The Day Nyack High was Silent

James McGuinness witnessed plenty of tragedy in his life. Just before his 20th birthday he enlisted in the US Army and soon found himself sent off to war in the Chinese-Burma Theater.

That part of his life behind him, in the late 50s he and his wife Peggy bought a home in Valley Cottage and their kids started in the Nyack Schools. Life was good, but this isn’t the story of Jim McGuinness the veteran, this is the story of Jim McGuinness the father, and the worst day of his life.

Early on the morning of March 24, 1972, James McGuinness Jr. boarded school bus No. 596 in Valley Cottage. A cool morning, but spring was coming. He joined forty-eight other students heading to Nyack High School over the mountain. Their bus would never arrive. There was construction at the normal railroad crossing in Valley Cottage, and the bus had to take a different route through Congers. Bus driver Joseph Larkin, moonlighting from his job in the New York City Fire Department, drove the bus over Gilchrest Road. As he approached the unguarded railroad crossing without safety gates or warning lights, it was 5 minutes to eight; the kids were starting to fear they would be late for first period classes. Many of them saw a train down the tracks. Did the driver not hear or see the train? What was he thinking as the bus continued into the crossing? The bus didn’t stop and the 83-car train couldn’t stop. Somebody yelled: “We’re going to crash!”

The freight train sliced through the middle of the bus, splitting it open and dragging parts for almost a quarter mile. Three boys were killed almost instantly: 18 year-old Richard Macaylo, 14 year-old Robert Mauterer, and 16 year-old Jimmy McGuinness. Police, ambulance volunteers and firefighters rushed kids to Nyack Hospital. Thirty-eight children were listed in the newspaper as injured; eight of them as critical. Of the 49 kids on the bus only one would not require hospitalization.

NHS hockey coach and Journal-News sportswriter Richard Gutwillig would elegantly write of his experiences the day of the crash:

“I have just undergone the most traumatic experience in my life as a teacher and coach at Nyack High School. I’m used to seeing kids vibrantly alive, happy participating in life. This morning I looked at kids in death. The life and dreams of at least three of the teenagers have been smashed under the wheels of the Penn-Central train … the tail end of the bus was some twenty yards from the crossing while the main part of the bus was impaled on the front engine of the three-engine freight train 500 yards up the track. Seats and broken windows were mute testimony to the force of the collision. But the greater tragedy and sorrow for the rescue teams, relatives and onlookers was the scattered tangle of wreckage, possessions, books, sneakers, baseball gloves, a lacrosse stick, an orange and even a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”

Sharp grief and grim disbelief filled the air as Nyack High School students grappled with the events of the accident. Kids sobbed as they huddled in small groups against the chill wind, waiting for a bus that would never arrive. “He was a little kid and we were always wondering if he was going to get bigger,” lamented Kathy McCarthy, a freshman friend of Robert Mauterer. “Yesterday we were fooling around in study hall and today he’s dead!” Jimmy McGuinness was a kid with a big smile who loved playing Lacrosse as a Nyack Indian. “He was nice to everybody,” recalled his friend Tony Lazzarino. The accident’s stark reality would continue to prevail throughout Nyack High School as 14 year-old Tommy Gross would die several days later and 16 year-old Steven Ward would lose his battle for life on April 14.

I met James McGuinness several times after that day at different veterans group meetings. Jim was the charter commander of the West Nyack V.F.W. Post. Gone was the smile, the good life look on his face. His fellow veterans felt his pain. Nothing he experienced in war would prepare him for the loss of his little boy. His wife Peggy once told me “I can never look at a school bus and not think..” and then some tears she had left would fill her eyes.

Forty years later Jimmy’s sister, Carol Ann, remembers the anguish she felt as her family waited to learn of Jimmy’s fate. It was that same feeling all across Nyack and Valley Cottage. The students who lived through that time and the people who rode on the bus that fateful day simply don’t forget. It is the day that Nyack High School fell silent.

My apologies for bringing up a reminder, but I feel the loss and long struggle deserve to be remembered.

Playing ball in the old days

Spring is here and kids are playing baseball again just like they have for decades.  Well, maybe not quite like the games of my youth.  Our games were back before parents decided to make the games “better.”

When I was growing up, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, it was unthinkable that a parent would be involved in our baseball games.  Maybe sometime before dark someone’s mom would yell out of the window: “Dinner,” but that was about it. We didn’t have parents yelling at us from the bleachers, because there were no bleachers.  There were NO team moms who felt obliged to provide snacks for us during or after the game.

The ball games I remember involved no concession stands, no dugouts, no real bases and the best of all no parents.  We didn’t have a field to play on, so we played in the middle of Washington Street north of Cedar Hill Avenue. There were four houses in the outfield; on the left the Lazars and Wirtensons, and on the right the Cowards and Cranstons.  The houses were far apart so there actually was a bit of a left and right field.  We couldn’t play hardball, so we settled for softball.

There were no set teams and both boys and girls played on the same team.  Whatever kids from the neighborhood happened to show up got to play.  There were Cowards, Wirtensons, Fentons, Mathsens, Delollios, Plotzers, Lewis, Springsteins, Phelans, Olsens and yours truly.  Sides were chosen in the time-approved fashion, with the best players picked first and the worst, like me, last.  The team who got first “ups” was the one who won the batch clutch, an intricate and often controversial ritual involving one player clutching the barrel of the bat, the other player grabbing the space above of  first player’s hand and alternating until there was no bat left to grab.  The winner was the last player to hold the bat.  That is, unless both teams shouted, “bottle caps!”  Then the other guy would cover the knob of the bat with his hand (girls were never captains) then the loosing team had one chance to kick the bat out of the grip of the winner.

Official baseball rules were in effect; with a few exceptions.   You could only advance one base when the ball rolled under a porch and if teams were short of players, the “invisible runner” rule went into effect.  When it came your turn to bat, you left the base and an invisible runner took your place.   If you hit a single, the IR would advance one base— etc, etc, you get the idea. Usually the youngest or the worst players would pitch because if the worst player hit the batter with the ball, it wouldn’t hurt as much.  Our makeshift field served the gang for many years but it all came to a screeching halt one late August afternoon in 1957.

We were playing the White Avenue gang and trailing by two runs.  A runner was on first, Mary Ellen Fenton was on second— (oh, did I ever have a crush on her, but geeze! don’t tell her now)—it was my turn at bat.  Groans arose from my teammates. The game is on the line, and the worst hitter is up.  No one to pinch hit, so I had to bat.  I decided to bat left-handed—I wasn’t hitting anything right-handed.  The first pitch came in low; I swung and missed. The second pitch was high; I missed that one too. Two outs, two strikes—two on and a guy who can’t hit the side of a barn: disaster in the making!  My teammates were cheering me on—well, yelling at me—when the next pitch came.   I swung and the crack of the bat told the story—a fly ball deep to right field.  I stood there watching. I’d never hit a ball that far.  I started running and by the time I reached the chalk outline of first base, the softball found its target—the dining room window of Aunt Jean’s house. The ball hit the window dead center and the crash was unmistakable.  Two runners crossed the plate to tie the game as I stood crying on second.

That was the last game ever played in the Washington Street Ball Park.  All the kids chipped in a quarter to pay for the glass.  It was my Pop who fixed the window, so I paid for that blast for many years afterward.

Yes, that was baseball 50 years ago. We didn’t have batting helmets, gloves or $200 Titanium bats.  Most of our wooden bats were held together with wood screws and electrical tape.  We won some and we lost some games but we always had fun, and that’s the way baseball should be played.

Front Street Veterans

I enjoy researching stories for my monthly column, and as a veteran I love learning and writing about the men of our community who left the safety of their homes and went off to war.

This month I write about the Veterans of Front Street.  During World War 2, from 1941 to 1945, twenty-four sons from this two-and-a-half block long street served their country.  Their service earned them my gratefully-bestowed title of The Fightingest Street in Nyack.  Kids who once played baseball or tag on this pleasant little tree-lined street served in every branch of American fighting forces in every theater of the war. They flew planes over distant Pacific Islands, waded ashore on remote atolls fighting the Japanese.  They sailed on destroyers and in submarines in the South Seas. They participated in the invasions of Africa and Europe, fighting against the Nazi who wanted to rule our world.  Some treated their wounded comrades and others sat down to eat their K-rations in bomb-gutted Belgian villages.  Some served in defensive guard units at American bases in the far-flung corners of the world that were too obscure to even appear in their geography books in Nyack High School that was a short distance from their front doors.

The “boys” from Front Street were:  Tech, Sgt. Gerald P. Gise who served in the Pacific as an aerial gunner with the Fifth Air Force.  His brother Robert Gise was in an Army Anti-Aircraft unit in France.  A shirt-tail relation of mine: Sgt. Theodore Knarich served in a Radio section of the 10th Air Force in India. Pfc. Douglas Kessler served with an Anti-Aircraft unit in New Guinea.  Pvt. William Waldron was with the 7th Army and took part in invasions of North Africa, Sicily, Italy and France.  2nd. Lt. Arthur Winship served four years in the Army’s Coastal Artillery.

