Monthly Archives: January 2024

FDR’s 1930 CAVE VISIT SPARKS LIFETIME MEMORY FOR YOUNG BOY

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Town of Esperance Historian Ken Jones shares a story from his files from the Dale Family, whose father, retired USMC Major Frederick H. Dale, cherishes a boyhood memory of serving then-Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt an ice cream cone at a 1930 Farm Bureau picnic at Howe Caverns. Dale was 12 at the time.

Born in 1917 in Albany to the late Frederick Sheldon Dale, Jr. and Mildred (Hunter), the younger Dale spent his youth in Esperance with his mother and stepfather, William Montanye, and graduated Cobleskill High School in 1936.

Gov. Roosevelt drew a huge crowd to the August 22, 1930, Farm Bureau picnic in the Howe Caverns’ parking lot. Frederick—he often went by F. H.—got the job selling ice cream cones through his Aunt Blanche, then the Schoharie County Clerk, the first woman to hold the job, elected in 1919.

The 1930 Farm Bureau Picnic at Howe Caverns. The guest speaker was then-governor Franklin D. Roosevelt. The lodge is in the background, left.

Meeting the governor and future president became a lifetime memory for Major Dale. And while a career in the Marines took him around the world, he often returned to Esperance throughout his lifetime for the Memorial Day parade, and services at the church and cemetery.

Dale’s path crossed with FDR again. He was with the Marine Corps’ detachment that in April 1945, marched in the funeral procession through the nation’s Capital for the late President Roosevelt—the man the young Dale had sold an ice cream cone to 15 years earlier.

Dale enlisted in the Marines in February 1942 and participated in both the Guadalcanal and Bougainville Island campaigns, followed by a tour of duty in Japan as part of the Marine occupation force. Following WWII, Major Dale served briefly in Korea and later on an extended tour of duty in Vietnam.

Major Dale died in February 2009, in Charlotte, NC, predeceased by his wife Olga.  His two sons, Thomas Hunter Dale and William Jessen Dale and their families live in Florida and North Carolina, respectively.

Major F. H. Dale is buried in the Esperance Cemetery.

Included in Esperance Historian Jones files on the Dale family was a transcript of the Aug. 23 news article on Gov. Roosevelt’s appearance at Howe Caverns. The article is attributed to a “special” correspondent. In this case, it was Virgil Clymer, then the general manager at the cave. Minor edits have been made for clarity.

From The Albany Evening News:

Aid to Farms Cited by Roosevelt

Governor at Howe Cavern Picnic Tells of Lower Taxation

Special to the Albany Evening News

COBLESKILL, Aug. 22 —The government of New York state is “farm minded,” Governor Roosevelt declared in an address before 5.000 farmers gathered yesterday at Howe Caverns for the fourteenth annual picnic of the Schoharie County Farm Bureau.

This attitude of the state government, he attributed in a large measure, [is due] to the study and work of the agricultural advisory committee appointed just prior to his inauguration.

Some political significance was given by Republican leaders to the Governor’s address by the presence of Jared Van Wagenen, Jr., a member the Governor’s Advisory Committee and Democratic candidate for the Schoharie seat in the Assembly. Mr. Van Wagenen introduced the Governor.

The Governor said that as the result of the committee’s work, the state no longer receives support from taxes on the farmer’s property. These go to local governments only.

“It is a simple but interesting fact that it was not until the appointment of by me of the Agricultural Advisory Committee before I was inaugurated that any definite study of farm conditions or any definite program of relief and improvement of existing conditions had been undertaken in a generation,” [said Roosevelt].

The committee found that the tax burden in this state bore unfairly and unequally on the farmer.

The result was recommendations by the Governor which the Legislature carried through under which the burden of farm taxes was reduced approximately $30,000,000 a year.

Another part of the program consists in increased appropriations by the state for what is best described as the functions of government in improving agricultural conditions.

During each of the past two years apportionment of appropriations to agricultural fairs has been increased from $250,000 to $375,000.

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Special thanks to Esperance Historian Jones for his contribution to this Cave Country blog post.

MORE MONEY, MORE PROBLEMS

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The Klondike Quarry, three miles east of Cobleskill along the D&H Railroad line, was the largest of the Schoharie County quarries during the stone boom. It held a contract with the City of New York to provide stone for the foundations of the Brooklyn Bridge, a contract today worth more than $65 million. Run by the NYC-based Cobleskill Quarry Company, the Klondike employed nearly 500, many of them recent Italian immigrants.

The abandoned Klondike Quarry on a Fall Day in 2022.

The full story is told in Farming With Dynamite: The Forgotten Stone boom in Schoharie County, available here and at local bookstore.

We add to the remarkable story of the Klondike with two reports which appeared separately, yet on the same page of the May 18, 1898, Cobleskill Index.  We can’t help but consider them somehow related.  Let us know your thoughts on the deadly incident.

The first story, headlined simply, ‘Cobleskill Quarry Co.’ describes a NYC policy that created financial challenges for the Klondike and its employees:

“Mingled surprise and regrets were everywhere manifest Monday morning. when the Cobleskill Quarry Co. paid 378 hands and shut down the works.

“Eleven thousand dollars was paid. A state law prohibits any city from creating debt over a certain per cent of assessed valuation. There is a dispute among N Y. City officials as to whether or not the city has reached the debt limit, and as a consequence work on all public works has been suspended and 60,000 laborers are thrown out of employment.

“The Cobleskill Quarry Co. has the contract from the city for foundations for the East River bridge. They have received no money from the city for labor and material furnished in the past eight months, and their dues now, on contract, is said to be $250,000.00. Hence the “shut down” of the Cobleskill Quarry.

“The company, which now has the contract to furnish stone for the D&H, formerly supplied bv Reilly & Weiting, intends to run the quarry with about fifty hands, on smaller outside orders.

“The company says they may start at any time on full force—any time the entanglement in N. Y. City is unraveled.

“There are rumors that the company will be running within a few days with over 100 hands.

“Since putting the above in type it is stated that the Quarry Co. has received $200,000 on indebtedness from the City of New York.” (Italics added. – ed.)

The second item in that day’s paper was headlined “Injured by the Cars,” tells of a tragedy at the Cobleskill train depot that apparently followed a scuffle the day before with the Klondike’s paymaster.  We can only guess the cause.

The paper reported:

“Yesterday noon an Italian, about 20 years of age, employed by the Cobleskill Quarry Co., attempted to catch on a freight going east, intending to go to Klondike.

“He swung under the cars and both legs were horribly injured. Dr. Frasier was quickly on hand, and he decided to send the man to the Albany Hospital, and he was placed on the next train east.

 One and possibly both legs will have to be amputated above the knee. It is rumored that the young man had trouble at the quarry and drew a knife on the paymaster.

The name of the Italian is Guiseppe Ophallete of New York. The wheels passed over his left ankle, crushing the bones. There are two fractures, one below the knee and one at the hip, The right leg is badly crushed, He is bruised all over his body. There may be internal injuries.

(Editor’s Note; In the same issue, the paper later reports Mr. Ophallete died of his injuries.)