Paul Newman still remembered in Pike

SHOHOLA — Paul Newman may be gone but he remains a part of Pike County’s local lore. The Oscar-winning screen legend died Friday, Sept. 26 at his farmhouse near Westport, Conn. following a long battle with cancer. He was 83. Newman, who personified cool as the anti-hero of such films as “Hud,” “Cool Hand Luke,” and “The Color of Money” - later in life became an activist, and popcorn impresario. But in Shohola, Newman is remembered for another of his favorite activities, race car driving. “Racing is the best way I know to get away from all the rubbish of Hollywood,” he told People magazine in 1979. In the 1970s, Newman, admittedly bored with acting, became fascinated with auto racing, a sport he studied when he starred in the 1969 film, “Winning.” Becoming a professional racer in 1977, Newman and his driving team made strong showings in several major races, including fifth place in Daytona in 1977 and second place in Le Mans in 1979. During that period one portion of Newman’s racing team located a shop in an old chicken coop on state Route 434, near Greeley and the highway’s Shohola Falls Road intersection. The team’s maintenance vehicles and traveling vans became common sights at garages in Shohola and nearby Barryville, N.Y. But the connection that became lore, came in the late 70s, Pike County Historian George J. Fluhr recalled. “(Newman) came in to eat one day at Johnson’s” then a tavern, formerly Vogt’s Store, located at the corner of Chauncey Thomas Road and Richardson Avenue. His appearance caused a local stir, to the point where regional newspapers picked up the story. The visit produced an artifact for the tavern. “Mrs. Johnson didn’t wash the dish. She wrapped it in Saran Wrap and talked about it with everyone who came in. That dish was there for quite a long time,” said Fluhr, who is also a Shohola resident and former township supervisor. Newman later became a car owner and formed a partnership with Carl Haas, starting Newman/Haas Racing in 1983 and joining the CART series. Hiring Mario Andretti as its first driver, the team was an instant success, and throughout the last 26 years, the team - now known as Newman/Haas/Lanigan and part of the IndyCar Series - has won 107 races and eight series championships. Despite his love of race cars, Newman continued to make movies and continued to pile up Oscar nominations. In 1982, Newman and a Westport neighbor, writer A.E. Hotchner, started a company to market Newman’s original oil-and-vinegar dressing. Newman’s Own, which began as a joke, grew into a multimillion-dollar business selling popcorn, salad dressing, spaghetti sauce and other foods. All of the company’s profits are donated to charities. Newman had a soft spot for underdogs in real life, giving $250 million to charities through the food company and setting up camps for severely ill children. Passionately opposed to the Vietnam War, and in favor of civil rights, he was so famously liberal that he ended up on President Richard M. Nixon’s “enemies list,’’ one of the actor’s proudest achievements, he liked to say. In Dec. 1994, about a month before his 70th birthday, he told Newsweek magazine he had changed little with age. “I’m not mellower, I’m not less angry, I’m not less self-critical, I’m not less tenacious,” he said. “Maybe the best part is that your liver can’t handle those beers at noon anymore,” he said. The Cleveland, Ohio native served in the Navy during World War II, then enrolled at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, where he got a degree in English and was active in student productions. He later studied at Yale University’s School of Drama, then headed to work in theater and television in New York, where his classmates at the famed Actor’s Studio included Marlon Brando, James Dean and Karl Malden. Newman is survived by his wife, actress Joanne Woodward, five children, two grandsons and his older brother Arthur. The Associated Press contributed to this story