Westport schools, and worked together on the 104th floor in the World Trade Center’s north tower.

Keith, a noted Staples High School wrestler, graduated from Bucknell University. After working in London for 6 years he became a senior vice president and partner at Cantor Fitzgerald, responsible for its equities derivatives department. He brought his brother into the firm.

Keith married his college sweetheart. They lived in New Jersey, with their son and 4-month-old daughter. (Click here for a stirring speech by Keith’s son Vaughn, on the 20th anniversary of 9/11.)

Scott attended Staples, the Lawrenceville School and Colgate University (where he played soccer, and was one of the leading scorers in its history), then earned an MBA from Fordham University’s Gabelli School of Business. In 2003, Colgate dedicated a new gateway to their soccer field in memory of Scott and other 9/11 victims

Scott lived in Weston, and was an equities broker. He was engaged to be married, when the hijackers struck.

Every year, the Westport Soccer Association awards scholarships in Scott and Keith’s names, through the Coleman Brothers Foundation.

Scott (left) and Keith Coleman

Jonathan Uman, 33, was a managing director of corporate development for eSpeed Cantor Fitzgerald, working on the 105th floor of the north tower. He lived in Westport, with his wife Julie and 2 young children. A donation from a foundation created in his name after his death went to the Westport Fire Department.

Colleagues remember Jonathan’s intellect, curiosity, wit and fairness. His many interests included Shakespeare, music and art. (Click here for a remembrance of Jonathan.)

Jonathan Uman

Bradley Vadas, 37, was a senior vice president with Keefe Bruyette & Woods, considered a top trader. He was working on the 89th floor of the south tower.

Bradley grew up in Weston, and had homes in Westport, New York and Wyoming. He graduated from Boston College with a degree in economics. He was passionate about chess, softball at Compo Beach, boating and fishing. He was about to become engaged. (Click here for Bradley’s obituary.)

Bradley Vadas

Friday Flashback #519

As Westport’s dining scene explodes, we enjoy more options than ever.

Of course, prices are rising too.

Comparisons with days past is a bit like apples and oranges (though they were not on the menu). Much has changed since the time when appetizers at one of Westport’s favorite dining spots included a half grapefruit, tomato juice and chopped chicken livers, steaks were $3.50, and a side salad set you back a whopping 25 cents.

Still, it’s fun to see not only what we paid, but also what we could choose from. This menu below is from Manero’s, the long-lived, much loved Saugatuck ancestor of what is now Rizzuto’s.

The date is uncertain. But the “CA” phone number offers a clue. CApital 7 became 227 in the mid 1960s.

Click on or hover over to enlarge.

Here are the drinks. A bottle of beer was 50 cents. Nothing cost more than $1, except wine.

(Menus courtesy of Seth Van Beever)

Speaking of Saugatuck restaurants: A bit later, across Riverside Avenue and a few yards south, De Rosa’s had great run.

It was razed to make way for what is now Momu and Sea Kayak Connecticut.

We don’t have their menu. But prices were higher than Manero’s.

And lower than Rizzuto’s. And The Whelk.

(Photo/Rose Colletti)

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Friday Flashback #518

Another Little League season has ended. Boys and girls have put away their baseball and softball gloves. No one thinks twice about who is playing.

Fifty years ago — in America’s bicentennial year — things were quite different.

The other day, longtime Westporter and avid sports volunteer Jeff Mitchell unearthed a fascinating story from the Westport News. It involved Little League baseball — then celebrating its 25th year in town — and its relatively new softball program.

Written by the News‘ (very) young sports editor, Dan Woog, it described a forgotten chapter in local sports history.

Westport won the Senior League softball state championship, qualifying for the New England tournament in Vermont.

But the threat of legal action — and violence — took center stage.

Westport included boys on the roster. It was legal. The Westporters preferred softball to baseball.

But no team had done it before.

Clockwise from top left: Steve Kane, Dale Call, Richard Frey.

