By a vote of three to two the Ridgefield Planning Commission voted not to recommend that the town purchase the Bailey property at the corner of East Ridge and Branchville Road as the site for the proposed 1,200-student junior high school, the April 2, 1964 Press reported. Daniel McKeon, chairman of the commission, who cast the deciding vote, reported that the decision was based primarily on the fact that the site was too small for the proposed school. 
The Press, however, editorialized that despite the fact that the site without the abutting 10-acre Rockwell parcel was woefully inadequate for the size of the school being proposed, the importance of building the new school in the village district near the center of the town’s population was paramount. The Press reported that another possible solution was to build two and eventually three smaller junior high schools in the outlying sections of town, such as Ridgebury, Farmingville and Branchville, while leaving the senior high school in the center. “We have no doubt but that junior high schools will be located in the presently outlying areas when the town gets big enough, perhaps in a decade or two.”
Dr. Philip R. Pitruzzello, the truly admired superintendent of schools and former RHS principal, unexpectedly tendered his resignation. The Board of Education regretfully accepted the resignation and agreed to release him from the third year of his contract. Dr. Pitruzzello had accepted a position as superintendent in a school district on the north shore of Long Island that offered a significantly higher salary. Dr. Pitruzzello also stated that he was impressed by the school district’s “clear evidence of strong public support for education and the foresight which the citizens have demonstrated in providing for the district’s building needs.”
Without ceremony or even a toot of the whistle, the New Haven Railroad abandoned carload service up the branch line to Ridgefield from Branchville. Passenger service on the line, which began in 1875, was cut in 1923 when bus service to Branchville was installed. The line once had twice-a-day through-passenger service without changing cars to Grand Central Terminal.
The Ridgefield Playhouse on Prospect Street featured Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. The Steak Barn at the rotary junction of Routes 7 and 35 offered charbroiled sirloin steak dinners for $3.
Mr. and Mrs. John Edward Emmons of Branchville Road announced the engagement of their daughter, Patricia, to John Robert Reese of Gloversville, N.Y. Mr. Reese, a graduate of Dartmouth College, was a second year law student at Yale University.
Miss Barbara Jean Califano, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Califano of Soundview Avenue, was married to Richard Paris, son of Mr. and Mrs. Walter Paris of High Ridge.
Anthony F. Chiodo, guidance counselor at Ridgefield High School, was advised by the selection committee on General Electric’s Guidance Fellowships that he received a summer fellowship at Syracuse University where he would study personnel relations and advanced guidance techniques. N. Budd Tamler, teacher of economics and United States history at the high school, received a National Science Foundation Fellowship in economics. He was one of 40 secondary school teachers from a nationwide panel of 600 teachers to receive such a fellowship.
The town published its proposed town and school budgets for the fiscal year 1964-65. The first selectman’s salary stayed the same at $9,000. Combined salaries for the paid firemen rose to $27,450 and police department salaries rose to $66,100. The total budget for the Parks Department was $11,450. Welefare assistance in town amounted to $10,000. The school system’s total budget was $2,668,716.72.