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This week in Shelter Island history

REPORTER FILE PHOTO Peter Waldner’s cartoon in the October 27, 2005, Reporter took on the issue of political signs.
REPORTER FILE PHOTO | Peter Waldner’s cartoon in the October 27, 2005, Reporter took on the issue of political signs.

50 YEARS AGO IN HISTORY

Pope Paul VI announced that the Ecumenical Council decided Jews are not collectively responsible for killing Christ.The Gateway Arch in St. Louis was topped off with a time capsule containing signatures of 762,000 students and others welded into the keystone before the final piece was set in place.

American historian Arthur Schlesinger Sr. died.

The first successful minicomputer, small enough to sit on a desktop, was released and cost $18,000, or one fifth of the cost of an IBM 360 mainframe in use.

The United States performed an underground nuclear test at Amchitka Island in the Aleutians.

And on Shelter Island …

40 YEARS AGO
Record vote expected among Islanders

Following a heated campaign in 1975, pundits were predicting a record turnout for at the polls, mostly because there were three candidates seeking the top post of supervisor. They were Democrat Mal Nevel, Republican Tom Jernick and Conservative Leonard Bliss.

There was also a contentious race for Highway Superintendent, pitting incumbent Leo Urban against former highway chief Hap Bowditch. Mr. Bliss toppled incumbent Tom Jernick while Mr. Urban beat Mr. Bowditch.

POSTSCRIPT: This year, two men who have occupied the supervisor’s seat — incumbent Jim Dougherty and former supervisor Art Williams — will face off on November 3. But there’s no contest for highway superintendent since incumbent Jay Card Jr. has the backing of all parties.

As for Town Board candidates, two of three will be elected and it’s possible that the candidate placing third could seek to be appointed to Councilman Ed Brown’s seat in January. Mr. Brown announced he was quitting the board as of December 31.

30 YEARS AGO
Town Board faces ‘insurance ripoff’

It was late October 1985 when the Town Board, struggling to put together a new budget, got word from its insurance consultant, William Mullen of Cutchogue, that costs could double in 1986. Mr. Mullen told them insurance companies are “ripping off the public and the state is doing nothing about it.”

POSTSCRIPT: This year, the Town Board has been expecting increases in its health care insurance premiums of about 4.5 percent.

Councilwoman Chris Lewis has said she wished she could have Governor Andrew Cuomo at a meeting where she could ask him how he expects municipalities to stay within a 2 percent tax cap given increases in insurance premiums, much less other expenses.

20 YEARS AGO
Center turns down fire district merger study

In late October 1995 Center Fire District commissioners sent a letter to their Heights counterparts rejecting a plan to study a possible merger of the two districts.

“At the present time, it is not in the best interest of the Shelter Island Fire District taxpayers financially to do a study on a merge as the majority of the Board of Fire Commissioners are opposed to a merge,” wrote Commission Chairman Phil Power. Heights commissioners expressed disappointment, but not surprise at the decision.

POSTSCRIPT: Today there is a single Shelter Island Fire District and seeming harmony among members who had served each of the separate districts in years past.

10 YEARS AGO
Cartoon takes on political signage

In the October 27, 2005 Reporter, cartoonist Peter Waldner offered his vision of political signage suggesting many fought to limit real estate signs around town but properties were littered with political signs in advance of the November election that year.

POSTSCRIPT: This year, the landscape was filled with signs for Democratic candidates while Republicans ran an add at the beginning of October promising their signs had just gone up and would be removed immediately after the November 3 election.

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