The 2 teams Westport beat — Seymour and Durham — protested that Westport had used illegal players.

The national Little League asked Westport to not compete. They decided that Seymour and Durham would play each other, to determine Connecticut’s representative.

Westport officials pointed out that the national office, in denying the protests of the defeated teams that Westport had used illegal (male) players, specifically stated that Westport won the state title.

Still, Westport’s board of directors feared that the safety of their players could not be guaranteed in Vermont. They withdrew from further competition.

Woog wrote in the Westport News:

Franny DeLuca, manager of the beleaguered co-ed softball team (dubbed a “unisex” squad by the New York Times), received a telegram from C.J. Hale, the national president of Little League Baseball, Inc.

Hale acknowledged that “the Westport Senior League softball team is recognized as 1976 state champions.” But “because of the importance of having a Connecticut entry in the New England tournament, the runner-up will be the Connecticut entry.” This acknowledgement that Westport was, and would remain, the official Constitution State champ mollified the Westporters.

Westport Little League chairman Don Levy sent a telegram to his counterpart in Seymour, extending “our sincerest best wishes for success in future tournament play” in Vermont, following Seymour’s win over Durham.

But controversy continued. The paper reported:

The entire matter is not yet settled. Several letters have come to the Westport News, and many phone calls have been made. All of them contained an outpouring of emotion rare in a case as seemingly minor as this.

One woman, the parent of a Senior all-star, wrote “I am the mother of a son, which I am beginning to believe is a dirty word.” She had heard adults in Durham say, “what do you expect from Westport parents? They’re all alcoholics, so how can they possibly know the sex of their children?”

She continued, “I was one of the parents who voted against going to Vermont. I did not feel we were quitters. I am proud of my son and of all the kids on the team who took that garbage (verbal abuse), but I could not go and neither could my husband. I was afraid.

For the record, the state champion Westport squad included Patty DeLuca, Karen Sidell, Jane Waltrip, Patty Constantikes, David Karlin, Mark Landis, Todd Fauske, Richard Frey, Doug Bernstein, Steve Kane, Dale Call and Jason France.

Manager Franny DeLuca was assisted by coaches Peter Coddington and Garry Vannart.

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)

Friday Flashback #517

We’ve posted this image of Main Street before. It’s from the 1962 Staples High School yearbook.

But never with this color, or computer-enhanced graphics.

Eric Bosch — who moved here with his family in the fall of 1963 — sent it along.

To orient yourself: Klein’s department store (far right) became Banana Republic, then (briefly) Oka furniture. Brooks Brothers will soon move in, from its current location a few yards north.

The Townly Restaurant featured a Jazz Age-era mural. It was lost when Klein’s expanded into that space, then rediscovered and hung by Banana Republic. No word yet on whether Brooks Brothers will keep it.

The Mobil gas station — once the site of an annual Christmas party, where food was served on the lowered hydraulic lifts — is now Vineyard Vines.

The hardware store was one of 3 on Main Street.

And of course, traffic flowed in both directions, all the way to the Post Road (aka State Street).

What else do you remember from that era? Click “Comments” to share.

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)

Friday Flashback #516

We’ve mentioned before how rocky Compo Beach was — for nearly all its existence.

Not until a major public works project in the late 1950s/early ’60s did Compo become the sandy “beach” we know and love today.

But how rocky was it?

Check out this (undated) photo. And wear your flip flops.

Or army boots.

(Photo courtesy of Karen Verelley)

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)

Friday Flashback #515

As the Delamar Westport celebrates its first anniversary — popular, modern, and with the very lively Dandelion restaurant — it’s a good time to remember its predecessor.

Not the little-lamented Westport Inn.

But the New Englander “Motor Hotel.” (A fancy name for “motel.”)

When it opened in 1960, it filled an important local need.

“Luxury at Everyday Prices!” the brochure (below) touted.

“Leave the turmoil and confusion of the hectic daily life behind …for a refreshing change of pace,” the marketing material promised.

