Just a flashback for no particular reason.

It was 1970 or so and I was working at a formica fabricating shop on N. State Street. It is now the home of the Catholic Shop, which if I were to tell you some of my other memories you would find that really funny. I digress. Across the street and up a half block on Butternut Street stood a church with a tall steeple. Lighting struck the steeple and blew bricks across Butternut Street into the Marine Midland parking lot. A few days later they decided they had to demolish the steeple. A crew with chain-saws worked all day and those of us in the shop watched their progress on and off during breaks. Late in the afternoon a tall crane came on the job but the top of the crane was not as tall as the steeple. They put a cable around the steeple and started to draw it tight. I saw this and from my vantage point it didn't look like it was going to work. It looked like the steeple would turn upside down and fall as soon as they tried to pick it up. But they must know what they were doing, they must have known this possibility and must have made provisions right? As the line tightened I called the guys in the shop to come watch... Just in case. We watched and sure enough as soon as the steeple came free from the building it turned upside down and fell out of the sling and crashed to the ground with a huge boom and a cloud of dust. We later learned that it also broke through the $20,000 stained glass window of the church.


This taught me that sometimes people only look like they know what they are doing.