Well, the rain may have dampened Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair attractions on a rainy Tuesday night, but things in the kitchen were still cooking strong.
Continue reading Retro Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair Foodie Time
More than a couple of decades ago, a little girl got on the carousel at the Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair and took a ride.
She was beaming and waving as she rode ’round and ’round. The moment was captured in a black-and-white photo.
It’s a classic fair moment that says a lot about the month’s end more than century-old tradition for which preparations are underway.
So, the Retro Pic of the Day honors this little girl’s ride on the merry go ’round and many other fair moments like it.
The little girl would be in her twenties now. Anyone recognize her?
— Elaine Van Develde
The following Retro Pic of the Day, an annual ode to summer riverfront life in the area, was originally posted on Aug. 1, 2016. Take a look back with us again …
Summers in the Rumson-Fair Haven area are rife with river-oriented activities that have become tradition.
River Rats’ sailing “camp” is no exception. OK, nobody was camping. It was more like a little club. Still is.
It’s been a sort of rite of living on the Navesink passage for decades — since 1955. Kids learn how to boat and do a lot of summer fun bonding in the process.
It’s that time. They’re setting up for the Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair. And before you know it, Majestic Midways will come rolling into town with the rides.
Some have been fair staples for decades — like the Zipper and the ferris wheel. Some are still terrifying to adults — never mind the childhood chicken terrors from the thought of being dared to ride anything but the stationary chair on the merry go ’round.
OK, so that’s a little pathetic. Hey, sometimes you just want to spare onlookers from some scenes that just wouldn’t be pretty — like a full-grown middle-aged person ill, in tears and hanging upside down at the top of a ride.
But we digress …
The Retro Pic of the Day hones in on two classic fair rides from the 1990s. We know one is the ferris wheel. And it looks like the same one. What about the other?
Know what ride that is? What’s your favorite? Least favorite.
We vote Zipper on least. Still, it’s some sort of odd comfort to see it again every year.
— Elaine Van Develde
A bunch of boys. A bag of Cheetos. Dirt-eating grins. Pranks. Pull the ol’ finger. The little things are what made these guys smile — and wipe their pants with orange-stained Cheeto hands.
Well, it seems that the fine officers at the Rumson PD are not the only ones making deer friends.
Well, summer vacation is in full swing and school’s been out for a couple of weeks.
Before you know it, students will be finding out who their teachers are for the new school year and some will be going to school for the first time.
We say it every year, and it bears repeating …
Yesterday was Father’s Day.
And, we at Rumson-Fair Haven Retrospect are of the mind that the day is really about much more than flipping a burger and patting a good ol’ dad on the back.
It’s bigger than that. It goes way beyond your own dad’s back yard and a grilling or two.
Growing up in a small-town niche like the Rumson-Fair Haven area carries with it that family tie feeling. Some of us were fortunate enough to have great dads. Some not.
But, what we all somehow did and still do have is a strong kinship to the dads of our towns. Even if we just recall a look, a bellowing chide or a chuckle over some stupid kid thing we did, we remember the dads with whom we grew up.
Now, many of those kids are dads, too, and living where their dads raised them. Perhaps, or likely, finding themselves bellowing the same chidings, trying to impart the same wisdom.
So many of these men were volunteers we saw all over town, characters whose nuances or sayings we remember, or that one poor patient guy who ended up being the poor soul to pick us up when we were stupid enough to get caught hurling eggs and toilet paper on Mischief Night — or something equally as dumb.
Yes, we do and should memorialize our own dads. Believe me, I, for one, am still looking for that money tree my dad told me was in the back yard and that gal named Dumb Dori whom he said I emulated when lacking “street smarts” to a pathetic degree.
Yet, I also vividly remember the calm, “I’m going to kill those idiots” smile on my friend Stephanie’s dad when he picked us up at the police station after following through on a really dumb dare. Then there was the “To tell you the truth, my friend, I don’t know” quote that consistently came out of Daryl’s dad’s mouth as he shook his head in wonderment over our mangled teen logic.
There were those dads for all of us — each leaving his own patriarchal imprint in our juvenile minds. For them we are grateful — for raising us here, for coming together to protect and nurture us and for offering a communal scolding or 100, for loving all their village’s children.
They were part of this community’s foundation — everyone’s founding fathers.
Our Retro Pic (or video) of the Day honors the area’s dads of those days for those reasons and so many more.
We don’t have nearly enough photos to encapsulate all the love and all of the dads, but this is a sufficient sampling to get the message across.
Happy Father’s Day to all the dads in the community who have been there for us and given us lessons and words to live by!
— Photos/courtesy of Rumson, Fair Haven family members via Facebook
Well, graduation is upon the RFH Class of 2017.
What better time than to take a look back at a couple of RFH graduations of the past?
So, in order to pay homage to the evening, the Retro Pic(s) of the Day offer a look back at a couple of the milestone days in RFH history.
Above is a photo from the RFH Class of 1979’s graduation at Borden Stadium, taken by George Day. There are also a couple of pics looking back at the RFH Class of 2013 graduation when it poured just after the start of the ceremony and it had to be quickly moved inside. Below is a look at the 2016 graduation at Monmouth University, where they now take place.
Share your photos of past RFH graduations with us by emailing them, with proper credit, to [email protected].
In the meantime, congrats to the RFH Class of 2017!
The longstanding annual St. George’s-by-the River Canterbury Fair tradition in Rumson has always been, let’s say, something to talk about.
The Fair Haven Fire Department Wetdown on Saturday brought a huge community contingent out.
It was like a scene out of The Wizard of Oz, with a wicked witch of a storm dropping a house on the spirits of Rumson-Fair Haven area locals. It was the scene of what many might call the Superstorm Sandy crime that devastated the Sea Bright peninsula and wiped out a decades-long iconic spot — Donovan’s Reef.
When the coast was literally clear of the storm’s wrath, locals flocked to the site to see what Sandy had spit out and left behind. They cried, reminisced, meditated on the jetty and gathered tiny scraps of memories made at the longtime RFHers’ hang-out.
The Retro Pic(s) of the Day take us back to Donovan’s in the aftermath of Sandy.
Laying on the ground were decades worth of remnants from a hut by the sea where many milestone memories were made. On the cusp of the iconic spot’s reopening, people wonder if the new and expanded hut by the sea will be a place to DO it again? Time will tell. Locals are poised for the fresh start. But, they always seem to look back on the good ol Donovan’s days.
What is your favorite Donovan’s memory from years gone by?
— Elaine Van Develde
— Photos/Elaine Van Develde
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