Ida Taylor’s four sons served their county. Fireman First Class Bernard Taylor served on a Navy destroyer in the Pacific; his brother, Norman Taylor, served in the Air Corps in Mississippi as a mechanic.  Corporal Calvin Taylor was in Chemical Warfare in New Guinea. The oldest son, Clyde Taylor Jr., Technician 3rd, served two years in the Army Engineers in the Hawaiian Islands.

Like their neighbors, four Stach brothers from 102 Front Street were all in the service.  Private Stephen Stach received a Purple Heart for wounds sustained in fighting at Treasure Island in October ‘43 while serving in the Artillery.  William Stach, Torpedo man third Class, was in the Pacific for 33 months on a Navy destroyer.  His ship participated in four island invasions with the most fighting on Bougainvillea in New Guinea.  Louis Stach, Seaman Second Class also served on a submarine in the South Pacific.  Private John Stach served in Europe with the Air Corps and took part in the D-Day invasion.

Kenneth Kolb, Seaman First Class, was in the Navy and participated in the invasion of Luzon in the Philippines, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. His brother Andrew Kolb, Jr. was a Motor Pool Sergeant in the Army, serving more than 20 months in Panama.

The Marines are represented by Private First Class Alfred Kessler, who served for 36 months with the 5th Marines in the South Pacific. Sgt. Julius Sergeant served three and a half years in the Air Force in the Philippines.  Private Frank Hoehn had a year’s service in Belgium with the  Quartermaster Corps. Sgt. Edward Roberts served two years with the Army Medical Corps in Europe.  Stephen Dec, Navy Radioman Third Class, was in the South China Sea.  Frank Wadsworth was an aviation cadet and served eleven months before he was given a medical discharge.  Private William Hudak was injured while training with the 20th Armored Division at Camp Campbell in Kentucky and was given a honorable discharge.  Chief Yeoman Robert W. Gates spent fourteen months in North Africa.

Thankfully all of the twenty-four men returned safely home after the war to take their place in what, 50 years later, NBC newsman Tom Brokaw would call The Greatest Generation.

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

A Nyack Love Story

“Marriage isn’t for some folks. I didn’t think I’d ever marry.” That’s what Ethel Mary McKee said to me on the day of her wedding – “Just didn’t meet the right man. I don’t have any regrets about waiting.” Now that might not seem strange to you; I’m sure you’ve heard it before, but you see, Ethel was not your every day bride. Her wedding was held the day after her 88th birthday. Her good friend proposed to her, and she told me she took two weeks to carefully think it over. She finally decided, “Why not—he’s a nice man.”

Ethel Mary McKee was kind of a fixture in my teenage years. Born in Canada, she moved to the United States when Woodrow Wilson was President. I met her when she was the head cook at Nyack High School. My mother worked in the cafeteria as the cashier back in the 50s and 60s. I had plenty of opportunity to get to know Ethel. To say she had a strange sense of humor would be an understatement. She enjoyed having fun, and was always looking for the humor in any situation. If she didn’t see the humor, she started it. To a teenager she was more of a curmudgeon, as she didn’t mind telling me exactly what was on her mind and what I was doing wrong. So, I guess it didn’t surprise me that she never married.
I knew it would take a special guy to marry Miss McKee.

That special guy finally came along; Kimball Weaver, a man twelve years her junior finally won her heart. Weaver, who was married four times before, was confined to a wheelchair as a result of a crippling accident he suffered working as a telephone lineman. Ethel and Kimball met in 1973 when they were both living in Depew Manor Senior Apartments. She cared for him and his fourth wife Margaret until she passed away early in 1978. My dad was also living at Depew Manor, giving me the opportunity to keep in touch with Ethel. As she aged she decided to give up her apartment, and move over to the county infirmary in Pomona. When Kimball’s wife passed away he also moved there.

I was surprised to receive a call from one of the staff at the infirmary requesting Pop’s and my attendance at the marriage of Ethel Mary McKee and Kimball Weaver on May 31, 1978 in the infirmary chapel. We had to go; I knew my mother, if she was living, would insist. Pop added—“This I’ve gotta see!” The chapel was crowded with friends, patients and staff. The couple sat in wheelchairs as the Reverend Jon Norton performed the marriage ceremony. Ethel, dressed in a white dress with a flowery green print, remained remarkably composed throughout the service, staring straight ahead. Kimball had difficulty controlling his emotions; glancing every now and then at his bride, he often wiped tears from his eyes. After the ceremony the wedding party gathered in the corridor outside the chapel. Music was played, slices of wedding cake were passed around and the newlyweds were toasted.
I was happy to see Ethel Weaver was genuinely pleased with the whole affair. The couple planned to move into Weaver’s apartment back in Depew Manor.

In the following weeks, I would see Ethel pushing her new husband around the courtyard in his wheelchair, enjoying the spring sun. I learned Ethel and Kimball shared a keen interest in watching Yankee ballgames on television. They seemed just like any other newlyweds. “You don’t know how happy I am,” he told me one afternoon, tears running down his face. “As long as I’m alive she’s never going to want for nothing.” Ethel answered with her usual sense of humor. “I’m trying to get him on a diet so he won’t be so hard to push!”

Two weeks married and their love seemed real, until Sunday, June 11, when Kimball
suffered a massive stroke. After Pop called me, I drove Ethel to the hospital where around noontime she talked to her husband.
She said to him, “look at all these nice young girls taking care of you.” He smiled at her and their marriage was over in the next minute.

A couple of days later as we shared a cup of coffee in Pop’s apartment, Ethel turned to me and said, “Y’ know, I don’t think I’ll marry again—never find a guy as great as Kimball.”

Their marriage lasted only a few short weeks but every time I ran into Ethel in the next year, she was smiling more than I ever remember.

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Jewish History in Nyack

Sometime around 1850 Abraham Brown and Moses Oppenheimer brought their families to Piermont and opened a store where they struggled to survive. In 1861 the “General Store” of Abe Brown suffered a serious fire and both of the families were wiped out. Abe Brown decided to rebuild his business in Nyack.  He opened a tailor shop on the south side of Main Street in the first building west of Franklin. The family quickly became part of the community.  Writings of Carl Nordstrom mention they may have been involved in the Underground Railroad, aiding escaped slaves in their journey to freedom. Abe Brown also became one of the building blocks for the Jewish community.

The earliest records I can find in the archives of the library show that “The Jewish Society of Nyack” was organized in March of 1870. The fledgling group had twenty members. They met for services on the last Saturday of each month; High Holy Day services were conducted in Abe Brown’s shop.  Members would drape the store windows with white sheets for privacy.  Jewish Society officers kept accurate hand printed records of births and deaths in Hebrew, English and German.

The society rented an unheated meeting hall on Piermont Avenue in 1882.  During winter months, they carried their Torahs for Sabbath services to members’ homes with heat from a fireplace or coal stove.  Some of the names on the congregation’s register included Neisner, DeJong, Brown, Baer, and Senegaglia.  Isaac and Jacob Neisner would open their men’s clothing and haberdasher shop at 85 Main Street.  In 1903, the brothers built one of Nyack’s first brick buildings on the north side of the block. Their success would lead dozens of other Jewish families to open retail clothing, shoe and housewares stores all along Main Street. Isadore Senegaglia, a direct descendent of Spanish Jews, was a retired doctor and sea captain.  His son, Jack Senegaglia was the first Jewish doctor in our community. The influx of Jewish merchants continued to increase as the village thrived as the freight and produce terminal of Rockland County, thanks to the Nyack Steamboat Company.

With their numbers growing, members began to have serious discussions about a larger meeting place.  In 1900, Max Siegal became Hebrew School teacher to fourteen students.  In 1902 the members adopted the name Congregation Sons of Israel. By 1907 the congregation was meeting on the top floor of Abraham Merritt’s two-story building at the southeast corner of Main and Broadway where they paid an annual rent of $18.  While the conditions of the building were less than ideal—the roof leaked—the congregation finally had a permanent home. Though their finances were rarely in the black, the members were intent on erecting a synagogue.  Records show the appointment of committees to find suitable property for  both a synagogue and cemetery grounds.

The Jewish Women’s Society of Nyack was formally organized and began aiding the congregation and the Jewish community on February 10, 1907—a date they shared with the founding of Congregation Sons of Israel.  By 1919, with a growing congregation guided by president Joseph Goldstein, they resolved to work earnestly to build a synagogue.  The deed for the corner of Broadway and Hudson Avenue was signed on March 21, 1921.  In 1924 the cornerstone was laid and by 1925 a handsome yellow brick building was completed and dedicated. The Jewish families in Nyack finally had their own home.

