1970-09-03

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KARMi £ PUBUC LIBRARY
274 MAIN S T ,
FARMINGDALE, N. Y. 1173 6
of J D yuarty
FARMINGDALE OBSERVES
POWELL HOUSE iToo WHERE THE HISTORY OF YOUR COMMUNITY IS RECORDED WEEKLY An Officiaf Newspaper of The Incorporated Village of Farminfdale — Serving Greater
Vol. 8 No. 2 Second Clasa Postage has been paid at Farmingdale, N. Y. 11735. Thursday, September 3,1970
Farmingdale Site Of
Flight Commemoration
An enactment of the First Transcontinental AirmailServiccwill be
commemorated this Tuesday, September $ at 12 noon with a pouch of
mail will be flown from San Francisco to Republic airport to com­memorate
the 50th Anniversary of airmail service.
According to Leo Morgan, Postmaster of Farmingdale, members of
the Silver Wings Fraternity, an organization of veteran pilots of 25 or
more years flight service, will participate.
A group of prominent Farmingdale men and women will be on hand
to welcome the flight on arrival at Republic Airfield in Farmingdale.
Letters from the Mayor and the Postmaster of San Francisco wili
be delivered to the Mayor and Postmaster of Farmingdale.
The first flight 50 years ago Morgan said, concluded at Roosevelt
Field, but since that field is no longer in operation the Farmingdale
airport facility was given the nod for the commemorative occasion.
Former Daler Now Ffies Mercy Missions
Dermot ( Buddy) Cole is 12,000
miles away from home. He is in a
land where some of the natives
still practice cannibalism and
headhunting. Despite the danger,
he is here " to try and help the
people."
Buddy, formerly of 19 Walnut
Avenue, Farmingdale, recently
took a year's leave of absence
from the New York Southwest
office of the International
Business Machines Corporation's
Field Engineering Division to fly
planes for the Catholic Mission of
the Divine Word in Wewak, New
Guinea. He flies thousands of
pounds of food, medical supplies
and cargo for delivery to more
than 200,000 natives.
He pilots one of two Cessna
single- engine planes or a Ger­man-
made Dornier over some of
the most hazardous terrain in the
world.
About four years ago at the age
of 43, Buddy decided to take
flying lessons to prepare for this
type of lay missionary work.
Since receiving his pilot's license,
he has logged some 200 hours in
the air.
In New Guinea, he's getting
plenty of experience as a " bush
pilot." The mission encompasses
40,000 square miles with 30 air­strips
which are short, rough
patches of land. The " runways"
are frequently flooded. New
Guinea has an average annual
rainfall of 300 inches.
Why is Buddy doing this?
" I guess I'm just interested in
people. The love of humanity, the
love of God~ to me, both are the
same. It's hard to tell the dif­ference,"
he said.
Buddy is no novice in helping
people. Over the past years he
has spent many hours of his spare
time visiting prisons and working
with narcotic addicts.
Buddy Cole is " volunteering all
the way." Before his departure,
he was showing films of the
mission and raising funds> for its
support. He even paid for Ins own
transportation to New Guinea.
A native of Brooklyn, he at­tended
Long Island Technical
Institute. He joined IBM in 1965 at
the New YorkDowntown office as
an electric account machine
customer engineer. Buddy is a
senior customer engineer for the
division, which installs and
services IBM information han­dling
systems, equipment and
programming systems. He
earned an IBM Means Service
Award in 1968.
Bob Waters, his field manager,
said, " Though Buddy doesn't say
much about himself, he's trying
to make the world a little better
place in which to live."
Shortly before he left, Buddy
vowed " to try to live up to all the
nice things everyone has said
about me."
He's made a good start.
Ask For Better Fire Protection At Republic Airport
Babylon Town Supervisor
Aaron Barnett has asked the
Metropolitan Transportation
Authority to do something about
better fire protection at Republic
Airport.
In a letter to Dr. William J.
Ronan, chairman of the MTA,
TALKING BUSINESS at conference for Long Island businessmen
and industrialists are Congressman James R. Grover, Jr. of
Babylon, center, who set up the conference, A. C. Rutzen, right, of the
United States Department of Commerce, and John Hallanan of
Farmingdale, chairman for the event. The conference, which drew
140 business representatives, was aimed at helping Long Island to
better compete with other areas of the nation for government con­tracts.
A number of government representatives attended the
session to meet with local company officials.
Supervisor Barnett cited the
inadequacies of the present fire
protection against aircraft and
fuel fires and the expense to the
taxpayers of the East Far­mingdale
Fire District of
providing protection at the field.
He proposed a three- point
solution to the problems.
Flight Safety, Inc., which
operates the airport for the MTA,
should be required immediately
to provide the special protection
needed against aircraft and fuel
fires occuring on airport property
in line with the company's con­tract
with the Authority and with
recommendations of the Federal
Aviation Administration.
The MTA or Flight Safety
should contract with the East
Farmingdale Volunteer Fire
Company for protection against
other type fires^ such as brush
fires and fire in buildings and
struct uresjat the airport.
The MTA or Flight Safety
should compensate any fire
departments in the Town of
Babylon which may find it
necessary to maintain special
equipment or stocks of foam to
fight crash fires occuring off the
airport but which result from
takeoffs or landings.
" Further in the interest of the
most efficient fire protection for
the airport and the surrounding
areas, I strongly recommend that
Flight Safety fire equipments,
when obtained, be compatible
with that of fire departments in
the Town and that the Flight
Safety fire unit maintain a close
working relationship with the
departments serving the Town,"
Supervisor Barnett said.
The supervisor pointed out that
according to the MTA's
agreement with Flight Safety,
the company is supposed to
provide adequate fire protection.
" From reports submitted by
the East Farmingdale Volunteer
Fire Company, I find this is not
the case," he said. " On the
contrary, East Farmingdale
firemen have had to answer
numerous calls at Republic in
recent months.
" Also, an advisory circular
from the FAA states that fire
stations located off an airport are
not considered acceptable
because of response time. This is
particularly applicable in this
case because the 260 men in the
East Farmingdale unit are
vounteers who have to leave their
jobs to serve at fires."
Barnett noted that taxpayers in
the East Farmingdale Fire
District pay an ad valorem tax of
55 cents per $ 100 of assessed
valuation for fire protection and
the total fire protection budget in
the district is now $ 167,270 an­nually.
" We expect this will be
substantially increased if airport
activities continue to grow in
intensity
"' Since the MTA took over the
Republic field and the property
came off the Town's tax roles, the
fire district has not received one
cent in revenues which would
have been allocated to it from
taxes assessed against the
property.
He said the fire departments
estimates a capital ouUay of
about $ 70,000 would be required
to provide the specialized type of
equipment needed to provide
adequate protection at Republic.
Mr. Barnett also pointed out
that when Vice President Agnew
arrived at and departed from
Republic on his recent visit to
Long Island, the East Far­mingdale
firemen were
requested to stand by for some
four hours, with a resulting loss
of time and money to the voun­teers.
" Thus in several ways, tax­payers
in the district are sub­sidizing
the MTA and Flight
Safety, who are profiting from
operations at Republic," Mr.
Barnett said.