Democrat and Chronicle from Rochester, New York • Page A4

Page4A DemocratandChronicle. com GARAGE DOORS UNLIMITED SINCE 458-8050 FREE Estimates on New Garage Doors or Repairs ROCNews Walking in Rochester a nd everywhere else is enjoying a comeback. Credit the Fitbit and similar devices, digital wonders that measure steps, translate them into miles, log them into smartphones and computers. If you see a Fitbit on a wrist, best to ake way. Fitbitters a just out for a stroll.

heir walking counts as serious exercise. My wife, Cindy, can easily clock up more than 15,000 steps a day. Our friend Will Wadsworth has broken the steps -barrier. Slacker that I am, I hardly ever get a buzz, the vibration that lets you know taken 10,000 steps. But none of us are in a league with Stanley Rychlicki or Edward Payson Weston, walkers supreme long before the Fitbit era began.

Rychlicki, who is 94 and lives in Caledonia, walked 136,887.02 miles while working. It was enough to earn him a spot in the 2000 Guinness World Records book for most miles walked in a career. He was featured in two more editions of the book for the miles he covered as a pipeline inspector in his native Pennsylvania and then in western New York. first hike was over the Appalachian Rychlicki said Monday. was 21 miles in nine hours.

My feet went to hell. Blisters and all that Given the obvious ardors of inspecting in the wild, Rychlicki was tempted to return to his revious work as a coal miner. But he stuck with the inspecting for 37 years, despite a wide variety of challenges: rattlesnakes, anything you could throw at me. Ten below zero was If Rychlicki is the greatest walker to have lived in the Rochester area, Edward Payson Weston may be the greatest walker to have walked through Rochester. Matthew Algeo feat ures Weston in his book, edestrianism: When Watching People Walk as Favorite Spectator Sport Pedestrianism? As Algeo makes wonderfully clear, in the late 1800s competitive walking was hugely popular.

People jammed arenas to watch athletes do laps for six days straight. Profession- a walkers also hit the roads, striding from city to city, coast to coast. Weston, a Rhode Island native, was a walker, the slow-and- steady star of a slow-and- steady sport. He made his name in competitive walks in the second half of the 19th century, but he kept on walking long after the popularity waned. He passed through Rochester in 1907 at age 68 on his way from Portland, Maine, to Chicago.

wo years later, he was ack again, crossing the country to celebrate his 70th birthday. On that journey, he arrived in Rochester in March having walking 49 miles from Wayne County. Before he took to bed at the and beautiful Hotel he gave a lecture at the MCA. The next day, he was up and out, and into a blizzard that slowed him down, just for a while. Algeo feature competitive walking in Rochester, though in an email exchange he pointed me to a brief newspaper reference in 1878 that mentions McInesay, the Rochester champion He also found a 1901 Associated Press account of a six-day walking match in Rochester.

interesting a bout this is that it is relatively late for a six-day pedestrianism Algeo wrote. then, six-day bicycle races had almost completely eclipsed pedestrianism. Possibly the sport had been forced to move from YC to smaller markets to keep It be the first time that Rochester came late to a fad. But sports marketers take note. The area is ready for the return of competitive endurance walking.

Ienvision a Fitbit 500 at Frontier Field. Walkers do lap after lap, day after day. Spectators fill the stands for six days, entranced by the new pedestrianism and a walk back in time. Long before Fitbit era, walkers really took to walking the walk In this photo from 2000, Stanley Rychlicki looks out from a cornfield next to a fuel pipeline marker near the Caledonia Pump Station in Caledonia, Livingston County. In 37 years as a pipeline inspector in Pennsylvania and New York, he covered 136,887.02 miles.

SHAWN PHOTO 2000 REMARKABLE ROCHESTERIANS For his endurance and record-making walking, add the name of this overachiever to the list of Remarkable Rochesterians that can be found at Ro- cRoots.com Stanley Rychlicki (1919- This Caledonia, Livingston County, resident was recognized in the 2000 Guinness World Records book and two subsequent editions for alking the greatest distance in a career. In 37 years as a pipeline inspector in ennsylvania and New York, he covered 136,887.02 miles, more than 20 miles a ay in all kinds of weather and over all kinds of terrain. Anative of Pennsylvania, he erved in the Army Air Corps during World War II as a radio operator on a -24 and participated in several battles in the Pacific. He is a member of the New York State Hall of Fame. ON REMARKABLE ROCHESTER Retired Senior Editor Jim Memmott reflects on what makes Rochester distinctively Rochester, its history, its habits, its people.

Contact him at: (585) 278-8012 or Chronicle.com or Remarkable Rochester, Box 274, Geneseo, NY 14454. Jim Memmott REMARKABLE ROCHESTER Aman was stabbed to death Tuesday morning in southwest Rochester, near Wilson Foundation Academy. Rochester police Capt. Tony McMullen aid emergency responders were called to 4 37 Champlain St. just after 9 a.m.

and found a man bleeding in the back yard of the vacant home. he man, who was not identified, had been stabbed multiple times in his torso, McMullen said. He was taken to trong Memorial Hospit al, where he died from his injuries. McMullen said it appeared that he was involved in an altercation ith a second person in he yard of the boarded up house when the stabbing occurred. eighbor Johavan Johnson, 18, heard screaming and ran to the yard of 437 Champlain, where he saw the bleeding man on the ground.

