Syracuse Herald-American, June 4
Village celebrates
its 50th birthday
A parade of military, fraternal and other organizations next Saturday with representatives of departments of the village will be one of the main events of Solvay’s celebration of a half century as an incorporated village.

The parade, with George L. Koehler as marshal, will move at 6 p.m. from Milton and Freeman Avenues. The line of march will be south in Freeman Avenue to Woods Road, then west to Milton Avenue to Center Street and east in Second Street to Woods Road, to the Village Park.

Addresses and an entertainment program will be given at the park. Frank Himpler, George Haaf, George W. Torrey, Edward D. Gorman and C. Jay Darrow are assistants to the marshal.

Solvay was incorporated May 31, 1894, with Frederick R. Hazard, president of the Solvay Process Company, as its first mayor. William Boyd, William Cross, James F. Mathews comprised the first board of trustees, with Charles O. Richards as clerk.

The present board includes Mayor John J. Degan, Louis Valletta, Stanley Duda, Roscoe Courlier, Walter O Scheiss, Norman F. James and George Bome.

The Solvay Process Company was the only industry when the village was incorporated, and to this have been added Pass & Seymour, Iroquois China Company, Frazer & Jones and Lipe-Rollway, with the Halcomb Steel plant and Church & Dwight just outside the village.

Solvay’s population now exceeds 8,300. It is one of the few villages in the state owning its power and light plant. It has modern schools and churches, a fire department headed by Chief Frank A. Willoughby and police department headed by Chief Blase Valletta.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, June 15
Congratulations to our busy neighbor, Solvay, on the fiftieth anniversary of its incorporation as a village.

Syracuse, more venerable, cannot look upon Solvay as a newcomer. For when one takes into account all that has been accomplished industrially in those 50 years in the village on the shores of Onondaga Lake, it must be admitted that Solvay has “filled the unforgiving minute with 60 seconds worth of distance run.”

The story of Solvay is two-fold. One concerns the great chemical plant of the Solvay Process Company, famed throughout the world. The other deals with Solvay as a community of hard-working, self-respecting, home-loving citizens with an abundant endowment of civic pride.

These two stories are closely interlinked. What is now a thriving community was only a salt yard in 1881 when the Solvay Process enterprise was launched. An engineer named Cogswell, representing Rowland Hazard, a New England capitalist, heard a paper read about the Solvay process of making soda ash, devised by the Solvay brothers, Ernest and Alfred of Belgium, in 1861. He interested Hazard in the idea of a plant in this area, visited the Solvay brothers in Belgium and won their backing.

The Solvay process has resulted in an astonishing advancement in the quality of soda products. Because soda ash enters into the manufacture of all the products of industry, the process has been of great benefit to the world.

It was Rowland Hazard’s son, the late Frederick R. Hazard, whose memory is cherished as the father of the village. President of the company, he was the first president of the village and occupied that post for a dozen years or more. Due to his gifts, the cooperation of Andrew Carnegie and the village’s government, it has had a good library since 1903.

Solvay had an assessed valuation of $2,000,000 when it was incorporated May 31, 1894, with a board consisting of William Boyd, William Cross, James F. Mathews and John H. Craig. Now its valuation is $8,500,000, its population is around 9,000. It has four schools in which 2,500 pupils are taught. It was one of the first municipalities in Central New York to own its electric lighting system. It also owns its water system, as few villages do.

Solvay owes only $190,000 on its $1,500,000 school system and only $240,000 on its $3,000,000 investment in streets, water and sewer systems. Bonds are being retired and predictions are heard that in five years it will be out of debt.

Surely a good outlook with which to begin the second half century!

Syracuse Herald-Journal, June 2
Tasty ending to an unfortunate situation
Patrolman James F. “Dip” Period of Solvay has been hunting deer for some 30 years. But, according to friends, he never saw a deer — to say nothing of shooting one.

Today Period got his deer, but his friends are ribbing him because he had the aid of an unidentified motorist and could’t keep his “kill.”

About 6 a.m. a young buck was struck by a car at Cogswell and Milton Avenues and was severely injured. The deer ran into a garage at the rear of Sherwood’s store at the corner.