The New Englander offered so much: a pool, cabana club, sundecks, playground, shuffleboard, picnic area, putting green, cookout grills, station wagon service to beaches and theaters, sightseeing tours — even “free ice” and “24-hour telephone service.”

Plus it was near bowling, a driving range, miniature golf, ice skating, beauty and barber shops, masseurs and masseuses, and — perhaps this would seal the deal — “stockbrokers.”

(The brochure also showed a vague illustration of the view in front of the motel. It was nothing like the reality of the Post Road, and buildings across the street.)

The center pages of the brochure touted “outsize rooms and suites, (all) fully carpeted, soundproofed and equipped with individually controlled heat and air conditioning.”

Diming options included the Gaslite Lounge — for a “congenial, sophisticated rendezvous in turn-of-the-century style” — as well as a “strikingly handsome” restaurant.

A private banquet room offered a “bandstand, public address system, and expert beverage and food service.”

The back of the brochure burbled on.

The New Englander was “minutes from the rich cultural and recreational life of the area.” Attractions included the Westport Country Playhouse, White Barn theater, Shakespeare Festival at Stratford, the “art colony at Silvermine,” museums, art galleries, beaches, boating, golf and picnic areas.

It was “minutes” too from “the industrial heart of the state”: Norwalk, Bridgeport and New Haven.

As if all that was not enough: at the New Englander Motor Hotel, credit cards were “honored.”

 

The New Englander never delivered on most of those promises. For the next couple of decades, it was just an average, non-descript motel.

The rooms were meh. Air conditioning was not a huge selling point. Restaurants came and went in dizzying succession.

Eventually the motel became an “inn.” Any changes were minor, and cosmetic.

Today we’ve got a legit hotel. There is valet parking. Christian Siriano decorated some interior spaces. The restaurant and bar are hopping.

But it still offers free ice, and 24-hour telephone service.

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)

Friday Flashback #514

Years ago, when Jay Cimbak was a framer at Max’s Art Supplies, he was in the alley nearby, between Post Road East and Jesup Road.

Workers were busily dismantling part of Toquet Hall. Jay knew it well: His shop used part of the upstairs for storage. In the 1800s and early 1900s Toquet had been an opera house, and the site of many other types of entertainment.

Jay was always fascinated by the section underneath the stage, which had been a dressing area. On the inside of doors were posters for long-ago shows.

Unfortunately, the demolition crew had already done most of their work. Not knowing — or perhaps not caring — about the unique doors, they’d smashed all that history to smithereens.

Except one.

Jay Cimbak, with his stage door. (Photo/Dan Woog)

Jay salvaged it. For years, it’s hung in his home.

Part of the poster had already peeled away. But the section that remains offers a glimpse into America’s strange past.

The stars of the “comedy sketch” show were John Whiteside and Margaret King.

She was a pianist.

He was a “parody singer.” And a “black face comedian.”

A very different era, for sure.

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Friday Flashback #513

Our Friday Flashbacks usually offer places and things — restaurants, stores, trolleys, Compo Beach bathhouses, and so much more — that no longer exist.

Today we explore 2 that never were.

Through the magic of AI, Nick Wiener offers a pair of what-might-have-been images. Both were hotly debated, more than half a century ago.

In the 1960s, United Illuminating wanted to build a nuclear power plant on Cockenoe Island.

You read that right: nuclear power, a mile off Westport’s shore.

You can read that fascinating story here. Today, we present an AI-generated look at what a large group of active residents (and intrepid Westport News editor Jo Fox Brosious) averted:

Thankfully, Cockenoe still looks like this today:

(Drone photo/Brandon Malin)

Not far away on the mainland, a handsome home stood for decades on Gorham Island.

(Photo/Peter Barlow)

It was a charming sight, just off Parker Harding Plaza.

Until a very large office complex was planned to replace it.

