Letters to the editor

'Remembering Little Lake Erie' and more

Posted 3/4/20

Letters to the editor March 5 to 11

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Letters to the editor

'Remembering Little Lake Erie' and more

Posted

Planning for a COVID-19 outbreak

Please take the time to view www.bit.ly/CDCplanning and read the CDC recommendations on how to plan for a COVID-19 outbreak. Local governments should be prepared for this. In addition to the CDC guidelines, the town should also be preparing their employees and citizens with knowledge and the tools that they will need to protect themselves. People should view videos on how to properly wash hands (it’s surprising how many people don’t know what it takes to wash properly). Educate the community on COVID-19 and its potential.

The town should develop an outbreak response plan immediately. This disease has great potential to shut down things like manufacturing and schools for the simple fact that employees will be quarantined.

The community needs to be aware that individuals and families need to be prepared to live on their own without outside assistance for an extended amount of time. This is not a time to begin a panic, but to simply be prepared for what realistically may be ahead of us. Preparation can prevent panic. People on medications need to be cognizant of the fact that if an outbreak happens here in the U.S., availability of those medications may be affected and prepare accordingly.

Please educate, make aware and develop a plan so that the citizens of this town can feel safe and as prepared as possible.

Carol Ropke Nelson
Tusten, NY

Military monuments

A graduate of West Point, Robert E. Lee first broke his oath of allegiance to defend the U.S. Constitution and the rule of law in 1861. For the next four years, he led the army of the confederacy. Hundreds of thousands died, including casualties of 39,000 from NY and 27,000 from PA (www.worldpopulationreview.com/states/civil-war-casualties-by-state) in the odious cause of continuing slavery within a seven-state southern confederacy that proposed to break away from these United States. Of course, many great southern cities were also burned and civilians killed as part of the inevitable ash heap nightmare that was and is war.

In the spirit of post-war reconciliation, Lee was never tried for treason, subsequently became the president of Washington College and, upon his death in 1870, had his U.S. citizenship retroactively restored by the U.S. Congress.

 In the following years, numerous monuments to Lee and many of his confederate colleagues were erected, largely by segregationists, throughout the south (Virginia, Texas, Louisiana, etc.) extolling what amounted to their traitorous military sacrifices in defense of slavery.

 When the German army was defeated in 1945, most of their capable and astute military leaders died. They chose to fight for Nazi imperial power that sought to conquer the world and, consequently, 50 million people perished. Neither in Germany nor anywhere else is there a single monument to their military skill. Like Lee, they chose the wrong cause: not freedom and democracy, but human bondage.

We need monuments to freedom fighters, not to those who would enslave.

It is not how well you “play the game” that matters, but rather it is the “team” for which you chose to “play”.

John Pace
Honesdale, PA

Remembering Little Lake Erie

I grew up just up the hill from the lake. Our house is what used to be called Pine Wood, just across the street from Cullen’s. I graduated from Narrowsburg in 1965.

I spent many wonderful hours fishing and canoeing on the pond, which is what we called it way back when. I caught many a sunfish—catch and release only to catch them again; I also caught bullheads, some pickerel from the bridge and carp.

In the winter, I could ride my sleigh down the hill right to the pond, put on my skates and skate. On weekends, it seemed like the whole town would be out skating.

The Legion Hall would play music and someone would make hot cocoa. Also, if you were really careful, you could skate to where the stream fed the pond and drink the purest cold water ever.

In the summertime, just after a thunderstorm, the bullfrogs and peepers would serenade the area.

Those memories will stay with me forever.

I now live 20 miles southeast of the real Lake Erie near Buffalo, NY.

Bob Orsini
Elma, NY

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