Demperio was summoned and found the deer was mortally injured. He shot it with his service pistol. The carcass was removed to the Onondaga County Home, where inmates will feast on venison.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, December 24
Some souvenirs required a bomb squad
Another U. S. Army grenade sent home as a souvenir by a serviceman was turned over to Syracuse police yesterday and was found to be harmless when dismantled by a member of the military police stationed in headquarters.

The grenade was brought in by Leo Miles, 17, of 409 Fourth Street, Solvay, who told Sgt. George Easterly and Captain Irving Blanchard that he had read a story about the possible danger of such souvenirs in the Syracuse Herald-Journal.

Miles said the grenade was included in a package of clothing sent home from Camp Swift, Texas, by his cousin, Pfc. Joseph Cazzolli, 22, a ski trooper. Cazzolli makes his home with his aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Louis Miles of the Solvay address, Leo’s parents.

The pin of the standard Army grenade was partially pulled out when it arrived at the station and looked potentially dangerous to Capt. Blanchard, a veteran of the last war.

Blanchard turned the weapon over to Corp. George Ehrhart, MP, for transference to Lieut. Jack Lacey, bomb disposal officer at the Syracuse Army Air Base. Lacey was officer of the day at the Air Base and could not come in to examine the grenade and he gave Ehrhart permission to dismantle the weapon.

Ehrhart carefully unscrewed the detonator and found the grenade lacked explosive powder.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, February 22
Completely recovered from a leg fracture he suffered last fall in the crash of his bomber plane in Burma, Corp. Kenneth Dilling, 25, is enjoying a 30-day furlough in Syracuse with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Ira K. Dilling of 331 Driscoll Avenue ( located a stone's throw from Solvay).

In service since mid-December of 1941, a few days after Pearl Harbor, Corp. Dilling says home looked better to him than anything else in the world.

He was one of a crew of 12 operating a big bomber in the Pacific and was injured during his 12th mission, his second over Burma. The previous 10 were missions against Pacific Islands.

His bomber had reached Allied territory when it crashed. Eight men escaped injury and four were hurt, three having broken legs. A rescue party reached him an hour after the crash, and within 48 hours he was on board a flying ambulance on his way to a base hospital.

His shin bone, fractured between the ankle and the knee, was treated with a sulpha drug as soon as he was safely on the ground, and he said no hospital patient ever had better care.

He was a radio gunner in his bombing crew, and while hospitalized he 9applied for appointment as an air cadet, intending to become a pilot.

A graduate of Vocational High School, he passed the test and when he was given a physical OK after discharge from the hospital he was ordered back to the United States and was assigned to the University of Mississippi Air Cadet School effective March 15, being allowed to remain on furlough.

Now he “has his fingers crossed,” hoping the curtailment of the Air Cadet program by the Army will not affect him.

Corp. Dilling is one of two brothers in the air force, his brother, Corp. Raymond Dilling, being stationed in Florida.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, March 8
A soldier’s view of Italy includes rain, mud, impassable mountain roads, wounded and dying men, and the occasional welcome shelter of an Italian farmhouse, according to the letters received by Mrs. Catherine O’Leary of 144 Freeman Avenue, Solvay, from her son, Lieutenant Michael O’Leary, fighting with the infantry in Italy.

“My boys who are carrying rations up the mountain will have a tough time tonight, slipping and sliding and trying to hold on to the rations and water that are so valuable to the men on top,” he wrote.

“It is raining here and the ground is damp and cold. The roads have become stream beds for the cold, muddy water, making travel and movement of heavy vehicles difficult and dangerous.”

He also described a night in an old Italian farmhouse and his gratitude for four good walls and a roof, with a big fireplace in addition. A hot meal, gathered together by the cook who really “went to town,” a doughnut dunking contest, and some good music from a radio which had just been set up in the house, rounded off an evening which was this particular doughboy’s idea of heaven.

Lieutenant O’Leary said the owner of the farm was a man who had lived in Scotland for many years.

Lieutenant O’Leary, 26, has been in the Army three years. A graduate of the Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, he went overseas last April,, and has been in Italy since September. He has three brothers in the service, Patrick and James, both Navy seamen first class, and Corp. Joseph O’Leary, who is in England with an Army Air Corps ground crew. James and Patrick are somewhere on the Atlantic, according to their mother, who have five other children to keep her company at home.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, April 30
A Flying Fortress Base in England (AP) — “It was the most ferocious fighter attack I have ever seen,” said Sgt. Harold G. Cleary, a Solvay High School graduate whose family lives at 104 Ostrom Avenue, Syracuse.