(AI images provided by Nick Weiner)

Thankfully, that was not ultimately built.

This was:

It’s easy to lament what we’ve lost over the years.

It’s also important to consider some of what we might really lament today.

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)

 

Friday Flashback #512

Printed high school yearbooks are forever.

Video yearbooks are not.

Briefly the rage in the 1980s and ’90s, the concept faded quickly once the cutting-edge technology became yesterday’s news.

And then unusable.

But whether your video yearbook is gathering dust somewhere (and you long ago tossed your VCR machine to play it), or whether you never bought one — or if you were not in Westport (or even alive) when these relics were made, but would love to see what Staples was like, back in the day: You’re in luck!

Staples grad Nick Wiener found 5 video yearbooks on YouTube.  They’re from 1987, 1988, 1991, 1995 and 1997.

The picture and sound quality isn’t great. But that’s not the point.

Three and 4 decades after they were filmed, edited and distributed — and soon thereafter, forgotten — they live on.

Click below, and relive the glory days: of Staples High School, and video yearbooks.

The 1997 video yearbook cannot be linked directly. But you can click here to see.

Go Wreckers!

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)

Friday Flashback #511

Right around this time of year, in the early and middle parts of the 20th century, Saugatuck would celebrate the Feast of St. Anthony’s.

The entire, tight-knit Italian community poured into the streets. Music, food, games — it was a beloved highlight of the year.

Then in the mid-1950s, I-95 (“the Connecticut Turnpike”) sliced through Saugatuck. Homes were demolished, streets destroyed. St. Anthony’s Hall gradually faded, as a center of social life.

Eventually, St. Anthony’s Feast faded too.

In 1983, a group of volunteers revived the tradition. Festival Italiano — held in Luciano Park, and the nearby railroad station parking lot — quickly became 3 things: A new Saugatuck tradition. A town-wide fair.

And an attraction that drew visitors from all over the tri-state region (especially Brooklyn).

Italian Fest director Roberta Troy and grand marshal Buck Iannacone exchange glances during the parade.

For 27 years — with people like Lou and Marge Santella, and Mike and Carla Rae at the helm — “the Italian Fest” was a cherished part of Westport summers. With carnival rides and booths, tons of food (especially pizza, zeppole and the like), and entertainment (including favorites like Johnny Maestro), an old-fashioned parade, and MC John LaBarca (host of the long-running “Italian House Party” on local radio station WMMM), it was a modern-but-retro version of St. Anthony’s Feast.

Best of all: the sponsoring Sons of Italy returned $2.5 million to local charities.

But in 2011, Festival Italiano became another memory too.

It had become harder to find volunteers. Costs rose. Sponsors dwindled.

Saugatuck has changed so much over the years. St. Anthony’s Hall on Franklin Street, and the Sons of Italy building on Riverside Avenue, are gone.

Families like Capasse, Anastasia, Luciano, Cribari, Giunta, Caruso, D’Aiuto, Dorta, Romano, DeMattio, Arciola, DeMace, D’Amico, Manere, Capuano, Arcudi, Melillo, Rubino, Caputo, Tiberio, Bottone, Nazzaro, Saviano, Reitano, Valiante, Tedesco, Gilbertie and Nistico are spread all over town — and the world.

The neighborhood was redeveloped in the early 2000s. Now — with plans afoot for new apartments and retail — it’s changing again.

It’s been over a decade and a half since the last Festival Italiano. An entire generation of newcomers has moved here, with no memory — or even knowledge — of that great summer fair.

And even less knowledge of the Feast of St. Anthony’s, which preceded it.

Time marches on. But if it marched backward, we’d all be outside this week, in the middle of Saugatuck.

We’d listen to music. Play games. Ride rides. Meet old friends. Enjoy life.

And of course, eat way too much fried dough.

(Friday Flashback is one of “06880”‘s many regular features. If you enjoy this — or anything else on our website — please consider a tax-deductible contribution. Just click here. Thank you!)