Recreation Department Announces Fall Horseshoe Tournament Winners

On Saturday, Saturday 27^th, 2024, the Smithtown Recreation Department held its annual Singles and Doubles Fall Horseshoe Tournament at Gibbs Pond Park.

The winner of the Singles Tournament was John Kassay with a record of 4 - 1. Justin Flores finished 2^nd with a 5 – 2 record. Ed Riss finished in 3^rd place with a 4 – 2 record. John Kassay beat Justin Flores in the final 22 – 20.

John Kassay and Deb Kassay were the winners of the Doubles tournament with a 4-0 record. Andy Kassay and Paul Williams finished in 2^nd place with a record of 3 – 2. John Kassay and Deb Kassay beat Andy Kassay and Paul Williams in the final 23 – 18.

Congratulations to all the winners and to everyone who helped make this event so successful.

We hope to see everyone at the Fall Horseshoe Tournament in October.

Contact the Smithtown Recreation Department 631 – 360 – 7644 for more information.

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP: Support Historic Tesla Lab With "Metals for Tesla" And "Bricks For Nik"

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

The historic laboratory in Suffolk County in which genius inventor Nikola Tesla did important, breakthrough work in a building designed by his friend, famed architect Stanford White, suffered a fire last year as restoration was beginning to turn the lab into a museum.

But the project of creating the Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe very much continues—with its leadership working hard on it.

“Terrible,” Jane Alcorn, a driving force behind the Tesla Science Center project in Shoreham, said last week about the damage from the blaze in November. But there is “momentum to bring back Tesla’s laboratory to its former glory,” said Alcorn, a center director. 

As it declares on the opening page of its website: “Mission: Rebuild. Keep the momentum going. Donate today to see Tesla’s dream come to fruition.”

Marc Alessi, executive director of Tesla Science Center, said of the blaze: “It was heartbreaking.” He spoke last week of how firefighters from 13 departments who battled it “took it personally. It means a lot to everybody.” In 2018 Tesla’s lab in Suffolk was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The fire was “a gut punch,” said Alessi, a former New York State assemblyman and Shoreham resident. It was originally estimated to cost $3 million to repair the damage. Now, said Alessi, that’s projected at $4 million, bringing the Tesla Science Center’s total cost to $24 million which includes restoration of the lab and also building a visitor’s center on the 16.5 acre site. 

Fundraising is in high gear with grant applications being sent to foundations and the seeking of government support and donations from contributors. Since the inception of the Tesla Science Center project, some $14 million has been raised including from the state and local governments, foundations and contributors “large and small,” said Alessi.

A “Metals for Tesla” effort has begun. This month, on April 20^th, in honor of Earth Day, or any day earlier, metal that can be recycled—including metal furniture, vehicles and pipes—can be dropped off at the lab site. Details are on the Tesla Science Center website at https://teslasciencecenter.org/ 

There is “Bricks for Nik” initiative in which individuals and businesses can buy commemorative bricks. They would be placed at the base of the statue to Nikola Tesla donated by the Serbian government (Tesla’s parents were Serbs) or other paved areas on the site. In addition to names, they could include quotes and dedications. The statue was unveiled in 2003 by then Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic who called Tesla a man whose “ideas were larger than his time.” More information on this is at: https://donate.brickmarkers.com/tsc

As the book “Tesla, Inventor of the Electrical Age,” published by Princeton University Press, relates: “Tesla was a major contributor to the electrical revolution that transformed daily life…His inventions, patents, and theoretical work formed the basis of modern AC electricity and contributed to radio and television.” Its author is Dr. W. Bernard Carlson, a University of Virginia professor of science, technology, and society. 

Most of the world would adopt AC or alternating current. And Tesla was responsible for many more inventions, among them hydroelectric energy technology, remote control through electricity, fluorescent lighting and the bladeless turbine, notes the book. Regarding radio, Guglielmo Marconi is usually credited with originating radio but, the book points out that the U.S. Supreme Court, after Tesla’s death in 1943, determined that much of Marconi’s work was based on 17 Tesla patents. 

