Special people | News, Sports, Jobs

Dylan Robinson and Ben Kravitz likely didn’t expect their response to a noise complaint in May to resonate the way it did.

When the Fredonia police officers arrived at the Greenacres Apartments, they found children outside playing and found themselves with a choice to be made — send the children inside or encourage their outdoor activities.

Judging from our readers’ responses to the story printed April 22 the OBSERVER, Robinson and Kravitz made the right choice.

“I saw all these young kids out here playing, and I said, ‘I’ll be darned, I’m not going to yell at them for being noisy,” Kravitz told the OBSERVER. “They’re outside playing, enjoying the nice weather, not causing trouble, just playing outside. I’m not going to tell them to go inside.”

Submitted photo
Alberto Rey is pictured here standing in Canadaway Creek, which just happens to be right in his backyard. Rey has been running a successful steelhead fly-fishing guiding business on this creek for nearly two decades.

And so, the kids continued to play, but now with two extra participants: Kravitz and Robinson.

“We showed up that night and there were a lot of kids out here,” Robinson said. “We got out and they asked us if we wanted to play. It’s been many years since I played Four Square.”

The gratitude from the kids spilled into the next week. Greenacres property manager Rachel Braidich invited the officers back to the complex on Wednesday afternoon, where they were presented with a basketball signed by all of the kids who live at Greenacres Apartments. Following that gift, Robinson, who was on his day off, and Kravitz got to join in for another game of Four Square, this time breaking in the ball they had just been gifted.

“It’s a very rewarding part of the job,” Kravitz said.

A NEW STORY FOR A FAMILIAR FACE

Submitted photos
Officers Ben Kravitz, left, and Dylan Robinson break in their new basketball with a game of Four Square against the kids at Greenacres Apartments.

With Canadaway Creek quite literally in Alberto Rey’s backyard, it’s not surprising that he’s a steelhead fly-fishing guide — and a world-class one at that.

But Rey’s story is a unique one, even for a man who needs no introduction to many in the Dunkirk-Fredonia area.

Rey, a Fredonia resident and State University at Fredonia professor, was recently recognized as the 2021 Endorsed Fly-Fishing Guide of the Year by Orivs, a popular fly-fishing company throughout the world. Rey started guiding in 1999, and in 2002, he became an Orvis-endorsed guide.

Rey said the recognition has been on his mind since the start of his guiding career, and receiving the award now is emotional for him.

“I’ve been thinking about it from day one,” Rey said. “Twenty years ago, I thought, ‘Maybe some day I’ll become guide of the year.’ When I found out I was a finalist last year, I was a little emotional. It wasn’t like I heard anything about it, so it came out of the blue and I wasn’t ready for it. Then I realized how important it was to me.”

Rey was born in Cuba and left the country when he was 3 years old. His family received political asylum through Mexico. He lived there for a few years before moving to Miami. He eventually found himself in a coal-mining town in western Pennsylvania where he grew up and graduated high school.

He is currently a distinguished professor in the department of visual arts and new media at SUNY Fredonia, where he’s been for 32 years.

“The other thing I love about it is you spend hours and hours in that environment,” he added. “When you first walk in you’re an outsider, and the longer you’re there you become a part of that environment and everything continues. You have animals come up to you and a lot of things that just wouldn’t happen if you’re just walking through that environment.”

‘CALL TO ACTION’

A Pittsburgh woman vacationing in Westfield took it upon herself last week to rescue an injured eagle she saw floating in the water at Barcelona Harbor.

Francesca D’Appolonia was alone waiting for her parents to join her at their shorefront home when she decided to check out the picturesque water. What she found was more than just a scenic view of Lake Erie.

“The water was perfectly clear and so still I thought, ‘The water looks lovely, let me go down and check it out,’” D’Appolonia said in a phone interview. “When I did, there was something floating in the water, where I quickly discovered it was an eagle.”

After getting no response at the house, she came back and checked on the eagle and found that it was still there. Upon returning, she received a call from Tim O’Day, director and founder of the Campbell Environmental Center in Erie County.

