Kingston, First Capital of New York, reads the state Thruway sign at Exit 19. And a rich history it is, covering more than three centuries. The City of Kingston will celebrate its 150th birthday on Friday. Details to follow.

Kingston's history can be divided into roughly four parts — the long and short of it, as it were.

Founded in 1652, the Dutch period lasted only a few years, until the English took possession in 1664. The colonial period ended with declaration of statehood in 1777. Statehood was ratified in Kingston that year, but only a few months after its adoption in April, British troops burned the village of Kingston in October. State government fled to Marbletown, 10 miles away, never to return.

Rondout, a creekfront trading post when British troops disembarked less than a mile away that October morning, boomed as a river access with the establishment of the Delaware & Hudson Canal in the late 1820s. The canal period ended in the late 1890s. The equally important but shorter-lived IBM period lasted from the mid-1950s to the company’s leaving in 1994.

The period we live in defies definition, other than one of government handouts, beginning with urban renewal demolition of Rondout in the mid-1960s.

The villages of Rondout and Kingston differed in many ways. Rondout attracted immigrants for the canal business, mostly Irish and German. Italian immigrants would arrive in numbers toward the last quarter of the 19th century when railroads began to take over for river trade. Kingston, barely three miles away, was the county seat and all that entailed — the judicial center and a commercial hub.

The two villages were very different, ethnically, demographically and in size. The future City Hall was placed at or near the boundary of the villages, meaning Rondout, though three times Kingston’s population, was only a quarter its size. In between was mostly farmland. The advent of railroads augured the rapid growth of what we now call Midtown at the end of the 19th century.

Friday’s agenda will cover most of these issues in depth. What intrigues me are the machinations behind the merger of the two villages to form the modern city of Kingston.

Local historians and authors generally agree that it was Rondout Village that first petitioned the state for incorporation as a city. Most cite commerce as the main reason, but there was something else far more pressing: public health. Rondout’s 4,000 residents, tightly packed in about 40 acres between steep hills and cliffs, had literally fouled their nests. Raw sewage bubbling up from the ground contaminated wells. Serious diseases like cholera and typhoid plagued the populace.

The only quick (and expensive) way to address that rising tide was a wooden-piped modern sewer disposal system (dumping into Rondout Creek). Rondout as a village lacked the bonding authority to finance that kind of project. Rondout as a city could.

There seemed to be little thought of merging with rival Kingston at that point. But soon enough, Kingston, worried about being “swallowed up” by Rondout, got into the act.

And herein lies the mystery. Rondout’s petition all but disappeared in a state legislature even more secretive than what we suffer under in modern times. Let’s just say that inside politics is eternal.

Kingston emerged as “the city,” with Rondout attached. Had Rondout prevailed, we’d be the uniquely named city of Rondout, not one of dozens of Kingstons, from Canada to Jamaica to Australia.

Pulling the levers behind the scenes seemed to be one William Loughran, member of the Assembly, congressman and future mayor of the new city, He was a Republican in a Republican-controlled legislature and of course, a resident of Kingston.

After that, it was just a question of settling details between the two outgoing village boards. It got ugly, as turf battles often do. Fists were in the air. Pitchforks, too. Siting the new City Hall almost exactly on the border of the villages, at a highpoint then called “O’Reilly’s Woods” on Broadway, was a necessary compromise.

From there Rondout declined, the Stockade area (old Kingston Village) thrived and Midtown, seemingly built around railroad tracks, took off as a residential hub.

Now, if anybody really knows, and can document the machinations surrounding the incorporation of Kingston, I’m all ears.

Note: Out of pure nostalgia, I headed this column “City Beat” — the name of the daily and weekly column I wrote for nigh on 40 years.

Farewell to John

Former state senator and senate majority leader Warren Anderson, R-Binghamton, came to Kingston in 1985 to pay his respects to the recently departed state Sen. Arthur Wicks, R-Kingston, a former senate majority leader.

“I bet you go to a lot more funerals these days than christenings,” I said, feeling stupid almost immediately. Anderson offered a wan smile and a nod. I know how he felt.

Former Mayor John Heitzman, 94, died a few days ago, barely three months after his wife Betty.

“I think Mom just said, ‘You’ve been on your own long enough, John, come on up here,’” said his daughter Ginger, standing in the receiving line with her siblings at Leahy’s Funeral Home in Kingston on Tuesday afternoon.

A man is judged in many ways. John’s was a full, busy life — service to his country in World War II as a teenager, a lifetime of devotion to wife and family, almost 40 years at Central Hudson, alderman and mayor, an active member of his beloved Democratic Party, volunteer extraordinaire.

John and Betty were an interesting couple, she outgoing and warm; John, reserved but opinionated, firm in his beliefs. He was something of an acquired taste, like good scotch.

John was elected mayor, the highlight of his political career, in 1989, after making a brief foray into mayoral politics in the mid-’60s. There are the worst of times, there are the best of times. The ’80s were not especially good for Kingston. Problems were mounting, money scarce, IBM was beginning to downsize — to what extent, nobody yet knew. Two years later, he was voted out of office in favor of Republican alderman John Amarello. Typically, he took it well; there was plenty of other things to do around town. There always was. And besides, it’s difficult for anyone to bring in bold, new programs to establish a positive record in a two-year term.

Note that John Heitzman served two years as mayor, not one year, as reported in a positive story in the local daily. They probably meant one term.

Personally, I thought “the two Johns,” as they were called during that campaign, were a bit past prime for the job back then, though Heitzman struck me as the more vigorous. Mayor T.R. Gallo, 33, who defeated Amarello in the next election, liked to call them “those elderly gentlemen.” John Heitzman, for one, outlived Gallo, who died in office 2002, by more than 20 years.

All in all, it was a wonderful life for Mayor Heitzman. May he rest in peace.