June 1919 - 100 Years Ago "in That Thriving Town"

June 1919 in Bovina saw some heavy showers and, later in the month, a lightning storm that killed nine cows on Pink Street.

June 6, 1919

·         Miss Viola Russell spent the weekend at Oneonta.

·         An electric fan has been installed in the office of the Dry Milk plant.

·         Arthur Bergerman, an uptown Bovina farmer, is producing over a ton of milk daily from his dairy.

·         Mrs. James Divitt has given up the Charles Hafele farm, which they purchased in the fall of 1917, and with her family moved to the Methodist parsonage this week. [This farm likely was off Coulter Brook Road.]

June 13, 1919

·         William Rogers, of New York, has arrived at his summer home at Lake Delaware.

·         At the sale at the Maynard homestead in upper Bovina on Wednesday cows brought high prices, going as high as $250 each.

·         Rev. Edgelow, rector of the St. James Church at Lake Delaware, has a new Ford car.  The barn at the rear of the Mason lot is being fitted up for a garage.

Bovina Farmer Takes a Bride

Floyd W. Hyatt, a Bovina farmer who a few years ago purchased the D.J. Miller farm has again embarked on the sea of matrimony.  On Monday, June 9, he went to Yonkers, and that evening was united in marriage with Mrs. Brown, of that city.  He arrived home with his bride Wednesday evening and his neighbors gathered at his home to welcome the new mistress. [This farm was in the Bramley Mountain area, likely on Miller Avenue.]

Bovina Farm Sold

W. Robert Doig Disposes of Tunis Lake to C.E. Hulbert

W. Robert Doig has sold his farm in Bovina to Charles E. Hulbert of Downsville.  Tunis Lake, a fishing resort, is located on this farm and this was doubtless an objective for the purchaser.  Three generations of Doigs have owned the place, which was in the distant past the Northrup homestead.

The sale brings to mind a legend told, which has it that the Indian Chief Tunis whose wigwam was on the shores of this lake, had located a lead mine in the vicinity and had taken a man blindfolded to it to prove his assertion. However, no one has ever been able to bring such a mine to light.

June 20, 1919

·         This section was visited by heavy showers Saturday and Sabbath afternoons.

·         Edward Lamb, employed on the Miller homestead farm, sustained a dislocation of the left shoulder on Monday evening.

·         Sergeant Donald Lee, a member of the Lightning division, who served over a year in France, arrived home last Saturday, having received his discharge. [Lee would be Bovina's last surviving World War One veteran, dying in 1995 at the age of 99.]

June 27, 1919

·         Mrs. William J. Storie attended the semi-centennial celebration of the founding of Cornell University. Her uncle, David F. Hoy is the registrar of Cornell.

·         Clifton Irvine who has been in the army, arrived home Saturday.  He is going back to Seattle, where he was before the war, and Lloyd Irvine and Millard Blair expect to go with him. [Clifton and Lloyd were brothers of Isabell Russell.]

·         Wendell Ormiston, whose boyhood was spent in Bovina, and Miss Lillian Haler, a teacher in the Goshen high school, were married June 20.  He is a telephone lineman with headquarters at Goshen.

Lightning Does Damage in Bovina

William T. Miller Had Nine Cows Killed Last Thursday Night

During the severe thunder storm that swept over Bovina last Thursday night William T. Miller, living on Pink Street, Bovina, had nine cows and a yearling killed by lightning.  [The farm was at Pink Street and Scutt Mountain Road. It had belonged to William's maternal grandfather then his father. It later was the Doig farm.]

The cows were lying close to the line wall between the Miller and Storie farms and beneath a large tree that stood on the Storie side of the wall.  The bolt had struck the tree and going down this had passed through the wall and electrocuted the animals without leaving a ark on any of them.  Six of the cows were lying with their heads in one direction and as death came had straightened out and the head of each was lying on the cow next to it.

The loss is an extremely heavy one as Mr. Miller had no insurance and his only recompense was $1143 received for the hides.

A little over a year ago lightning struck and burned the barn of John M. Miller on the farm adjoining. [John Miller was William's brother.]