150 Years Ago (October 1874)
The Husted Base Ball Club of Peekskill accepted a challenge from the Kellogg Base Ball Club of Cold Spring to compete for 10 gold badges that would be presented to the winner by Assembly Member Hamilton Fish Jr. When the Peekskill team arrived, Kellogg reported its local catcher was out of town and had been substituted with a Newburgh player. The Husted club protested; Kellogg offered to scratch him from the lineup if Peekskill removed a player who lived in Haverstraw. The visitors refused and left.
Alexander Purdy of Breakneck, who had been walking his dog on a string, insisted he didn’t hear any of the whistles blown by the northbound freight train whose cowcatcher tossed him over the south track and nearly into the river at Sandy Landing. Purdy suffered only bruises, but his dog was killed.
The Cold Spring Recorder noted that District No. 3 spent $11 [$304] annually per pupil but District 13 spent $16.08 [$444], which the editor took as evidence that the schools should be merged.
Officer McAndrew drove to the post office with a 3-year-old boy he had discovered playing near the tracks. The boy said his name was Charlie Hemway and that he lived in Matteawan [Beacon]. But suddenly he shouted “Mama!” and pointed to a woman on the sidewalk: Mrs. Daniel Henry of Nelsonville, who identified the boy as her son. He had been missing since breakfast.
The schooner yacht Restless ran aground at Sandy Landing and had to be hauled off by the steamer Boardman two days later at high water.
The wharf was covered with flagstones from Ulster County for Caleb Mekeel of Nelsonville to add to residences around the village.
According to The Recorder, an express train cut off a portion of Mrs. McGwinny’s dress when she was slow crossing the track. But Mrs. McGwinny insisted it wasn’t true, and that “she is able to look out for herself.”
The annual hunting match took place on a rainy Saturday. A team captained by C.H. Ferris won with 922 beasts and birds. The day ended with a feast at Town Hall. J.Y. Dykeman was the individual champion with 302 kills.
A dog was sent flying by the 8:12 p.m. express but got up and hobbled home.
The Lone Star Club, a Black baseball team that the Poughkeepsie Press said was from Cold Spring, traveled to Poughkeepsie to play the Butterflies. The Lone Stars were actually from Newburgh, with The Recorder noting there had not been enough Black men in the village for a baseball team since the 18th century.
Among the unusual items displayed at the Putnam County Fair in Carmel were a 200-year-old German trunk, 120-year-old shears and 143-year-old shoes worn in succession by Barnabas, Orpha, Ruth, Chloa, Heity, Polly, Daniel, Timothy, Samuel, Bizar, Jonathan and William Pierce.
Four train cars left for the waterworks in Providence, Rhode Island, with iron piping from the Cold Spring Foundry that weighed 17 tons, 20 tons, 30 tons and 50 tons. A fifth pipe being cast weighed 62 tons.
At a trustee vote for the Nelsonville school district, incumbent Stephen Mekeel received 19 votes and Isaac Riggs 17. But “owing to some informality,” The Recorder said, “the chairman did not declare the result.” In a second ballot, Riggs won, 22-17.
Alex Skeene showed off a banana he had grown in a greenhouse.
The little daughter of John Dillon was pulled off the track near the depot a moment before the southbound 1:51 p.m. train would have struck her.
Mrs. Morris Englebride and her daughter were on their way to church when they passed a man walking unsteadily, with his hands in his pockets, across the Foundry Cove bridge. Soon after, they thought they heard a splash, but there was no cry for help. They told their story at church and several men investigated and found a body with “H.M.” on the arm and a stamped rail ticket issued at Fishkill Landing [Beacon] for Sing Sing the day before. The coroner concluded that the man had fallen from the train, but it was unclear where he spent the night.
Jennie Bailey, the widow of John Bailey, who had been fatally injured in a quarry blast at Storm King in 1870, died at age 34.
After a son of Walter Phalon arrived from New York City at the family home on Garden Street sick with smallpox, the Village Board quickly created a Board of Health to order him isolated. The Recorder opined: “We wonder if the taxpayers will all turn out, at the lead of some officious mischief maker, and refuse to appropriate money for this board, as they did in 1872?”
A county judge ruled against Joseph Dore in his lawsuit against the New York City & Hudson River Railroad for killing his horse near the Breakneck tunnel. Dore claimed the train stopped but started again, killing the horse, which was caught in its cattle guard. The company said everything possible was done to stop the train.
125 Years Ago (October 1899)
George Morro, 24, a former Cold Spring resident, was shot in the back and mortally wounded outside his Brooklyn home following an argument over a woman. The assailant was captured after his gun jammed during a shootout with police. Both men had been drinking.
Peter Reed returned from the Manhattan Eye and Ear Hospital, where surgeons removed an ulcer on his eye, restoring his sight.
Navy Admiral George Dewey, the hero of the Spanish-American War, passed by Cold Spring on a train covered in U.S. flags.
The steamship Scotsman wrecked near the mouth of the St. Lawrence River in Newfoundland, killing 24 passengers, including the infant niece of Mrs. William Yates of Cold Spring. The girl’s mother and sister survived.
