This week in Shelter Island history
50 YEARS AGO IN HISTORY
The Toronto Rock and Roll Revival attracted an audience of approximately 20,000 to watch 20 performers including Chicago, Alice Cooper, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent, Little Richard, Doug Kershaw and The Doors and John Lennon, Yoko Ono and The Plastic Ono Band at Varsity Stadium of the University of Toronto in Ontario, Canada.
Controversial American author James Frey was born in Cleveland. He admitted to Oprah Winfrey that he had lied to her earlier when he claimed “The Smoking Gun” had been accurate when he had spent a few hours in jail rather than the 87 days as his book had said.
“Scooby Doo Where Are You” debuted in the United States on CBS Television.
American filmmaker, author and songwriter Tyler Perry was born in New Orleans.
“Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice,” starring Natalie Wood, Robert Culp, Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon and directed by Paul Mazursky was released.
And on Shelter Island . . .
50 YEARS AGO
School tax rate is $3.29
In 1969, the Shelter Island School District announce that it’s tax rate would not be as high as originally anticipated, but would be $3.29 per $100 of assessed value. The rate represented a 38-cent increase per $100 more than the current school year’s tax.
POSTSCRIPT: When the budget for 2019-20 was approved, it was estimated that taxpayers would pay $28.26 per $100 of assessed valuation for property at $500,000; $48.03 for property assessed at $850,000; and $56.51 for property assessed at $1 million.
30 YEARS AGO
Constitution Week calls for church bell ringing
The federal government and Shelter Island’s chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution asked that Island churches observe Constitution Week with the ringing of bells to commemorate the occasion. Residents were asked to pause when they heard the bells and reflect on the freedoms and opportunities the Constitution provides.
POSTSCRIPT: This was 22 years before Americans would pause to remember the lives lost in the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and aboard United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
Memorials with ringing church bells occur throughout the nation each year since the Al-Qaeda attack, to honor the 2,996 people killed and more than 6,000 injured on that day.
20 YEARS AGO
Title to town landings is focus of inquiry
The Town Board announced its intent to have town lands surveyed to determine whether property owners were encroaching on them, or the town had overstepped its right to claim some of them.
At the head of the list was land between Nostrand Parkway and the shoreline that appeared to have been taken over by a neighbor. He claimed ownership of a narrow strip where he had built a driveway and done landscaping, which made it appear to be his, although records at the time showed he had never paid taxes on the property.
POSTSCRIPT: The Community Preservation Fund Advisory Committee has been active in recent times in moving on property owners in other areas of town who have tried to block access to public lands acquired with CPF funding. They have been successful so far, and are vigilant to ensure that land meant for public access is not blocked by neighboring homeowners.
10 YEARS AGO
Summer, we hardly knew ye
Islanders had just celebrated Labor Day with weekenders and summer people packing up their possessions to return to their year-round residences. An editorial in the Reporter at the time noted a short summer period that flew by.
POSTSCRIPT: A check of the calendar then and now revealed that the late Memorial Day and early Labor Day this year was about the same in length — 14 weeks.
