\t\t\t\tThe New Year is here. \u00a0It\u2019s 1995 and it\u2019s great to be alive.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been thinking of what I should write for the New Year\u2019s Jottings.\u00a0 I went back to the prior years and learned I only referred to the new year in 1994\u2014in 1993 I seemed to have jumped in in March.\u00a0 The theme of \u201994 was and still is: Thank God for giving me so much in the past year and the optimism to face the new one with minimum apprehension.\u00a0 The month of January in \u201994 was my \u201coperation\u201d month and fortunately only good memories remain\u2014the bad are buried hopefully never to rise again.<\/p>\n
A modest poll of the Jottings recipients, sometime readers, indicate they would like more reminiscing and less current events.\u00a0 We will try to satisfy both readers and recipients in the \u201995 editions.<\/p>\n
By way of a trip down memory lane, I recall an incident at the end of my campaign in 1966 for State Legislature.\u00a0 A friend of mine, Joe Gerngross, was the President of the St. Joe\u2019s Father\u2019s Club.\u00a0 St. Joseph\u2019s was a parish in Cheltenham, Montgomery County, and incidentally, not in the District I was seeking to represent.\u00a0 But, as I said, he was a friend, and a friend in need.\u00a0 He needed a speaker for his meeting night in November and it happened to be the night before the election.\u00a0 \u201cWould I be that speaker?\u201d asked Joe.<\/p>\n
Well, since there was little I, or anyone else could really accomplish on the last night, I agreed.\u00a0 He then advised that there would also be another speaker, a Republican, to give his party\u2019s view.\u00a0 We were going to talk about the respective platforms of the gubernatorial candidates.\u00a0 The Republicans were represented by the incumbent, Shaeffer, and our candidate was Milton Shapp.\u00a0 The gentleman Joe asked to speak for the Republicans was James Cavanaugh, today a Judge on the Superior Court of Pennsylvania.\u00a0 I knew Jim as a member of the brood of Cavanaughs who used to summer in Sea Isle City.\u00a0 I also knew he was a good plaintiff\u2019s lawyer and had run for political office in the Northeast in several prior elections.\u00a0 He was not a candidate in this one.<\/p>\n
The Father\u2019s Club of St. Joseph\u2019s had about 50 members present on that historic evening.\u00a0 Joe was the Master of Ceremonies.\u00a0 He introduced us both and then gave me the opportunity to speak first.\u00a0 I offered condolences of a tongue in cheek nature in that it was regrettable that they could not vote for me, since all of them lived outside of the district.\u00a0 I did note that the speakers were on an even keel in that they couldn\u2019t vote for Jim either.\u00a0 Then I expanded on the virtues of our candidate and his program for progress.\u00a0 But as I now recall some nearly 30 years later, I can\u2019t for the life of me think of one outstanding proposal Miltie had, but I\u2019m sure there were many in 1966.\u00a0 I spoke for about 10 to 15 minutes and then rested, assured all would vote for Shapp the following day.\u00a0 It was then Mr. Cavanaugh\u2019s turn.<\/p>\n
He began rather formally with a nod to the Chairman and his friends, and then the bomb was dropped!\u00a0 He said \u201cI have been waiting for this opportunity, throughout this campaign of Mr. McSorley\u2019s, to expose a secret\u2014not that Tom Gola needs it to win by\u2014but<\/span> that secret is this!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMr. McSorley, as a young man, sneaked into Braca\u2019s Pier Theater in Sea Isle City.\u00a0 He did so by going hand over hand on the sewer pipe under the theater to a hole in the bathroom floor.\u00a0 By the way, the pipe went out over the ocean water.\u00a0 He did this on several occasions and I can prove it, since I did it with him!\u201d<\/p>\n The room exploded!\u00a0 I was at first a bit puzzled and then, as he disclosed his startling revelation, I broke into laughter.\u00a0 I later, of course, properly acknowledged that I had sinned and asked to be forgiven.<\/p>\n I had forgotten those daring episodes of getting into Braca\u2019s or that Jim had ever been a party to them.\u00a0 But then I remembered and recalled we often did it several times in one week, even if we had seen the show, just for the sport of it\u2014not just trying to avoid the probable 10- or 15-cent admission charge.<\/p>\n Over the years after the \u201cexpose\u201d whenever Jim and I met we would laugh about that evening and recall the days of summer and Sea Isle by the Sea.<\/p>\n I had many happy days in the land of tomatoes and crabs.\u00a0 The bushel baskets of both were a Friday regular and sometimes we even provided the crabs.\u00a0 We would go out in the flat bottom rowboat into the coves and marshes of our inland waterways and lay traps.\u00a0 We would also use lines with fish tied to them (croakers I think) over the side of the boat, slowly lifting the line when we got a nibble and then netting the nibbling crustacean.\u00a0 This was done from early morning until lunch time, but sometimes we even took lunch.\u00a0 I\u2019ll never forget those warm tomato sandwiches.\u00a0 They were made before we left and the sun had usually made them very tepid.\u00a0 We never had any coolers, so the juice or soda matched the temperature of the tomatoes.\u00a0 An early example of Paul\u2019s ability to eat almost anything when he was hungry\u2014called appetite.<\/p>\n Later, Sea Isle was visited to run the beach run and in 1976 it began on the boardwalk (concrete walk now) in front of the old homestead at 11-45th<\/sup> Street.<\/p>\n On New Year\u2019s Day we had Dan, Marge, Jerry, Betty, and Bill and Bunny King as dinner guests.\u00a0 I recalled with Bill joining in the runs at Sea Isle, but particularly the one I chronicled here before of Bill getting 10th<\/sup> place runner was assaulted by a group of passing junkies.\u00a0 The jury is still out on whether Bill had anything to do with their actions.\u00a0 His reputation for competitiveness belied his denials.\u00a0 I also reminded him at the dinner of his record of runs in\u2014which appeared one clipping completely edged by the author in \u201cblack\u201d like a memorial card for the dead.\u00a0 It was the one race in 20 plus years in which I beat him!\u00a0 Now there\u2019s competitiveness.<\/p>\n Reminder for the New Year\u2014someone once said, \u201cHusbands are like fires, they go out if left unattended!\u201d (Applies equally to \u201cwives\u201d).\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The New Year is here. \u00a0It\u2019s 1995 and it\u2019s great to be alive.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been thinking of what I should write for the New Year\u2019s Jottings.\u00a0 I went back to the prior years and learned I only referred to the new year in 1994\u2014in 1993 I seemed to have jumped in in March.\u00a0 The theme … <\/p>\n