Pledged Ramp Nixed; Too Costly

By JOE ZELNIK VILLAS — Frances Regan never got her wheelchair ramp. Regan, who’ll be 80 on Dec. 15, had her right leg amputated beloW the knee this summer. She hasn’t been out of her Ridgewood Avenue house since she came home from Betty Bachrach Rehabilitation Center Sept. 13. The Herald and Lantern reported Oct. 12 that donations to the Volunteers and

News—— Week's Top Stories

Choice Decision

COURT HOUSE — County freeholders are expected to decide tomorrow whether the county Municipal Utilities Authority should build a trash transfer station along Shunpike in Burleigh, Middle Township. Township officials and those from other municipalities want the depot built on MUA land at the county Crest Haven complex. Wildwood Crest Commissioner Frank J. McCall favors a second station near West Cape May while Lower Township Committeeman Robert Fothergill has proposed an alternative — converting the Sunset Beach magnesite plant into an incinerator.

Resources Division of the Cape May County Welfare Department would provide a ramp. Marianne Sheik, division director, said Monday that the project fell through because “it would require a great deal more lumber than anticipated.’’ She said it now appears the project would cost $1,200. A financial contribution from Harrison Beverage of Pleasantville, which was thought to be sufficient to cover the cost, is limited to $200, Sheik said.

“I HAVE ASKED everyone in this county and many in Atlantic County,” said Sheik. “I have reached put as far as possible. They‘have said they do community projects, that they donlt have money to help individuals. They would go broke if they did.” “I definitely need the ramp,” said Regan. “Nobody has any idea what it’s like. I have to get out; I want to get to my heart doctor.” Regan said Social Services asked if her

sister could help. , “She’s a 77-year-old widow living on Social Security in Baltimore," said Regan. “They also asked if the (Lower Township) Rescue Squad could help,” said Regan. "They’re in debt themselves. They brought me home (from Bachrach), but I hate to pester them to take me to the doctor’s. I don't like to impose on people. I'd just like to get out." Sheik said she contacted "all the lumber

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VoJ. 19 No. 49

For Lighthouse Point Resists

Rates Rising CAPE MAY — City Manager Fred Coldren told city council last week that sewer rates will rise 30 percent when the county Municipal Utilities Authority begins operating its new sewage treatment system next month. Bills would increase about 55 cents for each 1,000 gallons, Coldren estimated. Currently users pay $1.85 for each 1,000 gallons.

No Agreement STRATHMERE — Residents of this Upper Township resort will pay $400 instead of $125 a year for water if James Panunto, owner of Aramingo Water Co., convinces township officials to loan him $67,000 and back the rate hike as a way to repair the utility’s equipment. Panunto met behind closed doors with township and Sea Isle City officials last week. No agreement y/as announced on a way to salvage his operation, however.

Doris Ward

THEY’RE OPPOSED — CecUe Jarvis, left, and Ethel Sowers pose before the Cape May Point Lighthouse. TTiey are treasurer and vice president, respectively, for the Cape May Point Civic Club, which opposes a MAC proposal to make the lighthouse a tourist attraction.

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Russian Refugee Envisioned Villas

By E. J. DUFFY VILLAS — Hannah Millman wept when she first laid eyes on the Lower Township farmland her son, Joseph bought with the money he borrowed from her. Villas, as a town, did not exist in 1927. When Joseph Millman purchased the huge bayside tract then, it was generally considered part of Fishing Creek. “Tltere was a smattering of a town there not much,” recalled Leo Sterenberg,

Inside BEAL ESTATE tnnsfen. A new feature. Page 37. FLORENCE HEAL aaya wwMwcta can be great Christmas gifts. Page 15 » LOU RODIA fishes the Costa Del SoLPagt 4 ‘SURE CURES’ for small miseries. Dorothy Frees on Page SB.

