Category Archives: Local Life

A look, in photos, of latest area events, local everyday people and places.

Retro Fair Haven Girlfriend Celebration

Gaggle of Fair Haven girlfriends get-together of the late 1960s
Photo/Sandi Richards von Pier

There’s nothing quite like a simple summer day of hanging out with a gaggle of your favorite gals. Back in the day, that was the way. Birthday party, perhaps? Those were no-frills home events, too. There were goodie bags, games and good ol’ fun.

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Retro Fair Haven Buds’ Bonding Times

Looking back again at some simple neighborhood kids’ fun from spring to summer to winter to fall …

Summer funnin’, they had themselves a blast. No matter the season, it’s all about lifelong bonds. Simple connections forged through some simple fun. A bunch of Fair Haven 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.

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Retro Fair Haven Dock Daze

Summer days down by the Fair Haven Dock
Photo/Elaine Van Develde

You’ve seen and heard it before, but a trip back to the summer days at the Fair Haven Dock always bears a revisit …

Summer fun in Fair Haven doesn’t get any simpler or more treasured than ending the day down by the Fair Haven Dock, sand between the toes, a few antics up the sleeve, a little seaweed in the shorts, and a crab or 20. Dock time has been a time-honored tradition for kids since, well, the dawn of time.

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Retro Bathing Beauty Firecrackers

Bathing beauties of a Fair Haven neighborhood in 1965
Photo/Sally Van Develde

Back in the summer of ’65 …  the heat was on in Fair Haven, and some pint-sized bathing beauties were set to walk the walk, if the suit and the bathing cap fit. In the spirit of the season, call them little firecrackers. Celebrity neighborhood sparklers. Whatever the name, they were set for a good, simple backyard game. This one was easy — the suited up line-up. On cue, they struck the pose and gave a big “Cheese!”

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Retro RFHers’ Summer Adventure

It’s officially summertime, and the livin’ is … adventurous for many RFH students. Most are known to hit the beach, clubs or public, in Sea Bright. And some look for a little adventure in venturing away from familiar, iconic turf, and onto another great Jersey adventure, so to speak.

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Retro RFH Grads’ Dive into Summer

Class of ’76 seniors dive into summer
Photo/RFH Yearbook 1976

Summer is officially here and RFHers have graduated. That means that it’s a last summer hurrah for those RFH seniors, many of whom will be headed in different directions after the summer’s over. It’s another milestone time — one that almost always brings with it a treasure trove of memories that evoke forever smiles.

It’s a time when those graduated seniors who are headed off to college and life’s new path in the fall dive into that goodbye summer with gusto.

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Retro Fair Haven Graduating

Fair Haven eighth grade graduation from Willow Street School (Sickles) circa 1946 Photo/courtesy of Jane Croft

Well, all the graduates in the Rumson-Fair Haven area have officially walked that walk.

One of those walks was the one of tradition in which Fair Haven eighth grade graduation tradition of grads take a walk back in time down Third Street from Knollwood School, where it all ended, to Viola L. Sickles School, where their Fair Haven schooling all began.

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