In 1965 the Congregations Sons of Israel sold their beloved building, and moved to a larger, modern synagogue on North Broadway constructed by longtime member and builder Harry Degenshein.  While the move was celebrated by many members, it caused a split in the Jewish community.  The split led to the creation of Temple Beth Torah in 1966.  That congregation now has a fine new synagogue on North Highland Avenue.

While many of the members of the original Jewish community were retail merchants in the heyday of Nyack’s downtown commercial district, today’s Jewish families number in the hundreds, and are represented in every walk of life—in professions, the arts and our civic and service organizations.

To end this history with a quiz: in November, 1936 the Congregation Sons of Israel purchased cemetery grounds called Temple Israel Memorial Park.  Anybody (except congregation members), care to guess where Nyack’s Jewish cemetery is located?

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

When we were kids

I had coffee the other day with a few longtime friends and it didn’t take long for our conversation to turn to the times when we were kids sixty years ago.
I took notes and decided to turn our thoughts into a column of things we remembered. Our memories are more of a list than a story— see how many you recall.

• Black & white televisions that took three minutes to warm up and Dads sometimes had to go up on the roof to adjust the antenna so we could watch channel seven.

• Saturday morning cartoons: Andy’s Gang, The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Roy Rogers with Nellie-Bell, Trigger and Buttermilk.

• No one in the neighborhood owned a dog with a pedigree, just a mutt who chased the balls for us that we hit into the outfield.

• The quarter we got for a weekly allowance got us into the Broadway Theater for the Saturday afternoon feature, two cartoons and the Movietone News.

• The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was cooties.

• When your dad pulled into Bunny Haire’s gas station on New Street, they cleaned his windshield, checked the oil and pumped the gas all for about 25¢ a gallon. For a time we even got S&H Green Stamps.

• School days—eating the white glue in Mr. Ekdahl’s art class; learning music with Mrs. Fulmore at Liberty Street School, where the girls all had to wear the same blue shorts for gym. Mrs. Kaney taught kindergarten at Upper Nyack Elementary on School Street; moving day from the old school to the new one on Broadway. The trauma in the 3rd grade when Miss Poochie changed her name to Mrs. Heinlein. (What was that about? we wondered.) Some recall sitting in Miss McClaren’s speech class at NHS, giggling at her constant groping to hold up her falling lingerie. A few of us recalled being sent to the principal’s office—but dealing with Mr. Ritt was nothing compared to the fate awaiting us when we got home.

• We remembered what a huge treat it was to get new shoes at Herbet’s, Glynn’s or National Shoes. Lucky’s, Neisner’s and Zabriskie’s all had suit clubs where our moms paid a few bucks a week for our new clothes. We talked about all the medicines and stuff that came from Koblin’s, McManus’ or Shea’s Drug stores.

• Everyone remembered when a Schmitt’s ice cream soda cost us a quarter, and there was a jukebox on every table; when
Maple Grove, Miller’s and George Donzella delivered milk in glass bottles right to the back door. Their cardboard caps would burst in the freezing weather, pushed up by a little plug of frozen milk. Fuller Brush men came to the house selling their wares, as did deliveries from Dugan’s Bakery, Westwood Cleaners and Mr. Buckout, the ice man.

• There were many memories of when the Thruway came to Nyack and the DelRegno brothers moved many houses. Truckloads of rock and earth excavated from the South Nyack cut were used to fill in the old ice pond and the shoreline of the Hudson in Memorial Park. We remembered the chimes in the Bell Memorial Chapel on Clinton Avenue in South Nyack before it was torn down to make way for the Interstate.

• Did you ever spend a hot July evening catching fireflies? How many remember the West Nyack Drive-In Movie, Benny’s Cloverleaf for pizza and Auction City on a Friday night? Remember attaching your Mickey Mantle baseball card to a bike spoke with a clothes pin to make it sound like a motorcycle? What about lying on your back in the grass and saying: “Hey that cloud looks like…” Our summers were filled with whiffle ball games and bike rides over to the old oak for swimming in the Hackensack River. We recalled when our mistakes were corrected by simply shouting, do over and when calling out olly-olly-oxen-free made perfect sense? Do you remember candy cigarettes, wax Coke-shaped bottles with sugar water inside? Also sledding down Hudson Avenue or, if you dared, challenging the huge hills in Oak Hill Cemetery.

After several hours we all agreed it felt good to go back for a few moments and say: “Yeah, I remember that!”

I’ve shared a few memories with you because my old friends ended our meeting with a suggestion to pass them on. How about cutting out my column and handing it to someone who may need a break from grownup life? I double dog dare ya!

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Memories of Liberty Street School

Liberty Street School once rested majestically on a small hill in the south end of Nyack. Its lovely green front lawn sloped gently down to Broadway.

Built on property donated by Tunis Depew, the school opened in 1851; additions were added in 1867, 1909 and 1949. Originally called the Nyack School it was the only public school in the area, and housed all grades until the end of 1929 when new junior and senior High Schools opened on Midland Avenue.

High School classes occupied the top floor. There was a pre-fabricated building on the south side of the school housing what, at the time, were called slow learners. On the southeast corner, a building housed grade 3-D (advanced students). Physical education was handled either in the giant hall on the downstairs floor or on the outside playground depending on the weather.

Upper grades went to the Nyack YMCA on Burd Street, where varsity basketball was played. Varsity baseball and football were played on “Doc” Bernard’s field located at his Clarkstown Country Club. Students were separated by gender, boys on the south playground, and girls on the north. The yearbook was called The Owl; the school colors were blue & gold.

In the early 1930s the front lawn was sold for a new post office and Liberty Street was extended south from Depew to Hudson Avenue. The Nyack School became Liberty Street School.

Teachers stayed for a long time back then; to many, Liberty Street seemed like home. Teachers like Susan Blauvelt & Warren Templin (English), Florence Slade (spelling and penmanship), Winifred Davis and Geraldine Moffit, (mathematics), Betty Ingersoll (history), Evangeline MacLaren, (public speaking & dramatics)—was she ever qualified for that subject! Gertrude Goldstein and Bandmaster Arthur Christman, (music), Solon Gordon, (printing and mechanical drawing), Vivian Krumm and Francis H. Campbell, (science), Ella Goodsir, (bookkeeping), and Doris Newton, (geography). In 1929 Kenneth MacCalman was the superintendent and a former chemistry teacher, A.W. “Mr. Ritt” Ritterhausen was the principal. Before him principals were Homer J. Wightman and Charles Warner.

Sports have always been a big part of education and Nyack School was no different. The Nyack coaches of the day included Harold S. DeGroat (baseball, basketball & football), Thornley Booth, (soccer), George Hobart &, Harold Petersen, (basketball), Thomas G.Ausbury coached football and baseball. Phyllis R. Clarke and Ruth Mosley coached all the girls’ sports. Assistant coaches included Sol Gordon, (wrestling), Verner Cox, Warren Templin (track & soccer) and Francis Campbell, (tennis). All-County athletes were plentiful coming from Liberty Street including the Geary, Lovett, Donovan and Theis brothers, Louis Durkin, Louis Tillinghast, “Buzz” Fountain, and Harry Rosenberg. Rosenberg was the first in Rockland County to run 100 yards in 10 seconds—miraculous time in the 20s, considering the type of shoes and the cinder track. Also guys like Syd Bradshaw, Chris Kelly, Bud Avery, Peck Artopee (yes, the street is named after him), Fred Conace, Syd Miller, Pete (take 2 & hit to right) D’Auria, Dan Guilfoyle, Andy Podraskie, Horace Tyrus, Harry Dropkin, Bill Perry and Jack Rose. The girl athletes often remembered are Betty Zabriskie, Dorothy Blount, Betty Parietti, Hope Coffey and the Speh sisters.

Academics were stressed—and paid off for many of the students. Success came to many including Sydney Bradshaw, former governor of the NY Stock Exchange, Eddie Sauter, arranger for many of the Big Bands during the 40s; Bill Smith, basso star of musicals like Showboat and Porgy and Bess; Leonard Goldstein, in charge of all U.S military bands in Europe by the end of World War II; Rusty Crawford, chairman of the board of Bowery Savings Bank; John Bott, former editor of the NY Post, William H. Hand, assistant to Thomas Edison and later a successful inventor, Homer Lydecker Sr., a successful businessman and avid baseball fan, and Clifford Blauvelt, vice-president of American Cyanamid.

Liberty Street would continue to be the village’s only Elementary School until it was closed in 1968 after being declared unsafe by the State Education Department. After settling a dispute over the land with the Depew family heirs the school was torn down in September 1977. The property was sold to the Nyack Urban Renewal Agency. Dozens of Liberty Street Alumni stood watching the demolition with a tear in their eye. “It was a very nice school at the time,” said Pat Roy who graduated from 6th grade in 1953, as she watched the workers tear down the school. “But, I don’t feel bad, it’s making way for other things, Liberty Street served its purpose in its time.”
The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

160 Years of Service

In the winter of 1851 many were still alive who witnessed the birth of America; in August the yacht America won the first America’s cup;  November saw Herman Melville publish Moby Dick.  One of our least known presidents and the last Whig, Millard Fillmore, was in the White House.