A cardboard man set in front of Spaulding’s pharmacy to promote codfish oil was so lifelike that a farmer alighted from his wagon and asked for 10 cents of quinine.
John Durlip, a West Point Band drummer, went missing from the academy, along with the 16-year-old daughter of Sgt. Kniffen, who taught chemistry.
The Recorder opined: “The approaching election will test the sincerity of the citizens who have been crying out for change. The Democratic ticket [which the paper endorsed] is composed of strong and clean men.”
William Ladue circulated a petition to build bicycle paths in the town and county.
Sheriff John Donohoe, who had been running the Garrison Hotel for 14 years, leased it to his sister, saying he was tired of keeping house as a bachelor.
The Cold Spring Hose Co. paraded its new firetruck equipped with three ladders, a 35-foot extension, four hooks and poles, rubber fire buckets, axes, crowbars, lanterns and an automatic wheel-striking gong.
The Cold Spring Light, Heat and Power Co. filed papers with the state to incorporate with $30,000 [$1.14 million] divided into 200 shares.
Zophar Post, who had lived in Philipstown for 58 years, died at his home in Nelsonville. He survived his brothers, Cyrus, Henry, Sela and Lemuel.
J.Y. Mekeel offered for sale a square Steinway piano, with carved rosewood legs and case, for $125 [$4,700]. He gave its value as $850 [$32,000].
100 Years Ago (October 1924)
A new state law required that anyone who became qualified to vote after Jan. 1, 1922, first demonstrate their ability to read and write English.
Kenneth Jaycox, 27, died while attempting to extinguish a fire on the second floor of his home in Nelsonville opposite Allen’s Garage. Jaycox collapsed while carrying a barrel half filled with water up the high, narrow staircase. He was survived by his wife and young daughter. [Jaycox was a member of the Ku Klux Klan; his procession at Cold Spring Cemetery included 25 hooded members.]
Theodore Roosevelt Jr., the Republican candidate for governor, spoke from the rear platform of a special train that stopped at the Cold Spring station at 2:52 p.m. on a Monday. He shared “the errors of the Democratic Party” and promised that “all extravagance would cease” in Albany once he took office.
The New York Central Railroad installed electric lights at the Garrison depot.
William Henry Knox sailed for South America aboard the S.S. Voltaire to represent the National City Bank of New York at its Rio de Janeiro office.
The Salvation Army’s Hudson River Guard Band performed on a Friday morning outside the post office.
The Cold Spring Dramatic Association performed minstrel shows in the parish house at St. Philip’s Church in Garrison and Philipstown Town Hall.
The Manitou post office closed its doors, forcing residents to begin retrieving their mail in Garrison.
Electric lamps were installed on the Bear Mountain Bridge so the men constructing it could work at night.
75 Years Ago (October 1949)
More than 300 people attended the Flower Show and Exhibition of Period Rooms hosted by the Philipstown Garden Club at the Highlands Country Club.
The Haldane Central School established a safety patrol to help younger children cross Main Street at Fishkill Avenue, the iron steps and Town Hall.
The Franciscan Friars of the Atonement celebrated its 50th anniversary. Francis Cardinal Spellman, the archbishop of New York, was in Rome and sent his regrets.
In a column that appeared weekly on the front page of the Putnam County News & Recorder called “Wake Up America; Peekskill Did,” George Benziger, commander of the local American Legion, shared details of how Communists had infiltrated every level of society, including the unions and schools. The headline referred to an August benefit for the left-wing Civil Rights Congress with Paul Robeson in which concertgoers had been attacked with bats and rocks.
J.J. Lynch gave an archery demonstration during an assembly at Haldane High School that included trick shots.
50 Years Ago (October 1974)
The Haldane school board approved bids for $240,000 [$1.5 million] in renovations, including adding drainage, paving a parking lot and installing sidewalks and concrete stairways.
A friend of the Rev. William Reisman, rector of St. Philip’s Church in Garrison, alerted him to a portrait at a Toronto antique store of Beverley Robinson, the founder and first warden of the church. It was found to be a modern copy of a portrait done in London of Robinson in his Loyalist uniform.
25 Years Ago (October 1999)
Bryon Tuttle of Garrison returned from a six-month deployment in the Balkans aboard the USS Halyburton. The ship helped conduct NATO airstrikes in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
Del Karlen Jr., an associate regional counsel for the Environmental Protection Agency, analyzed property records in the Putnam County Clerk’s Office to determine the ownership of dirt roads. Lou Petrocelli of Garrison, a candidate for town supervisor, funded the study.
A plaque was dedicated along Route 9D near the Chestnut Ridge Apartments to honor Joe Percacciolo, a former town supervisor and county legislator who died the year before.
Supervisor William Mazzuca said that Tropical Storm Floyd had caused $975,000 [$1.8 million] in damage to Philipstown roads, particularly Old Albany Post Road, South Mountain Pass and East Mountain Road, despite drainage improvements.
The Garrison school board rejected a petition signed by 168 residents asking it to postpone a referendum on a new building. Acting on the advice of counsel, the board noted that residents had no say over the design or delaying the vote.
The Town Board voted to oppose the merger of its cable provider, MediaOne, with AT&T, citing poor service and broken promises.