Johnson and his brother both removed their shirts and used the garments to try stop the bleeding. told him to try to stay a live because a couple of times he wanted to let Johnson said. McMullen said the at- acker had fled the scene before officers arrived. Officers are investigating the incident. The slaying is Roches- 21st homicide of the ear.

Twitter.com/vfreile Twitter.com/NeetiU_DandC Rochester police collect evidence Tuesday at the scene of a homicide on Champlain Street. NEETI PHOTOGRAPHER Man stabbed on Champlain Street dies Victoria E. Freile and Neeti Upadhye Staff writers Sentencing for con- icted killer Clayton Whittemore has been postponed until Aug. 5. A request from his attorneys to push back his July 15 sentencing date was granted last week by State Supreme Court Justice Daniel Doyle.

Whittemore, 22, was onvicted on May 30 of econd-degree murder for the brutal beating death of his 18-year-old irlfriend, Alexandra Kogut of New Hartford, Oneida County, inside er dorm room at The College at Brockport in 2012. urors deliberated for just a few hours be- fore returning their verdict, quickly dismissing defense claim that he committed the murder while under the influence of an reme emotional disturb- a triggered by an argument with Kogut and fueled by years of child a buse suffered at the hands of his father. Whittemore faces a entence of 25 years to life in prison. Twitter.com/meagmc sentencing pushed back to August Clayton Whittemore Meaghan M. McDermott Staff writer Effective Wednesday, the State Police Aviation Division will have a new home at the Greater Rochester International Airport.

The agency is moving its Syracuse and Batavia operations to ochester, a consolidation the agency says will provide more resources for New Yorkers living in central and estern New I a news release, State Police said the ove will provide im- roved coverage for miss ions including search and rescue, surveillance and those involving specialty units. move will improve efficiency and effectiveness while maintaining the same or improved levels of police said. There will be no job losses as a result of the onsolidation. om witter.com/meagmc State Police will consolidate aviation units at Rochester Meaghan M. McDermott Staff writer that are instituted among Men, der iving their just powers from the consent of the Courtney said his central premise of the Founding Fathers today, more than ever, under a ssault.

This central pillar of free society; this notion hat is deeply heretical to authoritarian culture, proclaims that it is from the eople that moral authority is He urged the officials the dais to the counsel of the governed; to eek the wisdom of all citizens and to honor the enlightened wisdom and the profound of the founders of American government. And with that, Town Sup ervisor Bill Reilich thanked Courtney for his speech and the Town Board moved on with its business although initial efforts to hold a moment of silence in memory of Deputy Supervisor Jerry Helfer, who died Sunday at age 48, were interrupted by the audience departing. utside on the lawn of he Town Hall, free thinkers, atheists, non-religious, supportive reli- ious and others gathered to decry the Supreme ourt decision and pledge that they will hold the court and governments to the edict against discrimination. is prejudice based on the misguided elief that belief in God is the only path to said Ronald Lindsay, president and CEO of the Center for Inquiry. we need to overcome that He pointed out and as signs carried by dozens of supporters attested that one in five Americans identifies as non-religious.

avid Niose, with the American Humanist Assoc iation, said his group and others plan to secular Americans have a lace at the by ins isting on their rights to give invocations before eetings where local gov- rnments employ the practice. will hold local gov- rnments and the Supreme Court to their said Greg Lipper, an attorney with Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the organization that represented Greece residents Linda Stephens and usan Galloway in the lawsuit seeking to force change to the prayer practice. will ensure all Americans can appear before their government, not as members of a particular religion, but as invocation drew significant and even national attention. More han 100 people jammed into the Eastman Room at own Hall to hear him speak, and there were at least 14 news cameras pre- ent. Many in the audience ore signs saying stand for Secular he invocation drew one protester who carried a sign and said he felt comp elled to come, but not nough to identify himself.

Others wore their sent iments on their shirts, as did Lisa Gleason of Greece, whose T-shirt aid an atheist have read on the front and a ns 14:34 Women should remain silent in the on the back. Gleason said she attended the meeting be- ause it was exciting to see history made in her own town. I think this will spur people across the count ry to push she said. Courtney said that is the plan. are not going to be invisible he said of non-believers, umanists, atheists and free thinkers.

will stand at podiums, we will deliver invocations and we will be Twitter.com/meagmc Dan Courtney of Hamlin, an atheist, delivers the invocation at the Greece Town Board meeting Tuesday. JAMIE PHOTOGRAPHER GO DEEPER DIGITAL To see a video from meeting, go to Democratand hronicle.com Atheist Continued from Page 1A.