Editorials, letters to the editor and other articles reflecting on iconic people, places and traditions related to them in the area.
Sing it! Row that boat ashore, Michael, Mary, Karen, Lynn, and whoever else has an oar. And, whatever you do, don’t rain on their parade! You couldn’t if you tried.
Continue reading Retro Fair Haven Folk Singers’ Song of Simple Joy
Get out! That’s what most school kids are likely wishing to do these dank spring days. And get out with the “in” crowd was always the cool thing to do before school back in the 1970s in Fair Haven.
Picture that. A picture is worth a thousand awkwardly cool moments in the memory of a middle school kid.
To a Fair Haven eighth grader of the 1970s, there was nothing cooler than being asked to hang out, before the bell rang, on the side of Knollwood School by the bushes with the clique of the coolest kids.
Continue reading Retro Knollwood Cool Kids’ Hangout
There’s a reason why the 1970s and ’80s TV show Cheers was so popular.
The title song said it all in one sentence “You wanna go where everybody knows your name, and they’re always glad you came.” It resonated with millions. Everyone wanted that place to go to where they knew they belonged. A nose-to-the-screen-free environment. Face-to-face social interaction with a family of another kind that, good or bad, always showed up. Regulars. A place like Cheers — with parents.
Continue reading Old News: A ‘Cheers’ to Iconic Places & People
This is our annual reprise celebrates the upcoming traditional pics with Santa at the Fair Haven Firehouse and continues our hunt for those classic pics of miserable children not enduring their mandatory torturous visit with Santa very well at all. Send us YOUR miserable children on Santa’s lap photos! Email them to evd@rfhretro.com. We’re checking our list and waiting!
Sometimes no matter how hard you try, that classic Santa pic with the kids just goes terribly awry. And we’re pretty sure that this Sunday’s visits with Santa at the Fair Haven Firehouse will be no exception.
Continue reading Retro Firehouse Santa ‘Sleighing’“What’s that? An iPhone 1?” he quipped as I tried to capture a moment between him and his lifetime friend at a reunion committee party with my sad little smashed-screen phone. Click. “Shut up, Dave! Jerk!” I, a 58-year-old woman child, sniped back, with a 10-year-old kid giggle and arm punch.
Then there was the knowing laughter and the look that was only understood among those like us who had had a lifetime of it. The deep all-knowing complex simplicity of a childhood shared in one little world of a small town by the river.
Continue reading RFH ’78’s David Memmott: Picture of a Childhood in a Classmate Gone
It was a parade fit for royalty — the king and queen of England kind of royalty, to be exact.
With the death of Queen Elizabeth II and all the honor and ceremony that has come with it, retro minds go back to a royal day in Red Bank when the queen, who just recently died at 96, having ruled for 70 years, was only 13. Her father, George VI, was king. Her mother, the first Elizabeth, was queen. And while visiting the United States and Canada, the royal couple made a stop in Red Bank.
Continue reading Old News: A Royal Red Bank Procession
A back-to-school reprise dedicated to everyone’s first friend on that first day of school as a kindergartener. My first friend and neighbor in Fair Haven was Pam Young (second from right), who passed away in July of 2020 … Everyone can relate. Go back with us. Remember your first day of school and that first friend …
Knock-kneed, nervous and all dressed up with somewhere to go, this gaggle Fair Haven neighborhood girls of 1965 lined up so their moms could get that classic first-day-of-kindergarten shot. And there wasn’t a smile among them.
Continue reading Retro Back-to-School Neighborhood Line-Up
This Retro Pic(s) of the Day story was originally published on Aug. 25, 2015. It is being run again in honor of the Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair and the Felsmann family to honor them in light of their recent loss of Millie Felsmann’s son, John, or “Smokey,” husband to Trudy and dad to his fair-raised children. He didn’t like getting his picture taken, so we will respect that and honor him via his family. This is how they concoct and serve up those sweets at the fair …
When it came to cotton candy — that fluffy spun light blue and pink sugar on a cone that melts in your mouth, on your mouth and many times on your hands, too — Millie Felsmann was the pro at the Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair.
Don’t get us wrong, here. We know that Millie also commandeered the candy apple making. Yes, Candy Bennett was there, too — for many hours a day, making and selling those candy apples, apropos name and all.
Well, she was, after all, Candy, the candy apple lady. Yes, Candy had a lot do do with those candy apples — but Millie was the boss. She, along with her troupe of kids and Candy, Betty Acker and Mrs. Frank, started work on those apples as early as 6 a.m.. And, even further back, to 1965 or 66, Mrs. Topfer made those apples, too.
Continue reading Retro Fair Sweets Queens
For decades there was what was referred to as The Grab Bag Booth at the Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair. The booth was there for kids to get consolation prizes, featuring, of course, real brown paper grab bags full of goodies, that parents could buy if they didn’t win at the wheel games of chance. And there were balloons … and some fair ladies to keep the fair goodness going strong.
The Grab Bag Booth is now gone from the midway. At one point, for many years, my mom, Sally Van Develde was the chairwoman of the booth. This piece is an annual reprise to honor the booth’s goodness, the Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair and those things that never disappear like helium balloons into the dark sky … Memories of a special lady — my mom.
Growing up in Fair Haven with parents in the fire company, Fair Haven Firemen’s Fair time meant time spent inflating punch balls during the day and helium balloons at night.
Continue reading Retro Fair Grab Bagging Balloon Lady & BudsMy little sister Terri was a light. Sometimes she burned bright and brilliant; other times she merely sparkled … As she traveled, explored, and embraced her worlds, Terri connected with people for a moment or a lifetime; once she made a connection, she cherished it. My heart is broken. I will miss her desperately. ~ Chris Rowett Peter
A light. Always glistening. Shining. Lighting the way to welcome every connection in her universe. Wrapping each in a tight hug of warm, ferocious illumination.
That’s how Rumson-raised Teresa Ann Rowett, better known as Terri or TT, was seen. The youngest of five sisters and one brother, the third sister to pass away, the Rumson-Fair Haven Regional High School Class of 1982 graduate died suddenly at Shore Point Health in Port Charlotte, on Aug. 22. She was 57. Her life was celebrated on Sunday.
This is how she is remembered …
Continue reading Remembering, Embracing Her Light: 1982 RFH Grad Terri Rowett, 57
It’s all about letting the sun and surf shine, and scorch a little, these summer days. And there’s nothing better to take the heat off while soaking the goodness of it all up than a cool ride with the tide along a Sea Bright beach.
The scene is a reminder that the boon of the ocean’s refreshing roar is a mainstay respite, a bigger and brighter beacon that overshadows any sliver of scald.
A bit of relief has come from the sun, and the beach always beckons with cooler days of comfort ahead.
In other words, the heat wave has lifted. Phew. Better days under the sun are ahead. Take in the view, feel the relief and check out the weather forecast, from the National Weather Service, below …
Sun and surf up!
The weather forecast for the Rumson-Fair Haven area through the weekend from the National Weather Service …
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