A story about Sutton's Pvt. Otto Scheerer appeared in local newspapers in early 1944
Thursday, February 28, 2019
1919 Newspaper Ads
Newspaper ads from early newspapers have preserved much about the story of our past.
Schwenk & Bieck was a major early Harvard business.
Windmills played a huge role in the development of our area as settlers were able to tap into our valuable underground water resources from the git-go. Most windmills were of the "flat" wheel design but there was a smattering of this design around.
Not sure of the basis for the "cyclone proof" claim though. I believe my uncle, Frank Starr down south on Highway 74 had one of these, though I may be dis-remembering.
Sutton Paving Proposal 1919
The February 27, 1919 issue of The Sutton Register covered the proposal for the first paving of Sutton streets. Editor Francis M. Brown published this item on the topic:
One a later page, The Sutton Register carried a response to the paving proposal by R. G. Brown, brother of the editor:
R, G. - Robert Brown, had some cost concerns.
At about this same time, some folks in Fairfield were proposing to start their first paving project, too.
The Sutton News installs a new Kluge printing press in 1944.
The Sutton News newspaper installed a new automatic printing press in early 1944 providing evidence supporting its claim in the article that the News printing plant was second to none in this part of the state.
There really was, and is a company that uses the name "Kluge" beginning in November 1919 as Brandtjen & Kluge, LLC as described in their web site - Brandtjen & Kluge.
A fun question remains. Do you suppose our word "kluge" comes from this company? Or better yet, "kludge?"
Kluge (English: /ˈkluːɡi/, German: [ˈkluːɡə]) is a German-derived surname. In German, capitalizing, and adding a final e to, the adjective klug (meaning "clever"), creates a noun; it is applicable to females and means "clever one".
A kludge or kluge (/klʌdʒ,
I'm more familiar with the second word, which we spelled "kluge" perhaps erroneously, or at least using the alternate spelling. Software development lends itself to including a kluge in the coding that will serve the purpose, generally, rather than making a major re-write to produce a clean program - no one will look at the source code again, at least for a long time....
Lt. Jerry Lilliedoll Gets His First Zero in Aerial Combat
The March 9, 1944 issue of The Sutton News carried this story of Sutton's Lt. Jerry Lilliedoll getting his first Zero in combat. I'd say they buried the lead by mentioning the 1st Lt promotion first.
It is likely that Lt. Lilliedoll was flying a P-38 or a P-40 with the 13th AAF.
See a promotion comment below the clipping.
Promotions in wartime were driven by events, vacancies and other considerations. In more benign times, promotions are based on statutory rules.
The Air Force company grade promotion rules during the Vietnam era saw newly commissioned officers receiving the rank of Second Lieutenant. Eighteen months later the officer became a First Lieutenant and after another eighteen months came the automatic promotion to Captain.
There were ways to be denied one of these "automatic" promotions though our joke about it went along the lines of, "you'd have to flash in a school yard." Not exactly true - I did see promotions denied and had a part in denying a 1st Lt promotion for one of my people as part of a disciplinary action.
After Captain came a long wait for the competitive promotion board for major at about the 10-years of service point in the career. Increasingly competitive promotion boards are used for promotion to the ranks of lieutenant colonel and colonel. Promotion to the general ranks, the flag officer level, is another story altogether.
Wednesday, February 27, 2019
Pending Prohibition in 6 states in 1919
The Harvard Courier newspaper reported on the pending implementation of prohibition in six nearby stats in 1919.
