150 Years Ago (August 1874)
When a traveler near the Pacific Hotel hired Theodore Morrison for $1 [about $28 today] to row him to Cornwall, Leonard Schegel offered to do it for 75 cents. The hacks argued; after Schegel struck Morrison with his cane, Morrison shoved him. That’s when Schegel’s son, James, threw a rock that hit Morrison in the forehead. James was charged with assault, but a jury found no cause for action against his father.
A granite crosswalk was laid across Main Street from Garden Street to Kemble Avenue. The Cold Spring Recorder soon after complained that the contractors had not removed the chippings and blocks, creating a hazard that required nearby store owners to keep their lanterns on.
Moyse opened a store near the Sunk Mine and, in a display of his service, pushed a barrel of flour and a ham in a wheelbarrow for half a mile to a customer’s door.
Nine members of the Jubilee Singers of Wilmington, North Carolina, visited the Methodist Church. The Recorder assured readers that those expecting a “vulgar” minstrel would be disappointed; instead, the singers performed “those peculiar songs of the Negro camp meeting, which express a distinct religious idea, although grotesquely worded.”
A woman who fell off the gangplank of an excursion steamer at the dock was quickly lifted from the river because the tide was high.
A rumor that James Ruddiman had drowned spread for four hours until he showed up.
A canal boat sank in 15 feet of water at the wharf. It required eight hydraulic pumps to raise but its coal remained on the deck.
At his discretion, the town assessor added $30,000 [$825,000] to the value of the New York City & Hudson River Railroad property.
The Recorder editor lamented that documentation of the early history of Philipstown was sparse. “Little can be found upon the records but the brief entries concerning the elections of officers and the laying out of roads,” he wrote.
A Steiner Repeating Fire Extinguisher salesman left samples of its portable home unit with two merchants.
W. Foster, of the Kellogg Base Ball Club, was applauded after he leaped aboard a riderless wagon on Main Street, grabbed the reins and brought the horse to a stop.
After drinking three beers at a Cold Spring saloon and taking the train home to Garrison, Morris Osborne was struck and killed while walking on the tracks. A station agent found his body at 4:30 a.m.
In a letter to The Recorder, a reader noted that Osborne and three other local “drunkards” had died since Jan. 1 and called on the village to enforce its temperance laws.
While playing with his children, John Hustis stepped on an iron garden rake and was severely injured by a tooth that went through his shoe.
E.J. Pierce, a female physician from the Highlands Medical Institute in Newburgh, delivered a “lecture for ladies” at Town Hall.
A young man named Levy was standing at the railroad station when a mailbag tossed from the 9:46 a.m. express knocked the pipe from his mouth.
Although the pump at the depot had been repaired, The Recorder noted that the cup was so often missing that thirsty travelers had to borrow the one in the ladies’ room.
Harry Porter, 8, drowned after falling from the decaying dock on West Street. Three men dove into the muddy, oily water and Capt. George Wise threw a scap net until its iron ring caught on the boy’s leg. He was pulled out, but 15 minutes had passed.
Isaac Finch, a former Cold Spring resident who moved to Oregon, mailed the editor of The Recorder 8-foot-tall spires of timothy grass.
An intoxicated Gilbert Christian was arrested after making a scene inside a Nelsonville store by insisting he could lick any Irishman in town.
Nichols and Mckeel constructed a black walnut numismatic cabinet for James Nelson that had 21 drawers.
Owen & Webb painted their store on Stone Street to resemble a brownstone.
125 Years Ago (August 1899)
While cleaning his bicycle, Fred Andrews lost the end of a finger in the rear sprocket.
A horse kicked Frank Warren in the face, breaking his nose.
A farmer named Light came to the village to sell a load of apples but instead “loaded up on apple juice,” according to The Recorder, and fell off his wagon while turning at Parrott and Bank streets.
Isaac Lawrence of Jersey City visited Fishkill Landing [Beacon], where he and Cornelius Haight reminisced about attending the old red schoolhouse in North Highlands 50 years earlier.
William Pope learned from a traveler that his sister, whom he had not seen in 30 years, lived in Bay View, Massachusetts. He invited her to visit, and she came with her daughter.