retired bead of Bayside Realty, Villas, a friend and colleague of Millman's. One or two shops in the Murray Building at Bayshore Road and Bates Avenue were “the center of town at the time,” Sterenberg remembers, and the Bate turkey farm “was the biggest thing in town then.” That was the scene Hannah Millman beheld when she visited her son’s new property for the first time. Before he bought the local farmland, be invested in a housing project south of Millville that was “not too successful,” said Sterenberg. With that in mind, Hannah Millman no doubt looked upon her son's undeveloped land as poor soil for opportunity. No doubt he soothed her in their native Russian arid explained his vision of building a community of low-cost homes for Philadelphia’s city-worn. CALLING HIS development “Wildwood Villas" then, simply, “Villas" to avoid confusion with the seaside resorts, Millman saw his vision grow through the (Page 4 Please)

MAC Proposal

By E.J. DUFFY

CAPE MAY POINT — Members of this borough’s civic club have asked the U.S. Coast Guard to sink the Mid-Atlantic Center for the' Arts’ request to lease the local lighthouse and open it as a tourist

attraction.

“The borough's government is against the whole deal too,” noted Cecile Jarvis, treasurer of the b2-member Cape May Point Civic Club and wife of Borough Commissioner Edward Jarvis. The Jarvises live across the street from the 124-year-old lighthouse that adjoins a state park. just over the borough limits, in Lower Township. Since the end of World War II, the lighthouse has ceased to function as such. Die huge, revolving light was removed and homing devices installed, mainly as navigational aides for aircraft. While those aides receive periodic maintenance from the Coast Guard, which has jurisdiction over the property, the tower and its fixtures have fallen into disrepair, according to Herbert M. Beitel, MAC president. “One thing I don’t think they’re aware of...,” he said of civic club members, “there apparently is a very real risk that the lighthouse would be abandoned. “Its major value is as an historical property,” Beitel added. “Die Coast Guard is under severe fiscal restraints and is under some pressure to dispose of some of its property.” MAC FIRST ANNOUNCED its “negoUations with the Coast Guard to obtain a . lease of the Cape May Point Lighthouse’” on page six of its seven-page annual report, dated Oct. 22. “Our plans,” wrote Beitel, "are to make that wonderful view available to »our visitors as well as (in conjunction with the Chamber of Commerce) a memorial to lost seamen.” If A dm. W. E. Caldwell, commander of the Third Coast Guard District, approves a lease for MAC, Beitel explained last week, the Cape May-based organization intends to repair the landmark, restore and preserve it while it continues to operate as a navigational aide. Repair estimates, he said, “go into several thousands” of dollars, but MAC has “not really ” decided the amount of admission it would charge lighthouse

visitors.

During its Nov. 10 meeting, civic club members “unanimously opposed the proposal,” Cecile Jarvis confirmed, “We sent out letters to the (borough) commissioners, to MAC and to (Congressman) William Hughes." Hughes, state Sen. James R. Hurley, the commissioners, the county freeholders and other officials were also mailed copies of the civic club's letter of opposition to Caldwell, she added. (Page 27 Pleased

Hike Lower’s r Low Image; Rename It

What's in a name? That which we calj a rose, tty any other name would smell as

suteet...

— Shakespeare's Juliet VILLAS r- "What can be lower than Lower?” asks developer Elery Bowman. Lower Township suffers from an image problem, according to the president of Bowman Builders. Many of the high brow residents from other Cape municipalities look down their Vioses at the township

It seems Lower neighbors tend to link it with "lower” synonyms like "beneath,” “tinder,” or even “less than, lowly, or undesirable,” as.jn low life, lowbrow, and even L’il Abner's Lower Slobovia (even less inviting than Slobovia itself). Bowman thinks a lot of the negative vibes are cued by the municipal name — and could be cured by a name change. “1 would think one-of the best ways to improve the municipality’s image is to change the name, " he said. “I’m starting a one-man campaign to change, the name to North Cape May.” LIKE VILLAS. Fishing Creek, Erma, Cold Spring, Town Bank, etc.. North Cape May is a community inside the township. Unlike “Lower Township,” the title "North Cape May” has, at worst, a neutral connotation. At best, it evokes an association with the positive image of Victorian Cape May, a part of Lower Township until

1848.

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◄-N.CAPt FISHING CREI VILLAS GREEN CREi