Nyack was a very different village. The majority of the stores and homes were located on the east side of Old Hook Road—not yet called Broadway.  Nyack was growing; steamboats owned by David Smith and his brothers were making daily runs down the river to New York carrying farm produce from Rockland County.  Holiday plans were in full swing on the evening of December 18 when the cry of fire was heard. The steamboat Arrow, moored at the Main Street Dock, was on fire. The only fire truck in town was drawn to the scene by the men of Orangetown Fire Company.  Their fire truck worked hard, but the steamboat was consumed.  In the next day’s Rockland Journal, editor William G. Hasselbarth wrote the Arrow was terribly damaged due to lack of adequate means to combat the fire.  It was a few days later, two days before Christmas, a meeting of twenty-six members of the Fire Department and New York firemen living in Nyack held an organizational meeting at the Paint Shop of J.H. Oliver, over Taylor’s Carriage Factory on Main Street to organize a new fire company.

About the only thing historians know about the meeting was Nyack’s second fire company was born.  No minutes were kept, but it is apparent the company name was also chosen at the meeting: Mazeppa.

For years company members discussed the reasons for adopting this unusual name. Al Simons in his history of Mazeppa writes “a late member of Engine Company No. 48 of NY City Fire Department chose the name because his own company, organized in 1828, was also named Mazeppa.  Later Ron Bolson, in his history of Mazeppa, writes of the origin of the name.  Ivan Stefanovich Mazeppa was born in 1640 in Poland. His liaison with one of the royal ladies was discovered by her husband and Mazeppa was bound to a horse that was set loose to gallop across the steppes of the Ukraine.  He was rescued and became a leader of the Cossacks.  Portraits of Mazeppa’s steed adorned several volunteer fire trucks in NY City.  For whatever reason the name was chosen, each of Nyack’s Mazeppa Fire Engines proudly displays the gallant steed that has raced to the scene of fires for 160 years.

The first meeting of Mazeppa was held at the York House on the corner of Main & Piermont on January 6, 1852.  William Perry was elected Foreman. Shortly afterwards, Mazeppa purchased the latest in firefighting equipment: a piano-box side-arm pumping engine in NY City for the astronomical sum $1,000. Their truck was housed in several places until 1887 until the company moved into the fire house they still occupy today.

Mazeppa rightly claims to be the first Rockland County Fire Company to cross the Hudson River to fight a fire.  Their fire engine was placed on a ferry in 1867 and again in 1868 to aid firefighters in combatting blazes in Tarrytown.  Mazeppa was the first fire company in Nyack to have a fire bell.  It was placed on a pole in front of the engine house.  Company by-laws required the first member arriving at the engine house to ring the bell until a thorough alarm should be sounded or be fined 50¢.

When the Nyack Fire Department was formed in 1863 Mazeppa’s Charles G. Crawford was elected its first chief.  A member of that company, George Dickey, was the longest-serving chief in the NFD; he served for 12 years: 1877-1889. The first president of Mazeppa was the Honorable State Supreme Judge Arthur Tompkins. Elected in 1888, he served for 50 years.

For those who would like to read more, two  detailed histories of Mazeppa are at the Nyack Library: Alan E. Simmons history of Mazeppa A Century of Service, and Ron Bolson’s excellent Mazeppa.

Their 160 years of service is celebrated at their annual dinners when current members of Mazeppa stand in front of their guests and sing:

The old gray mare,
She ain’t what she used to be,
Ain’t what she used to be,
Ain’t what she used to be,
The old gray mare,
She ain’t what she used to be
Many long years ago.

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Angel of the Battlefield

One show I hate to miss on TV is the reruns of M*A*S*H.

I enjoy the comedy amidst the horrors of war. The characters are wonderful: Hawkeye, Trapper, BJ, Radar and of course “Hot-Lips.” I’ve watched every episode many times and only recently discovered Nyack has a direct link to one of the characters in the M*A*S*H series. Some might question my theory, but keep reading and see what you think.

Twenty-one year old Christine Menninghaus completed her degree as a registered nurse at Flower Fifth Avenue School of Nursing. She quickly found a job at a hospital near her home in Clifton, New Jersey. She told me once, “I served in a civilian hospital for a year and then decided I wanted to do something different.” So, in 1948 Chris joined the Army Nurse Corps. After training at Fitzsimons Army Medical Center in Colorado, Chris found herself heading to Pyongyang, Korea. In November, 1950 the first nurses since the start of the Korean conflict landed at Pusan. Chris was assigned to the 171st Evacuation Hospital where she met Major Ruby Bradley. Major Bradley, who was in command of the nurses in Korea, is regarded as the most decorated woman in US Military History.

In a 2009 interview published in the Veterans of Foreign Wars magazine, Chris tells of her experiences in Korea. “I served at an evac hospital, a little bit further behind the lines than a M.A.S.H. unit. While I was farther away from the fighting, the shooting was far too close for comfort. At times we barely escaped the Chinese onslaught. When a M.A.S.H. unit became inundated, wounded soldiers would be brought to us. We would take care of head, spinal, chest, and abdominal injuries and other smaller injuries—but there was really no such thing as a minor injury.” Chris went on, “We did surgery 24 hours around the clock when there was a major campaign and I served in six campaigns. There was a lot of uncontrolled blood. In a regular operating room, you take care of that because you clamp everything off, but it wasn’t like that there. We treated thousands of patients under the most heart-rending circumstances. Despite working 12-hours shifts, there was never any doubt about the worthiness of our cause and the camaraderie was like none other than I have ever experienced.”

One of the surgeons Chris worked with was Dr. H. Richard Hornbeger. For her service, Chris earned six campaign stars. Her experience working with the wounded in combat reinforced her desire to be a nurse. After leaving Korea, she was assigned to the Keller Army Hospital in West Point. She served there for a year and half where she met the love of her life Peter Sinnott.

In 1953, Christine Sinnott was hired by Nyack Hospital where I first met her on the morning of August 17, 1972. I was wheeled into her operating room, where she was the “charge nurse,” to correct the damage I suffered in my fall from a utility pole while working as a lineman. It was only a few years later and a few more times meeting in her operating room, that Chris and Pete Sinnott became my neighbors.

So, by now you must be wondering how Chris’ magnificent nursing career ties into M*A*S*H? I wrote earlier she worked directly with Dr. H. Richard Hornberger in Korea. Dr. Hornberger used the pen name “Richard Hooker” and wrote the book M*A*S*H: A Novel about Three Army Doctors published in 1968. His book was used as the basic script for the movie and later television series. In his novel’s forward notes, Hooker writes: “The characters in this book are composites of people I knew, met casually, worked with, or heard about while working in Korea.” Certainly “Hot Lips” has some of the traits the doctor saw in Major Ruby Bradley, and isn’t it possible some of Chris’ traits as an excellent operating room nurse and the camaraderie she experienced also went into developing the character of Major Houlahan? Knowing Chris for more than 30 years, I think so!

The tragedy in Chris’ life didn’t end with the war in Korea. In 1980 her husband Peter was killed in a tragic accident while serving as a volunteer in the Nyack Fire Department. The way Chris handled the horrors of Korea went a long way helping her handle the death of her husband with grace and dignity. If you’ve spent time watching M*A*S*H you can see some of the same values in the character of “Hot-Lips” Nyack certainly had an Angel of the Battlefield!

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

A Christmas Love Story

“At Christmastime, when men and women everywhere gather in their churches to wonder anew at the greatest miracle the world has ever known, the story I like best to recall during the holiday season was not a miracle—well, not exactly. My story begins with a young pastor and his wife taking over a rundown church in an unknown river valley town.

One stormy December night, rain soaked through the church’s exterior and caused a chunk of wall plaster behind the alter to fall, leaving a ragged hole. “Thy will be done,” said the pastor. “Christmas is only two days away,” gasped his wife.

That afternoon, the dispirited couple attended an auction where a gold-and-ivory lace tablecloth was put on the block. It was a magnificent item, nearly 15 feet long. Suddenly the inspired pastor bid $6.50 and took it back to his church. He hung it over the hole in the wall and the extraordinary beauty of its shimmering handwork cast a fine holiday glow over the chancel. About noon on Christmas Eve, the pastor opened the church door and noticed a middle-aged woman at the bus stop. He knew the bus wasn’t due for 40 more minutes, so he invited her in, where it was warm. She lived in the city and had come to the village to interview for a governess job with a local family. Unfortunately, she didn’t get the position because of her imperfect English.