The Haldane school board appropriated $4,000 [$151,000] for teacher salaries. It noted that, in the trustee elections, most of the 340 votes were cast by women.
Capt. Henry Metcalfe, who led a campaign to build a new Haldane school at a cost of $26,505 [$1 million], declined a suggestion that it be renamed for him. “I would as soon think of altering the name of that tomb in our cemetery in front of which I hope I shall someday rest,” he wrote.
Ernest Baxter, 13, fell from the upper part of the wagon shed and caught his wrist on a grappling iron. He hung for a time before he was able to lift himself and extract the hook.
Howard Junior caught 16 trout in the Continentalville brook in a single day.
Annie Morgan, 26, the daughter of financier J.P. Morgan, was camping in the Rocky Mountains along with other friends of Prof. and Mrs. Henry Fairfield Osborn of Garrison, who had a complete outfit for shooting and fishing.
A steamer captain predicted a severe winter because of the number of crabs being caught in the lower Hudson.
The Recorder advised: “There are two dogs roaming between the railroad and the dock which could be dispensed with. They are a menace to bicycle riders.”
A shoeshine chair staffed by an Ethiopian man was installed outside Henry Ticehurst’s barbershop.
Mary Bowne was sitting on her stoop on Market Street when she saw a man next door fall 20 feet to the sidewalk from a second-story window. It was Michael Carney, who walked in his sleep. He was not seriously injured.
Jesse Austin, who had ferried generations of West Point cadets across the river, died at 78 and was interred at St. Philip’s Church in Garrison. In a tribute, a friend wrote that, at the beginning of the Civil War, “Jesse felt sad when he saw upward of two score of them doff their uniforms in the cabin, and with cheers for secession cast the good old gray coats to Jesse, one of which he had until the day of his death.” Later that year, Austin received a War Department telegram ordering him to keep up steam all night. At 4 a.m., President Lincoln and two officers got off a train at Garrison to be transported. Years earlier, in December 1853, Robert E. Lee, the academy superintendent, wanted to cross at 3 a.m. in a storm. The rowboat journey amid the ice took 90 minutes, but then Lee invited Austin to his quarters for a drink.
Michael Raftery of Cold Spring escaped from the Putnam County Jail by sawing through the iron bars of his cell window.
John B. Quirk, aka James Harvey Bennett, was one of 54 men awarded the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest military honor, for cutting a submerged cable to isolate Cuba from Spain during the Spanish-American War. Quirk, the chief boatswain’s mate aboard the USS Marblehead, died in 1900 and was buried at Cold Spring Cemetery.
Four young women from Garrison who went to a bluff to watch the searchlights of passing ferries became lost in the woods on their return. A search party found them just before dawn.
The Board of Trustees ordered hackmen (taxi drivers) to stand on the opposite side of the street from the depot.
The Cold Spring Engineering Society held its first meeting.
Sheriff Donohue laid out a croquet ground at the Garrison Hotel and, according to The Recorder, was seen “teaching the young lady guests this fascinating and exhilarating pastime.”
The cook on the USS Annapolis, anchored off West Point, drowned when he jumped into the river to bathe and was dragged under the gunboat by the current. He was buried with military honors in the post cemetery.
During the night, someone went through Joe Madonna’s sweet corn crop on River Road and stole 600 ears — his entire harvest.
John Smalley, a farmer near Sunk Mine, spotted a chunk head snake [copperhead] peeking from under a stone. He ran inside to get a table fork, which he used to stab the snake in the head. As he did, the snake wound itself around Smalley’s arm and had to be cut to pieces to release him.
100 Years Ago (August 1924)
The Cold Spring Village Board awarded a $38,000 [$700,000] contract to Christopher Brothers of Peekskill to pave Main Street from the railroad to Fair Street and construct a storm sewer from Fishkill Avenue to the dock. The firm stored its cement in a building at Main and Market, but the floor collapsed under the weight and 20 bags were lost in the flooded cellar.
The fire company reminded drivers that, in the event of an alarm, its apparatus had the right of way, and they should pull to the curb.