Sgt. Cleary is a waist-gunner who told how American warplanes raiding Berlin yesterday fought their way through waves of 150 to 200 German fighters.

He described how the German fighters tore through bomber formations 10 at a time while scores of others hovered above and below, awaiting their turn to strike.

“After the second attack, our tail-gunner counted 98 fighters getting together in formation again, and that was after we had destroyed a good number of them,” Sgt. Cleary continued.

He said the enemy formations held off over the capital itself, while Berlin’s massed ground defenses thundered up the greatest barrage yet encountered.

The Germans employed their old head-on tactics with attacks apparently timed to coincide with shifts in the Allied fighter escort formations, when protection was likely to be weakest.

The Germans did all they could to avoid contact with the American fighters, crewmen reported, but said they witnessed several red-hot dogfights.

Sgt. Cleary, son of Mr. and Mrs. George Cleary, not long ago underwent another dangerous and trying experience. A letter from him dated March 13 tells of his plane, the Thorobred, having been shot down over the English channel.

The crew managed to get into rubber boats and all were picked up by Allied ships. After that, the sergeant wrote, the crew members were given seven-days’ leave at an English mansion where they had servants to attend them, were permitted to take part in a fox hunt, play tennis, ride horseback and fish. The English gave them the best of food for a week after their experience.

Sgt. Cleary, 22, was employed by the United States engineer’s office in Syracuse before he entered the Army in October, 1942. At Solvay High he was active in sports. He went overseas in October, 1943, a year after he entered the service.

His father says his son has been on at least 22 missions. He holds the Air Medal and three Oak Leaf Clusters.

In another dispatch Sgt. Cleary is quoted as saying of the German fighter attacks over Berlin:

“They went right through out formation 10 times with 45 above and an equal number below, all attacking simultaneously.”

Syracuse Herald-Journal, March 6
By Jack Durkin
A forceful fivesome from the field of sport now in the service of Uncle Same is the battling Brostek brother array of Solvay. Before their acceptance by the military, Anthony, Bill, Frank, Henry and Joseph Brostek left an imprint as athletes. They’ve found sports competition fitted them better for the armed forces.

Lieut. Henry Brostek, a former football captain and blocking back at Catholic University, Washington, D.C., has already distinguished himself in brilliant fashion as a Marine dive bomber pilot in the South Pacific. Prior to his college athletic career, he had been a baseball and gridiron star at Solvay High School.

Sgt. Joseph Brostek is encamped at Savannah, Georgia, in the Army. He was an all-around athlete as a schoolboy, and readily agrees his background as an end in football, keen competition on the basketball court, and as a pitcher on the diamond, equipped him splendidly for service.

Also stationed in Georgia is Pvt. Frank Brostek. He had a spirit that also responded to the call of competition. Football, basketball and baseball brought out his versatility as an athlete. Ask him if there’s a greater physical conditioner than competitive sports, and he’ll shake his head, negatively.

Drop down below Georgia a bit into Florida and you’ll find another Brostek, who is making a splendid soldier. He’s Pvt. Anthony Brostek. He made a name for himself as a baseball and softball pitcher, before he donned uniform. “I’m glad I had athletic competition in my civilian days,” he says. “It ha been a real lift don here.”

Accepted by the Marines, Bill Brostek is the last of the brothers to enter service. He expects to leave soon for training as a “Leatherneck,” after having been a Herald-Journal Baseball Leaguer. “I’m ready!” he says, typical of the brothers’ response to a challenge of competition.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, June 14
One of five sons of Mr. and Mrs. Anthony Brostek of 1204 Woods Road, Solvay, in the service, Capt. Henry A. Brostek, 25, arrived home this week after a year in the Southwest Pacific, bringing his bride of two weeks with him.

His wife is the former Miss Betty Hanahan of Los Angeles, California, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Cecil Thompson of that city. They were married June 1 in Saint Michael’s Church, Los Angeles.