After offering a prayer in the chancel, the woman noticed the pastor straightening the tablecloth on the wall. She drew near in disbelief. “It is mine,” she said showing the
surprised pastor the monogrammed initials buried in its folds. “It is my banquet cloth.” The woman explained how her Viennese husband had the beautiful cloth made especially for her in Brussels. Life was good until the Nazis took over, and the day came when she let him put her on a train to safety. He was supposed to follow with their possessions, but he never came. She later learned he died in a concentration camp. She deeply regretted leaving him. “Perhaps all these years of wandering have been my punishment,” she lamented. The pastor tried to give her the cloth, but she refused and left the church.

During the Christmas Eve service, the tablecloth seemed to dance in the candlelight before the congregation. One man in particular, the middle aged village jeweler, couldn’t take his eyes off it. “It is strange,” he told the pastor after the service. “Many years ago my wife—God rest her—and I owned such a cloth. In our home in Vienna, my wife put it on the table only when the bishop came to dinner. The pastor told him of the woman’s visit earlier in the day. The man couldn’t believe his ears. “Can it be? Does she live?” Together they went to the local family to ask about the woman they interviewed, and later that night the two men drove to the city to try and find her home.

As Christmas Day was born, this man and his wife, who had been separated through so many saddened Yuletides, were reunited. It was a miracle of the Christmas season!”

I am certain many of you have read this story before. I didn’t write it; it has been around the Internet for years. Entitled
The Gold and Ivory Tablecloth, it was written by the Reverend Howard C. Schade. The Reverend Schade, a large broad-shouldered man with blond wavy hair and a booming voice, was pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church in Nyack from September 1951 to 1959. He passed away in 1989 after a distinguished career in Christian leadership. I spoke with Reverend Tom Danney, who recently retired as pastor of the Reformed Church. He told me the church receives numerous calls about the story—from a film company in Japan and from a woman in Florida who reads the story to very receptive audience at nursing homes during the Christmas Season.

Rev. Tom told me there are varying opinions about the truth of the story; however it was written by Rev. Schade while he pastored his flock at the Nyack Church.

Reverend Tom smiled when he told me the story offers a reminder that love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things and endures all things.

I truly hope each of you will experience a miracle this Holiday Season

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Nyack’s Sawbones

If you lived around Nyack for a bit you might know Broadway was once called Old Hook Road, though could have been called Doctors Avenue.

I searched the records at Nyack Library for doctors with offices along Broadway who practiced any kind of medicine, dentistry or chiropractic over the past umpteen years. I found eighty of them. I wonder how many of them our readers will recall.

• He was a baby doctor before they were called pediatricians. I know he treated me for a dog bite at his splendid Victorian home/ office at 152 South Broadway, on the corner of Brookside Avenue. Dr. Pierre Relland was a physician & surgeon who took care of several generations of kids.

• Across the street at 180 South Broadway was Dr. Louis T. DeNigris. Also a physician & surgeon, he would become the mayor of South Nyack and serve as a Nyack Fire Department Surgeon.

• Just down Broadway was the office on Dr. Raymond Esposito Sr. a well-known chiropractor who also served several terms as the village’s mayor while treating its aches and pains. His home/office was a magnificent brick structure at 233 South Broadway.

• Dr. George Nicolla was an osteopath.
I knew him as a real gentleman and member of Nyack Rotary for years.

• On the same side of the street, just up the block at 207 South Broadway, was the home-office of another of Nyack’s famous general practitioners of the 50s, 60s and 70s: Dr. George K. Looser, a wonderful doctor who also served decades as a surgeon for the fire department.

• Just south of Cedar Hill Avenue was the home/office of another fine physician Dr. Herbert Kurtz at 100 South Broadway. Herb and his lovely wife, Eva, were active in the Nyack Hospital community for decades. They often led the annual fund raising Kermiss Ball at the Rockland Country Club. Dr. Kurtz was in practice with Dr. Phillips Lampkin and Dr. William Giles.

• At the corner of Broadway & Depew was one of the most famous doctors of his time: Dr. Louis Couch, at 46 South Broadway.
• Above the old A&P supermarket, at 37 South Broadway, were the offices of three generations of dentists: Dr. John Gilchrest, Dr. Harvey Gilchrest and my first dentist, Dr. Gerald Gilchrest. How fondly I recall Old Doc Gilchrest getting cussed out something awful while he removed all of my dad’s teeth in one visit; as a young lad I learned some new words that day!

• For you trivia buffs—who was the dentist who maintained a practice in the same office? His life met a tragic end in October 1968.

• Long before he moved to Franklin Street, into Rockland Gardens, the dental offices of Dr. J. Weishaar were located over the stores at 12 South Broadway. He was later joined by his son, Dr. Jefferson J. Weishaar in the practice on Franklin Street where they remained for years, treating the molars of the villagers long before fluoride toothpaste.

• A few of you might recall when the offices of Dr. Herman Newman, an Optometrist, were in the corner of the O & R building. Doc Newman later moved across the street to a little shop at 6 North Broadway.

• Just up the street, at 10 North Broadway, was the office of one of Nyack’s first female physicians, Dr. Marjorie Hopper. For many years she and Dr. Murray Stoltzer served as the official doctors for sports physicals for Nyack School students.

• At 66 North Broadway was the office of the first fire department surgeon, Dr. E. Hall Kline, who practiced with his dad, Dr. Charles Kline.

• ‘Way up on the village border was the home/office of Dr. Joan and Abraham Stein, at 253 North Broadway, across the street from Dr. Bryant Rooney, at No. 240, who was also a fire department surgeon.

I am confident our readers can add quite a few doctors to my list.

Oh by the way—not that this has anything to do with doctors—but did you know that at one time, in addition to being called Old Hook Road, Broadway was also named Helen Hayes Way? Yup. Back in the late 1980s the road was re-named for a short time in honor of her ninetieth birthday. Street signs were installed on the signposts along the street where, within a week, they were stolen. Wonder where they went?

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Lost In the Hudson

Recently I was putting together information for some upcoming column by reading though old newspapers in the Nyack Library History room when I can across a story of a little boy drowning in the Hudson River.

It didn’t take long for memories to come flooding back to me. I remember the drowning—I knew the little boy. It was a very long time ago; suddenly I recalled memories I’d suppressed for decades.

My dad was late for dinner; not something that happened often unless the fire whistle blew late in the afternoon. He was quiet as he stood at the kitchen sink washing up for dinner. We sat down to eat, and he was still quiet, so was my mother. Finally he asked, “Do you know Tommy Steen?”
“Yes,” I answered, “he lives down on Depot Place, we play together sometimes. Why?”
“He fell through the ice on the Hudson River. He was riding on his sled near Memorial Park. What about John Hayden?”
“John lives on Franklin Street, near my best friend, are they all right?”
“John fell into the Hudson trying to rescue Tommy. Fire Patrol got a ladder in the ice and he climbed out of the water. Tommy didn’t make it. The firemen haven’t found his body yet.”

Tommy Steen and his buddies, the Galganio brothers, Tommy and Paul, took their sleds down to the river about one o’clock on a cold Saturday afternoon, January 19, 1957. Ice on the Hudson River looked to be about ten inches, Tommy Galganio later told rescuers. The buddies went out the river ice several hundred feet south of Memorial Park. They made their way up to where the new barges form the enclosure for the little bay at the park’s river bank. There they met John Hayden who was putting on his ice-skates. The boys headed out on the river ice, skating and sledding. When they almost reached the open water the ice was clear and great for skating John later said. While they were there, Tommy Steen’s pants ripped. Steen and Paul Galganio started back towards the park. John skated part way in pulling Tommy Galganio on his sled, then left him and skated out on the ice again.
He got part way out, when he heard the Galganio boys calling “Tommy’s fallen in!” Young Hayden skated back toward them. On the way he skated over thin ice, leaped over more, skated further, then fell through ice about 75 feet away from Tommy Steen, who had gone into the water about ten feet from the barges. John fell straight in, but the air in his jacked helped to buoy him up.

The Galganio brothers ran towards the Powell boatyard for help as John clung to the underside of the ice with his skates. He tried rolling himself up on the ice, but it kept breaking. He couldn’t pull himself out. He could see Tommy Steen in the water and kept calling to encourage him. He watched him bobbing up and down; saw his small bare hands trying to grip the ice; saw him disappear after clinging to the frigid rim for at least ten minutes. His heavy winter boots and the rip in his pants made it difficult for Tommy to stay up.

Firemen arrived; Chief Lynn Clapper ordered Fire Patrol’s rescue boat to be pushed out on the ice as members of Chelsea Hook & Ladder pushed their wooden ladders across the ice to form a rescue bridge.
A ladder was put into the water and John Hayden climbed out. He was carried to shore and transported to Nyack Hospital. Fireman in the rescue boat began using pike poles hoping to bring up the little boy’s body.