“It was one of the more fun rescues, and I’ve been doing this for 40 years,” O’Day said. “I drove 60 miles in the evening, had to climb down a 40-foot cliff, swim in the lake to get the bird, pull it back up in a crate, get back here (Campbell Environmental Center), put it intensive care, run fluids on it, remove some of the parasites on it and drive another 40 miles to a vet that’s qualified to treat it. It was quite an effort.”

D’Appolonia said she went to great lengths to rescue the eagle because they have always been a constant in her vacations to Westfield.

“I’ve been coming up here since I was a baby,” she said. “The eagles are a big part of it. They nest along the coast here so we always see them, and after decades of seeing these eagles it’s still amazing. Seeing one injured in the water was a call to action. I can’t not try.”

TEEN A HERO

Around 9:30 p.m. March 30, Javier Garcia, 16, and his friend, 14-year-old Camron Torres, were on their way to pick up pizza near Central Avenue in the city of Dunkirk when they ran into another 16-year-old.

In an unplanned fight that ensued, Garcia was reportedly stabbed a total of three times as well as slashed across his chest by a knife he didn’t know the other youth was carrying.

With quick-thinking reflexes, Torres stayed by his friend afterward and took him to the nearest safe place he could find — the Dunkirk Police Department. By this point, Garcia had almost lost a liter of blood.

“He was stabbed and wanted to run home and he said, ‘No we have to get you somewhere else,’ “ Jeanette Delgado, the aunt of Garcia, told the OBSERVER. “So he assisted my nephew to the police station and stayed with him. I’ll be honest, if he hadn’t reacted quickly and gotten him to the police station, he would have died because he lost a whole liter of blood.”

Garcia, who was transported by helicopter to the hospital that night, came home from Monday. He is still experiencing a lot of pain, but is on the mend. He suffered a punctured lung that collapsed, a lacerated liver and a lacerated spleen, Delgado said.

“I’m very thankful that Camron was able to think clearly and handle the situation so well because I really feel that if he wasn’t there then my nephew would have died,” Delgado said. “To me he’ll always be a hero.”

BROTHERS AT HEART

The story of a California man’s search for a friend from Vietnam was one of those that caught OBSERVER reader’s eyes.

The bonds of friendship can be precious and strong, even if time spent together is brief, as was the case of local Vietnam veteran Harry Uhl and his buddy, Ed Morris.

“I have been looking all over, everywhere, for Eddie Morris,” said Uhl, a native of Randolph. “I have been watching VVA (Vietnam Veterans of America) magazine. I went to Veterans Finding Veterans at the Fenton Museum and they could not find him. They did tell me that he didn’t die in Vietnam, because I didn’t know if he did or not. I left before he did so I never knew if he made it out alive.”

The Army veteran remembered his buddy talking about his father working at Folsom Prison during the time when country music star Johnny Cash wrote the song “Folsom Prison Blues.”

“I remembered that and that made me think he was probably in that area,” Uhl said.

While Uhl waited in Randolph for a response, Ed Morris was in Rescue, Calif., 12 miles from Folsom Prison, showing the brief note to his family.

“I was quite amazed to get the letter. I remembered him very, very well. When I showed my family, they said ‘Call him! Call him!” asid Morris, a retired Folsom State Prison Correctional captain said. “I told them I was going to write him but they said, ‘Call him!”

After mailing a note to Uhl, Morris waited six days to make the call. In the note he conveyed how happy he was that his old Army sidekick had found his address and that it was his greatest surprise over the last 54 years. He sent his phone number and said he couldn’t wait to hear from him.

“The phone rang and the voice said ‘Is this Harry Uhl? This is Ed Morris.’ I could have fallen out of my chair. I couldn’t believe it,” the retired businessman said.

They talked briefly, but spoke for 40 minutes the next day. They learned that they both had three daughters and a son — and many grandchildren.

“We picked up where we left off 54 years ago,” said the former owner of Zahm and Matson John Deere dealership. “Eddie always called me Uhl. He always had a grin on his face and I never knew what he was up to. We got along better than brothers.”