He went to Shoreham in 1901 to pursue his vision of providing wireless electricity. “Tesla was convinced that he could set up stationary waves in the Earth and transmit power and messages,” writes Carlson. He received a $150,000 loan from “the most powerful man on Wall Street, J.P. Morgan…to support his wireless work.” 

He had been “approached by James S. Warden, a lawyer and banker from Ohio who had relocated to Suffolk County,” purchased farmland and “christened his property Wardenclyffe.” 

He offered Tesla land. On it, the laboratory was built along with a tower 187-feet tall. Below the tower a deep “ground connection” was dug. “In many ways, Wardenclyffe was the fulfillment of Tesla’s dreams. For nearly a decade he had been planning in his imagination a system for broadcasting power around the world, and now that system was taking shape in the real world,” says Carlson. But then Morgan pulled out of the undertaking and Tesla faced huge financial problems. The tower was demolished in 1917.

        As Alcorn, a retired teacher and librarian from Shoreham, explained in a presentation at the Suffolk County Historical Society, Tesla’s “plan and dream was to…provide wireless electricity to people around the world.” He was a “visionary” with ideas that would revolutionize the world. He envisioned that not only radio signals but electricity could be sent far distances by linking into the resonance of the Earth. She said Tesla believed that if electricity could be “wirelessly” transmitted, people all over the world “would be able to tap into it”—for free.

I wrote and presented a TV program about Wardenclyffe for WVVH-TV in 2011. You can view it on YouTube by inputting “Saving Nikola Tesla’s Laboratory” and my name or by going to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_H-UBvdPtag 

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.   

A History Lesson For Today And Everyday

History Lesson

By June Capossela Kempf

I was sitting on the front porch waiting for the school bus with my granddaughter, G G. (Gorgeous Granddaughter). My attention was split between the time and the street corner; hoping the bus would come before she drives me crazier than I already am for signing up for this detail in the first place – really?  I cherish these precious moments, sharing and bonding with her.

Today, she started off by asking; “How old are you?  When I answered, she swung into gear with a slew of questions.

“Do you remember Martin Luther King?”  

 ‘Sure do.”

“When he was alive? You remember his march in Washington. You were living – then? 

“Yeah, I watched it from a distance. I had a dream,” I quoted. Then, reflected how I wished I did more to support that dream - how I admired the people who marched for freedom back then.  As she struggled with the idea that her grandma witnessed her recent history lesson, the words to Aretha Franklin’s R_E_S_P_E_C_T’ tumbled around my head, along with freedom songs of the sixties. ‘If I Had a Hammer’, I softly sang out loud.

“How did you feel when he got killed?”

“So scared. I thought his dream for freedom would be lost forever and there would be rioting - everywhere.”

“.. But that didn’t happen, right?”

“His message got through. Laws were passed that not only inspired racial tolerance but protected the poor and disabled throughout the country – but we can’t forget how easily we can fall backwards.”

 G G carefully studied me like I was a talking relic resurrected from an archeological dig. 

“Did you go to Woodstock?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

I explained that I was a little older than most of the people who went.  I was married with a child, a house; and I didn’t approve the drugs and the wild crowds, but was there in spirit.”  Blah. Blah, Blah. 

 “Were you a Dove or a Hawk?” she said. 

Luckily, the bus arrived which enabled me to dodge the question. “I’ll tell you later,” I said.  

“Never mind, Grandma… You were no Hawk. “

How could she know? Especially since in the beginning I thought we were fighting the good war in Vietnam. Once I saw the destruction and realized the privileged could avoid the draft and we were losing, at a terrible cost, I leaned towards the bird of peace. But I stayed on the fence. Did I get out and march - face the fire hoses or write one letter of protest? 

I decided to talk to her tomorrow and tell her how during those days; I didn’t speak out for fear of offending my ‘friends and neighbors’ - that the bird I was most closely associated with was a chicken.

Perhaps tomorrow, I’ll tell GG that it is never too late to take a stand for your values.  We see now, as history repeats itself; that freedom can’t be taken for granted or expected to endure if we don’t fight like our forefathers to preserve liberty and justice “– all over this land.”

Thank you Dr. King – Peter,Paul and Mary, Aretha . And thank Heaven for G.G.