Next day a professional diver, Bernard Sweeney, from Brooklyn, came to Nyack and volunteered to enter the river in search of Tommy. About forty minutes after he entered the water, he found Tommy. Standing on the shore was his father, Walter. He stood a lonely vigil along the Hudson since he was told his boy disappeared beneath the ice. Walter stood watching the diver, his hands clutching for support that wasn’t there. He watched efforts to crack the ice. He talked to Bernard Sweeney. His eyes kept searching through the dim mist of early afternoon, scanning the ice and water through the fog, hoping that if he kept looking long enough, he eyes would find what they sought. He was waiting as the diver brought his little boy to the river bank. He wrapped his coat around Tommy, trying to make him warm.

My dad and I turned and walked away. “C’mon” said pop,” I think Walt wants to be alone with his son.”

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Piermont’s Unsolved Murder

Back during the big war just about everyone in Piermont knew “Pops” Ferrante. He’d been around the village for decades. He and his wife, Raffael, came to America in 1913, and opened a little grocery store on Piermont Avenue across from the Post Office and Chaize’s garage. Villagers stopped every day for fruits, vegetables and needed groceries.

People were accustomed to seeing “Pops,” wearing his brown felt hat, as he drove around the river village delivering grocery orders in his old truck. Many of his customers didn’t even know his real name was Felice, he was Phil to some and “Pops” to just about everyone. His little grocery store struggled and survived the Depression and the war years. It was a popular stop for the GIs stationed over the mountain at Camp Shanks. In 1947 his wife passed away. His son, Matthew, found a job down in Washington. “Pops” thought, at age 68, that it might be time for him to sell the house and store and move closer to his son. He put a sign out front and began to dream about retirement. On a cold winter Wednesday his dream ended.

George Donzella packed his bread truck and started out on a delivery route from his father’s bakery at 198 Main Street in Nyack on February 6, 1952. George made daily bread deliveries up and down the river villages and into North Jersey. Just before lunch he pulled up in front of Ferrante’s Grocery to see if “Pops” needed bread.

The store seemed empty when George entered. He looked around and heard the moaning. Ferrante was lying behind a counter, a pool of blood forming around his head, his ever-present felt hat lying by his side. Donzella ran to the Post Office for help. Piermont’s Health Officer, Dr. Nicholas Viggiano was talking to Postmaster Frank Scott. Donzella told them how he found Ferrante. Dr. Viggiano called Piermont’s Emergency Squad, and rushed across the street to Ferrante’s aid. Postmaster Scott put in a radio call for the Piermont Police. Lieutenant Wallace Kile rushed to the store. The Emergency Squad, under the command of Captain John Boyan, arrived in minutes. They quickly placed the dying man in their ambulance and with Lt. Kile acting as escort raced up River Road to Nyack Hospital. Dr. George Looser provided immediate care, but with Ferrante’s massive loss of blood he died only a few minutes after arriving at the hospital. Ferrante was a small man, and Looser believed the brutal clubbing took place shortly before he was discovered since he could not have survived long after the blows he received.

By the time Lieutenant Kile returned to the store, a large crowd gathered as word of the murder spread through the village. Acting Police Chief, Howard Haight, who was off duty, met Kile, and along with the help of Rockland County Sheriff Henry “Buddy” Mock they began to investigate Piermont’s first murder in a long time.

They knew Ferrante didn’t trust banks and was known to carry large amounts of cash to pay wholesalers who would normally deliver on Wednesdays. His pants pockets were turned inside out and no wallet or money was found. At Ferrante’s side, as if it had been dropped from his hand when he was struck, was a small jar of mayonnaise. A quarter lay on the counter. Police theorized the murderer asked for Mayonnaise and clubbed Ferrante when he bent over to pick up a jar.

At the rear of the store was a room Ferrante used as a kitchen. A six-inch length of pipe with its cast iron elbow was found in a cardboard box in the kitchen where the murderer apparently tossed it as he made his escape. There was a side door in the kitchen leading to an alley along the railroad tracks. It was not unusual to see people walking along the tracks. Police learned Ferrante was at the Post Office around 9:45 joking with Postmaster Scott. They talked to Catherine Sturges of Piermont, who shopped in the store shortly after 10am and was possibly the last person to speak to Ferrante. A neighbor told police she had seen him outside the store at about 10:30.

Rumors were rife and police followed every lead but came up against a stone wall. To many it seemed strange how a mid-morning murder could happen in their village. Ferrante’s store had a large plate glass window in front and the killer should have been in full view of anyone going to or from the Post Office. Police theorize Ferrante may have known his killer, making the murderer a local man.

The case was never solved. With the passing of 60 years, it is doubtful it will be. “Pops” Ferrante’s killer got away with a few bucks and murder.

The Nyack Fire Department’s 150th Anniversary

This month will see a large parade in Nyack as our volunteer firefighters from the Nyack Fire Dept. celebrate their 150th anniversary.

I can’t fit all the history of our fire department in the space allotted for my column; the last written history was 191 pages long.  I’m confident you’ll read other accounts of the history, from its formation in 1863, with Orangetown Fire Engine Co. No. 1, Mazeppa Fire Engine Co. No. 2 and Empire Hook & Ladder Co. No. 1.

I would like to take a slightly different look back on those 150 years.  If we estimate calls for fires or other emergencies were logged in an average of 3 times a week, then the NFD would have answered 18,250 alarms—a great deal of time spent away from their jobs or families.

Of those alarms our firefighters have battled some very serious conflagrations, probably thousands, and unfortunately I also estimate more than fifty lives have been lost in Nyack fires.  Actual fire department records are unavailable to me, so from just what I can learn from reading old newspapers, I’ve put together a partial list of your neighbors who lost their lives.

In June, 1875 Mrs. Archer was fatally burned in a fire at the St. Nicholas Hotel stables on Burd St.  Three year-old Ruth Griswold burned to death when a kerosene lamp exploded in her South Nyack home in March 1880.  Homeless Civil War veteran John Harrington asked for permission to sleep in the Nyack lockup on June 5, 1881. He perished when a flash fire swept the jail at 3am.  The South Nyack home of Rev. Ross Taylor was destroyed by fire on October 22, 1894, killing his four children: Arthur 11, Harriet 9, Ada 7 and Bert 5.  In July 1919, the Aniline Dye works on Cedar Hill Avenue exploded, killing three workers.  John “Boomer” Barnes died from suffocation in the Up-To-Date Laundry fire, where he lived, in December 1950.  Four small Harris children burned to death in a locked apartment fire at 129 Burd Street on September 5, 1958. Their mother left to do an errand.  Dead were Maker Jr. 4, Betty Lou 2, Darsia 1 and their baby sister Robin. The Graycourt apartment house burned in a horrific fire on January 20, 1959 killing Gladys Caine, Alice Freedman and Mary Narrido.

George Williams Sr., his wife and daughter were overcome in a smoky fire in their Prospect Street home on November 5, 1962.  Dr. Thornton Clark died from the effects of a fire in his dental office over the A&P on Broadway on April 27, 1968.  Two year-old Collin Dugger and his sister, Gail, 4, lost their lives on April 24, 1964, in a smoky fire on the corner of Piermont Avenue & Burd Street despite a valiant rescue attempt by Donald Price of Fire Patrol.  On a cold New Year’s Day 1970, a fire at Steve’s Bar & Grill on Main Street left 5 men dead.  Seven month-old Steven Moise died in a horrible fire at 6 South Broadway on March 2, 1971.  Charles Johnson was convicted of murdering his wife, Ella and children Charlene and Charles, after he set fire to their apartment at 83 Main Street on March 24, 1972.  Young David Nolan died in a fire at his home on South Midland Avenue on December 13, 1974.  Fire claimed the life of Nai W. Chin in 1986 as he tried removing a burning mattress from an apartment above his laundry at 84 South Broadway.   On April 20, 1986, 22 year-old Steven Starett plunged to his death on Hook Mountain. Climbers from NFD’s High-Angle Rescue team spent hours recovering his remains.

Alice Jones, an elderly resident of the Nyack Senior Apartments, died from smoke on December 13, 1988.  Paula Miller died in a horrendous explosion and fire at the Mobil Station on 9W on March 30, 1996.

Dr. Milton Salkin drowned when a water-taxi overturned in the Hudson River off Nyack on August 28, 1998.   Of course I can’t forget to mention four Nyack Firemen who lost their lives helping their neighbors. Gomer E. Morgan was killed in a boat fire on August 10, 1926.  Peter Sinnot died of injuries he received in a horrible accident in February 1980, and both Welles Crowther and Harry Wanamaker Jr. gave their lives helping others in connection with the tragedy at the World Trade Center 2011.

These are but a few of your neighbors who perished in fires or accidents despite the valiant efforts of the volunteers of the NFD.

Congratulations on 150 years of service to all my fellow firefighters and THANK YOU for your service!

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

The Nyack Villager thanks Mr. Leiner for many of the photographs from the Fire Dept. archives.