The Recorder alerted readers that child star Jackie Coogan, accompanied by Lt. Gov. George Lunn, would stop at the Cold Spring station at 9:15 a.m. on a Saturday on his way from Poughkeepsie to New York City for a benefit for Near East Relief. When the 9-year-old didn’t show, disappointing a large crowd, The Recorder said its notice had been published in “good faith” after a Near East Relief representative came to the village to prepare. Jackie and Lunn apparently took the express.
The director of the Putnam branch of the state tax department announced that, under a new law, every motor vehicle operator must have a driver’s license. At the same time, the state requested that police chiefs supply the names of reckless drivers so they could be “thoroughly investigated” before being processed.
The Recorder noted there was “great demand” for houses in Cold Spring and that owners who renovated would have no difficulty finding tenants.
Putnam County announced the results of its latest auction of Philipstown property seized for unpaid taxes, including a 38-acre tract sold for $26.46 [$486]; a Lake Surprise bungalow for $20.15 [$370]; and a 125-acre tract for $32.46 [$600].
75 Years Ago (August 1949)
Coach John “Chiggum” Merante announced the first practice of the Haldane alumni football team. Among the returning players were Joe “Moe” Mazzuca, George “Jiggs” Lyon, Roger “Hoot” Gibson and Bill “Frog” Mellravy.
Nate Glick was named an official RCA Television dealer. The 1950 models ranged from a 10-inch tabletop for $199.95 [$2,600] to a 16-inch console.
Mrs. Baruch, 74, was injured when, while sitting in the passenger seat of a parked car on Main Street, waiting for her daughter, the vehicle rolled from its spot and sideswiped a car across the street before drifting back and hitting a pole and a second car.
Eddie Cantor visited Leonard Bloomer of Lake Surprise at the Butterfield Hospital. The comedian, who attended the Lake Surprise camp as a boy, had been a friend of the Bloomer family for 45 years. Nat Holman, the basketball coach at City College of New York, also visited with his brother, Jack, who had been a camp director for many years.
The Rev. Richard Addison Thornburg, the newly installed minister at the South Highlands Methodist Church in Philipstown, was visited by his twin brother, the Rev. Robert Watts Thornburg of Chicago, and his father, the Rev. Dr. Amos Thornburg of Hollywood, California.
50 Years Ago (August 1974)
Dr. Rene Dubos, a microbiologist who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1969 for his book So Human an Animal, spoke at a Putnam County Historical Society picnic.
The fifth annual Arts and Crafts Fair at the Garrison Art Center included a folk concert with Nicky Seeger (nephew of Pete); Don McLean, known for his song, “American Pie”; and Mike Klubnick and the Chazy Band.
The Cold Spring Fire Department changed the time of its daily siren from 6 p.m. to noon.
A team representing Palen’s Drug Store in Cold Spring won the Ladies Night Owl League at Fishkill Bowl.
Ed’s Variety Store held its grand opening at 93 Main St.
25 Years Ago (August 1999)
Traffic on Main Street in Nelsonville was detoured onto Peekskill Road while workers installed a 48-inch water drain to replace a brick culvert that had carried runoff from behind Norm Champlin’s ironworks to Foundry Creek for 100 years.
John Pierson of Grainy Pictures in Cold Spring was in the news because of his early involvement with a newly released blockbuster, The Blair Witch Project. Pierson provided $10,000 in seed money for the film, which cost $40,000 to produce and grossed nearly $250 million. [One of the actors, Michael Williams, later became a guidance counselor at the Garrison School.]
After practicing for 15 years in New York City, Dr. Cynthia Ligenza relocated to the Medical Center at Cold Spring.
The Putnam County Board of Elections invalidated a petition to create the Philipstown Together Party because it lacked page numbers. The party would have given all Democratic candidates for office in Philipstown a second line on the ballot, which led one resident to file a challenge, saying a new party’s purpose should be to present new candidates or a new platform.
In a letter to the Putnam County News & Recorder, a New York City couple who had visited Cold Spring complained that there were no taxis at the train station and no way to avoid the “distasteful” pedestrian tunnel.