KOREAN WAR* USNAVY * VETERAN 1950-53 A Reason To Honor Veterans

Autumn Daze

By June Capossela Kempf

Here we are.  The season’s cool winds and driving rainstorms have brought down all the leaves that shaded us from the glare of the summer’s sun. Our thoughts now turn to the looming holidays that are coming at us like a cluster of ferocious firestorms. It’s November!  Plans have been in the works since last November to celebrate Thanksgiving Day with yet another world famous and magnificent Macy’s Day parade.  Spectators from all over the country crowd the sidewalks of New York and marvel at the iconic array of enormous inflatable characters while battling the winds high above their heads. They can hear loud and flashy marching bands from blocks away and if lucky, see dancing Rockettes dazzle the audience at Herald Square – all in anticipation of Santa ushering in the Christmas season. What a show!

But while this was all going on, another event was being quietly planned.  Parades and ceremonies, organized with solemn dignity giving homage to our heroes who sacrificed so much so we can have a reason to be thankful. In places all over the country citizens march down their own Lake Avenues in near silence. At the end of the road, they gather to hear a single bugle tapping out ‘Day is Done’. Veterans snap to attention and prayers are offered up by a local clergyman by the village gazebo.

What a scene!

Grandpa got ready early to go to the parade, and although he doesn’t have his old sailor’s garb to wear, he proudly dusted off his baseball hat emblazoned with the words:  KOREAN WAR* USNAVY * VETERAN 1950-53. Whenever he wears that hat, people, strangers if you will, stop everything to thank him for his service and engage in conversations like they were old friends hanging out on the front porch.

This year he was unable to participate in the parade itself, so Grandpa stood on the sidewalk, saluting each group of marchers as they passed by. But only a few devoted spectators showed up to stand in line beside the old Naval airman. As bitter memories flooded his mind, of things he could never talk about - even to his family; he connected with his fellow veterans, who didn’t need any explanations about his state of mind -they knew. 

On the way home, Grandpa seemed to be a bit agitated.

“How come there was such a small turn-out for the parade?” Then wondered out loud why we never learned anything from all the horrors of wars and atrocities gone by.

“It’s still going on,” he said. He then fell silent for a few moments and stared into space, stuck in the past, perhaps revisiting those distant terrors that came to haunt him from time to time. When he was ready, he put his dark recollections away and came back into focus:

“Hey,” he laughed. “Did they ever get the big witch rebuilt?” 

“You mean Winnie?”

“Yeah, “he said, “When I passed by her place the other day, she had a new head, and a construction crew was busy framing out her torso.”

“Ohhh, do you want to drive by?” I asked.

“Yeah, let’s go see how much she has developed by now.”

“Yup! I wouldn’t be surprised if she winds up all blown up and flying her broom high above the Macy’s Day parade next year.”

 I really meant that.

June Capossela Kempf: Essayist and  Author of : Yo God! Jay’s Story, a memoir  and Lady of the Dollhouse, a YA mystery

Assault On Police Results In Arrests At St. James Wedding

Suffolk County Police last night arrested a man for assaulting a police officer who was breaking up a fight at a wedding in Saint James.

Fourth Precinct Patrol officers responded to a wedding at a catering establishment located at 199 Mills Pond Road after a 911 call reported a fight at approximately 7:45 p.m. When officers arrived at the scene, they found multiple skirmishes had broken out among the more than 100 guests at the wedding. Officers from the Second, Fifth and Sixth Precincts, Canine Section and Emergency Services officers, as well as Smithtown Park Rangers and Head of the Harbor Police officers also responded.

As officers were breaking up the fight and restoring order, Justize Murphy bit one officer on the arm and shoved another officer. A second man, Qeywon Wilson, obstructed another officer who was attempting to break up the fighting.

Wilson was charged with Obstructing Governmental Administration. He will be arraigned at a later date.

Fourth Squad detectives charged Murphy, 22, of Mastic Beach, with Assault 2nd Degree. He will be held at the Fourth Precinct overnight and is scheduled to be arraigned at First District Court in Central Islip later today.

A criminal charge is an accusation. A defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.