Civil War Veterans of Mount Moor

The little plot of land lies just north of Old Nyack Turnpike now Route 59—a patch of green hillside nestled in the looming shadow of the second-largest shopping mall in the country. Thousands of cars drive by, and I wonder how many realize they’re passing sacred ground. The small plot of land is a cemetery. The historical marker at its entrance reads:
This burying ground for Colored People was deeded on July 7, 1849 by James and Jane Benson to William H. Moor, Stephen Samuels and Isaac Williams trustees.

Mount Moor cemetery has since proved a final resting place for African-Americans of the Nyack area including a number of veterans of the Civil War, Spanish American War, both World Wars and the Korean War.
In my column of November, 2008, I recalled a story of the Nyack men who went off to fight in a war to save our union. A few days after that column appeared a friend asked me if there were any Civil War veterans buried at Mount Moor. I didn’t know the answer, so I set off reading and researching in local history books only to find those journals listed only white soldiers. It really doesn’t surprise me that African-American men were omitted from our local history books, so this is my feeble attempt to rectify a gross error, and to record the names of Civil War veterans interred at Mount Moor.

My research found twenty-one Civil War veterans and four others from later wars. Serving in the Civil War were: Henry Adams, Andrew Gasan, Samuel Gulfield, Sam Johnson, Lafayette Logan, Charles Mayo, Thomas Mayo, John N. Miller, Solomon E. Miller, Benjamin and his brother William Samuels,(sons of founding trustee Stephen Samuels) Samuel T. Simmons, Richard Sisco, John Smith, Thomas Stewart, John Tallman and his brothers John, Samuel, Samuel II, and Thomas Thompson and Wilson Wyett.

All of these men survived the war. Thirteen of them served in the 26th Regiment of the United States Colored Troops; one of three regiments of African-American troops from New York. The 26th was formed on April 13, 1864 under the command of Colonel William C. Silliman. The regiment was active in the battles of Johns and James Island, Honey Hill and Beaufort, in South Carolina. James Island is located on the north side of Charleston, and was the location of a huge battle for control of the fort defending the city’s harbor. This battle was made famous in the movie Glory, the story of the black regiment, the 54th Massachusetts. While the 54th led the initial charge against the fort, the 26th USCT was the second regiment in line in the charge. Lafayette Logan was a soldier in Company F of the 54th. I wonder if he came to Nyack to be with a friend he met in the fighting on James Island.

I was able to find information about some of the veterans of Mount Moor. Henry Abrams served in the 26th. He lived on Catherine Street and worked as a teamster. He was the grandfather of Elliot Sisco Sr. Samuel Gulfield lived on Marion Street with his wife, Christina. Charles Mayo worked for years as a rag dealer in the village and lived on Midland Ave. John Miller was a shoemaker and worked at the Metropolitan Shoe Company on Cedar Hill. Benjamin Samuels lived on Brookside Ave and was a teamster. William Samuels was a laborer and lived on Catherine Street. Richard Sisco and his wife, Maria lived on Piermont Ave. Thomas Stewart and his wife, Rebecca lived in Central Nyack on Waldron Ave., John Tallman was a carpenter and lived on the corner of Broadway and High Avenue. Samuel II Thompson was in the US Navy. After the war he worked as a laborer and lived on Piermont Ave. His brother Thomas was in the 26th and later lived on Main Street opposite Summit Street. Each of these men was also a member of Grand Army of the Republic William C. Silliman Post #172.

The first Black Veterans GAR Post in New York was formed in July 1885.

I also researched to see if any African-American soldiers from Nyack in the 26th were killed or died during the war. Charles Hawkins lived in Nyack and enlisted at the age of 24. He served in Company I of the 26th and died while training. He is interred in Cypress Hills Cemetery in Brooklyn. Charles Jackson was a soldier in Company E of the 26th. He was killed on June 26, 1865 and is buried in the national cemetery at Beaufort, South Carolina. I will see that these two names are added to Nyack’s Honor Roll.

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Christmas Bells

Everything is ready: the tree is trimmed; holiday cards are taped to the door frame of the dining room. Dozens of Christmas cookies are festively placed on glistening glass platters. Boxes wrapped in colorful holiday paper are stacked in glittering disarray under the tree. We have completed the tinsel marathon of tree trimming; stuffing stockings and holiday music fills the house.
Why don’t I hear Christmas Bells?

Remember the small boy who made the church bells ring in a fictional story years ago? As the legend went, the bells would not ring unless a gift of love was placed on the altar of the local church. Kings and men of great wealth placed untold riches and jewels there, but year after year the church bells remained silent. One Christmas Eve, a small child in a tattered coat made his way down the aisle, and without anyone noticing, he took off this coat and placed in on the altar. The huge bells of the church rang out joyously throughout the land to mark the unselfish giving of a small boy.

I used to hear Christmas bells growing up in Nyack. I must have been about eight when I heard them first. It was the year
I got a shoe box from my best friend containing two baseball cards and the gum was still with them. I heard them the year one of my children gave me a tattered piece of construction paper where she had crayoned two hands folded in prayer and a moving message: Oh, come Holy Spirit! I heard them the Christmas my kids got together and cleaned the garage. They rang loud the year my 7 year-old son made me a clay pencil holder in the art class at Upper Nyack School. He had inscribed: Greatest Dad! It still graces my desk today.

They’re gone aren’t they? The bells of young love I mean. The Christmas bells of my little kids. Gone are years of the lace doilies fashioned into snowflakes—little hands traced in flattened plates of plaster of Paris —the Christmas trees of pipe cleaners— hand-colored thread spools holding small candles. They’re gone. No longer do I look out the windows of the house to find snowflakes and decorations dabbed on with Glass Wax. Gone are the chubby little hands that clumsily used up $2 worth of paper to wrap a cork coaster. Gone is the monumental decision of when to break the ceramic piggy bank with a hammer to spring the $3.29 for holiday gifts. No longer will they sit for hours cutting colored paper into strips and gluing them together, making chains to decorate our tree. Even popcorn is not popped and strung in long strings to adorn our tree anymore. Gone are the hours my children would spend poring over the Sears Holiday Catalog, dog-earing pages that showed the gifts they hoped Santa would leave under the tree for them. Unheard now is the muted thump-thump of pajama-covered feet of my daughter padding down the stairs early Christmas morning to tuck her homemade pot-holder beneath the tree. Gone are the hushed noises they would make carefully designed to wake me up all too early on Christmas morning. Gone is the important rule of the day: Dad has to have his coffee before opening Santa’s gifts.

Oh, it will be a good Christmas this year as there are grandchildren who help us celebrate now. We’ll eat too much. Make of mess of the living room. Throw the warranties into the trash by mistake. Drive the cat crazy taping a bow to her tail. Return cookies to Nana’s tray with a bite out of them, and listen to Christmas music. Yes, it will be a nice Christmas in my home.
But oh! what I would give to bend low and receive a gift of an animal made from toothpicks and school glue and once again hear the bells of Christmas just one more time.

To all of my readers, whatever holiday it is you celebrate, a happy, merry holiday season and a joyous and healthy New Year.

Thank you, every one of you, for the gift you give to me of coming into your house each month with my thoughts and memories about a Nyack that is long gone. I truly hope you hear the Christmas bells of love this year!

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days.’

PFC Henry W. Cook

I’m told the 440 race in track is the hardest to run. It’s not a distance race where a runner can pace himself; the race is more of all-out sprint. It is a grueling race run by some of the best athletes on the team. One of the best 440 yard men in the history of Nyack High School was Henry “Cookie” Cook. Back in 1948, he ran the 440 in 53.0 seconds flat; a Rockland County record. At the Section Nine track meet he bested that record with a time of 52.5 seconds for a new record. “Cookie” was also the track team’s long jumper. His leap in the Spring Track Season of 22 feet, 6 and a quarter inches was also a country record one he again beat at the Section 9 meet with an incredible leap of 26 feet, 8 and ½ inches.

Henry was one of the outstanding athletes in NHS’s class of 1948 lettering in Track, Football, Boxing and Wrestling. Puggy, as he was known to his friends, grew up in the shadow of World War 2 living with his father and grandfather Reverend Moses Cook at 80 Jackson Avenue. He was a good looking kid with a smile that would melt many a heart. Henry loved sports, and according to the NHS yearbook he dreamed of being a boxer. Soon after high school he found himself in a different ring. One he’d never imagined.