Capt. Brostek met his wife a year ago while stationed at North Island, California, awaiting shipment overseas. At that time Brostek was engaged in a friendly argument with another Syracusan, one from the west side, or “Tipperary Hill.” Brostek held out for the superiority of Solvay or Tipperary Hill, and his wife-to-be, of Irish extraction, joined the argument on the side of the Irish Syracusan, her date. “And so we were married,” Brostek said.

It was the first visit home in two and a half years for Capt. Brostek, who joined the Navy a few days after Pearl Harbor while he was a member of the Shamrocks, a professional football team, at Norfolk, Virginia.

Capt. Brostek was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Marine Air Force at Pensacola, Florida, in November, 1942. After further training in this country he was sent overseas slightly over a year ago.

A pilot of a Marine dive-bomber, Capt. Brostek took part in “60 or 65 missions” in the Solomons, driving the Japanese from Munda to Rabaul. He holds a presidential citation awarded to his group for their work in the Munda area, and also has been commended for knocking out enemy guns in that area, which were holding up the American advance.

“Japanese air resistance is weak,” Brostek said,, “but they still put up strong anti-aircraft defense. My most horrible experience was being attacked by a Japanese dive-bomber. That would scare anyone.”

Most of the work of the Marine dive-bomber group was routine, Brostek said, in describing his many engagements with the enemy, and bombing and strafing attacks on enemy installations and shipping. He did reveal that he had lost one plane in a crackup on an American aircraft carrier. He escaped unhurt. Brostek has not been injured in his year’s active service as a pilot against the enemy.

His bride is a graduate of the University of Southern California where she studied journalism. She will accompany her husband back to Cherry Point, North Carolina, where he reports at the end of his month’s leave.

Brostek is a member of a widely known athletic family, all graduates of Solvay High School, where they played football, basketball and baseball, and were track stars.

Capt. Brostek also attended Catholic University of America at Washington, D.C., where he was elected captain of the football team in 1940. He also played basketball at the university. He was graduated in 1941.

Arriving home this week, it was the first time in two and a half years he had seen his brother, Pvt. William Brostek, 18, who is home on leave from Camp Pennell, California, before being sent overseas.

Capt. Brostek has three other brothers in the service. They are Sgt. Joseph Brostek, a crew chief in the Army Air Force at Hunter Field, Georgia; Corp. Frank Brostek, with the Army in the European theater of operations, and Corp. Anthony “Lefty” Brostek at Drew Field, Florida. In addition, his brother-in-law, Cadet Don Brown of Fayetteville, husband of his sister, Jane, is studying for the Army Air Forces in Mississippi.

Syracuse Herald-Journal, July 9
Solvay was host last week to an old-timer, Dominick Vairetta, who at the ripe age of 99 made one of his frequent visits to the village.

He traveled from his home in Cleveland, Ohio, accompanied by his son, Louis Vairetta, to attend the wedding of a great-granddaughter. Trains were crowded, he admitted, but that didn’t bother him much because a soldier offered him a seat and he rode in comparative comfort from Cleveland to Syracuse.

A guest for the last week of his grandson, Frank DiBiase, 115 Alice Avenue, Solvay, Mr. Vairetta renewed acquaintances with friends he has made in other years.

He speaks little English, but with his 4-year-old great-granddaughter, Theresa Di Biase, as interpreter, he gets along well in the neighborhood. They take long walks together, visit Alice Avenue residents, and sit in the back yard of the DiBiase home.

Vairetta’s health is excellent, despite his years, say family members. He has lost few teeth, does not wear glasses, smokes cigars, but not cigarettes, and enjoys wine or beer, but never liquor. His greatest enjoyment, outside of traveling, is a friendly game of cards.

Born in Campobasso, Italy, on January 13, 1845, Mr. Vairetta was a farmer in Italy for many years. He crossed the ocean nine times, but did not take up permanent residence in this country until 1935. Then, at the age of 90, he traveled alone to make his home with his son in Cleveland.

He is the father of nine children, four living — Thomas Vairetta, who lives on Burnet Avenue, Syracuse; Mrs. Alice Giarusso, North Beach Street, and Angelo and Louis Vairetta in Cleveland. He has a large number of grandchildren and great-grandchildren, some of them serving in the American Army, others in the Italian.