Unable to afford college, Henry Cook enlisted in the Army hoping to earn the benefits of the GI Bill. After basic training at Fort Dix, NJ he was assigned to the 24th Infantry Regiment and sent to Gifu, Japan where he joined Company C. On Sunday, June 25, 1950, units of the North Korean Army crossed the 38th parallel and invaded the Republic of South Korea. The 24th Infantry Regiment, attached to the 25th Infantry Division of the US 8th Army, was one of the first units assigned to Korea after the invasion. By July 18, the 24th Infantry Regiment along with the entire 25th Division had been thrust into combat around the South Korean port of Pusan. The 24th experienced the same dismal performance common among many US Army units in the first few months of the Korean War, as they all fought for survival against the numerically superior North Koreans. The job of the segregated all-black regiment was to delay the enemy advance. The soldiers fought valiantly but often without much artillery, heavy mortar or air support. Troops of the North Korean People’s Army (NKPA) easily flanked American units out of position within hours of contact. Such was the case on July 30, 1950 when the 24th fought for Battle Mountain. Company C was reduced to a shell and other portions of the regiment suffered heavily with more than 180 casualties. PFC Henry W. Cook Jr. was wounded. His wounds must not have been severe as Army records show he returned to his unit and combat on August 29, 1950. Fighting in the mountains south of Haman in early September, the enemy attacked through the center of its position and the 2d Battalion collapsed. Henry Cook was seriously wounded and quickly evacuated to a hospital in Japan. Henry fought the battle of life as best as he could. He was a special kid who could run a quarter of a mile in less than a minute. He knew when to pace himself and when to sprint, but try as he may PFC Henry William Cook Jr. didn’t win his most important race. He succumbed to his injuries on September 6, 1950.

It was almost a year later before PFC Cook returned to Nyack. This time he didn’t return to hear the cheers of the fans and students at Nyack High School, but to tears of his father, grandparents and brothers and sisters along with veterans of the Avery-Brown American Legion and an honor guard and firing squad from West Point. Henry William “Cookie” Cook was laid beneath the green, green grass of Mount Moor Cemetery in West Nyack.

From my research into the Nyack men who were Killed in Action fighting in all of America’s wars, Henry W. Cook is the only man from our area I have discovered who is listed as KIA in the Korean War. The Rockland Country Journal wrote he was the first from Rockland County to perish. He joins the list of 100 men from Nyack who made the ultimate sacrifice. They gave their lives for the freedoms we Americans share today. Henry Cook ran the race of his life giving his winnings to all Americans.

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

More on Nyack’s Unsolved Murder

Who Killed Amy Stafford on Friday August 10, 1978? I asked the same question in my column of August 2010. Three years later I have a very good idea who is responsible for her death—but that doesn’t mean I can prove it. I’ve talked to a number of people who knew Amy. I’ve interviewed her friends; spent time talking with the Clarkstown Police, who are still investigating her murder. I talked to a doctor who was treating her. Spoke with people who knew her parents. I learned the details of her sister Bonnie’s accidental death in California. I tried unsuccessfully to contact her younger sister, Julia Colvin, who lives somewhere near Colorado Springs. I was successful in reaching her son Ethan and had a short visit with his father. I still can’t prove who her killer is—but I have developed my own list of suspects. Put together the events surrounding the crime, established a time line and a list of people who were in contact with Amy in the few days before her murder. I’ve even come up with a theory connecting her death to one of Nyack’s most notorious crime families, but all this is circumstantial and theories, I’m confident I know who her killer is; BUT proving it!

What do I know? I know at least one of the people I spoke with about Amy and her murder knows more than she is telling me. She told me she was only a casual acquaintance yet I found a witness who places her with Amy the night of her murder in a local bar. I also discover she and Amy were lovers. I found another witness who told me her boyfriend threatened to kill her as she was driving him nuts. Her boyfriend, who was known to carry a “boot-knife,” is my prime suspect. He recently passed away before I could get an interview. From working with the police I have a good idea how Amy got from Nyack to New City where she was found. I have developed two theories as to the motive for her murder. First, Amy was a sexual tease. She enjoyed arousing men to a point of high pitched sexual level then walking away. Was she killed by a frustrated lover? Secondly, Amy “dabbled” a bit in the drug trade. Nothing huge, but she was known to sell some weed to make ends meet. Was she killed by an enforcer for a local drug dealer? She was seen in his company the night of her murder. I seriously doubt Amy’s murder will be solved by yours truly. About the only hope I have after thirty-five years that someone who does know develops remorse and contacts me with a piece of information leading to her killer.

I have to tell you what else I know. There’s a second victim in this heinous crime. Michael Ethan Stafford was only eight years old at the time of his mother’s murder. Since he lost his mother, his life went from one horror to another. He had little or no relationship with his father. He went to live with Amy’s parents Eloise and William Stafford. Ethan wrote me that he had a hard life growing up and started using drugs and alcohol. “It consumed me,” he wrote, “I was the kid you didn’t want your kids around. I just wanted people to like me even though I didn’t like myself.” After his grandfather died in 1982, Ethan was completely without discipline; his grandmother simply couldn’t handle him. He spent a few years in group homes. By the time Ethan was 15 he was really into his addictions. He became a fixture in the bars of Nyack by his 16th birthday and became well known to local police. He met a girl, got her “in trouble,” and dropped out of school. His daughter was born when he was 17, he writes; “I wasn’t ready for that!” Ethan left for California to live with a cousin, but he took his addictions and problems with him. Being mixed race he faced racism, and it lead to a lot of fights. For most of his adult life he has been in and out of California prisons. When I first contacted him through his wife Jennifer, Ethan was incarcerated on his third felony and facing a life sentence. Since then the California Court of Appeals overturned his life sentence and he is awaiting parole and a return to a wife who has stood by him. I can only pray Ethan has matured, and he can finally put his mother’s murder behind him and salvage what is left of his life.

So, who did kill Amy Stafford?

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for helping us all ‘Remember the Days .’

Remember the days? by James F. Leiner

Nyack’s Last Ferry

Robert M. Lee had a dream. All he needed was to find a diesel-driven boat that could operate in nine feet of water, carry passengers and cars—and didn’t cost a quarter of a million dollars. Such a boat was, however, even rarer than a new car in 1942. Until he could find his dream boat he knew people would have to use the Yonkers ferry or drive across the Bear Mountain or George Washington bridges to reach their jobs in Westchester or New York City. Bobby Lee was an optimist, and he was sure with the war on he would be able to find the right boat and folks who wanted to cross the Hudson River from Nyack to catch the trains in Tarrytown would use his ferry service and not have to drive the long way.

In March of 1941, the old Nyack car ferries were taken off the river by the North River Ferry Company because they didn’t pay. At least that was the reason given by David Smith, the last of the Smith brothers who owned the company. When the ferries between Nyack and Tarrytown stopped running a service that had carried on for 101 consecutive years ended.

Along came Robert M. Lee and his dreams in October of 1942. After a trial run of the Dolphin, a boat he rented for a month to see if Nyack-Tarrytown ferry service was really needed, there was never any question in his mind as to the need for a ferry, but to those financial backers who wanted it to be a paying venture, there was a considerable question. Lee’s ferries were launches—passenger boats—and they did not carry cars as did the larger Manadanock, Nyack and Reading ferries that had been operated by North River.

Lee’s first two boats were the Robert M. Jr. and the Fairway. A year later he added the Kathleen and an excursion boat the Sea Cub. His passenger ferries were a hit as Nyackers found them the quickest and most convenient way to reach Nyack and
Tarrytown. I was surprised to learn that one of the Robert Lee’s biggest financial backers and supporters was Nyack’s Superintendent of Schools, Kenneth R. MacCalman. Nyack schools were turning out hundreds of skilled war workers and the Eastern Aircraft Company in Tarrytown was in need of those workers. There had to be a way to bring these two together and a new Nyack Ferry was his answer.

There were other passengers too, hundreds of them in the summer who went across the river just for a ride. Nyack moms would take their children and their sewing and spend the afternoon riding back and forth across the cooler river. Quick to appreciate passengers who enjoyed the beauty of the Hudson, the new company adopted a policy of only charging for a one-way fare and treated them to a free return trip. There were also many soldiers waiting shipment oversees at Camp Shanks who took a young lady from the USO, located on North Broadway, on a moonlight ride on the river for only thirty-five cents each.

By the end of the war, if Mr. Lee had saved a dollar for every passenger his small ferries carried across the Hudson since October of 1942, he would have the price of a new boat as they carried a quarter of a million passengers since the day they started, but Bobby Lee’s dream never materialized. His company never came up with the funds or financial backers to purchase a new car ferry. He did continue his passenger service and his ferries made the three mile trip from Nyack to Tarrytown eighteen times a day starting at 6:20 and ending at 12:15 in the early morning. On weekends the Sea Cub would leave Nyack at 10 in the morning for an all day trip up river to picnic at Indian Point for only $2, and they took a few laps around the “Mothball-Fleet” ships moored off Tomkins Cove.

As the war ended and the fifties started, it seems folks were busy getting their lives back to normal and the lure of the Hudson River trips was lost. With the opening of the Tappan Zee Bridge, ferry and excursion service on the river ended in May of 1956. Bobby M. Lee left Nyack and took his dreams with him.

The Nyack Villager thanks Jim Leiner for help-ing us all ‘Remember the Days .’