I Turned Back The Clock to Yesterday

Speaking of Hall's Blacksmith Shop, occasionally on our way home from school we would stop there to see him shoe the horses and perform other blacksmith functions. It was always a mystery to me that it didn't hurt the horses when he pounded the nails into the hooves or when he was cutting off part of the hoof with a sharp knife. Once in a while he would fashion a ring for us made from horseshoe nails.

As I was growing up and perhaps when I was around 12 or 13, my job was to go up to what we called the Hollow, which was to the west of Rte. '9W. The Elks Club was built on the site of the Hollow; it is now a convalescent home. I would cut the dead trees down and hack them into about 3-foot lengths. The smaller ones I would lug down across 9W, the railroad tracks to the top of Pop Wilson's Hill or Tor Avenue, where I would load them on an old brickyard wheelbarrow, which is somewhat different from the conventional wheelbarrow in that it didn't have a metal bucket or shell; it had two boards on either side of the wheel that were about six inches wide and about 28 inches long. Then I would start down the hill, bearing down on the handles to keep it from going too fast, since Pop Wilson's was a very steep hill, and at the bottom I would lift up on the handles and get a running start to get up the incline to West Street. Sometimes, if I had a big load, I would have to take some of the log off and make two trips. These would be piled in the yard and on Saturday I would go up with my father and we would drag down the bigger logs in the same fashion. We did this until we had a fairly good quantity of wood, and then we would saw the logs into kitchen stove lengths, about ten, twelve inches long. The bigger logs we had to split. our winter supply was at least two cords of wood. A cord is four foot high, four foot wide, and eight feet long. That amount of wood plus two tons of coal my father bought would do us for the winter. The next fall the process was repeated, until we moved to Sharp Street, where we had the comfort of central heating.

note by Jim O'Brien - The Komonchak's moved to 35 Sharp Street on October 31, 1924. They took out a mortgage for $1,700. The property was 30 feet wide and a hundred feet deep. A title-search seems to indicate that the house was built in 1893.

When we were cutting the logs with a crosscut saw, my father was always scolding me, saying I was pushing instead of just pulling in my direction. After we finished sawing and chopping, he would sweep up the sawdust1 the splinters were used for kindling and the sawdust was thrown into the garden. Pop said we were warmed by the wood three times, once while cutting and hauling the logs, then when we sawed and chopped them, and finally in the fire.

One part of our yard was used to house our chickens. We usually had about 35, 40 chickens for the eggs and for eating. At one time I had several pair of pigeons, which were housed in a small house on top of two poles, which was located in the middle of the chicken yard. My pigeon-raising days came to an end very abruptly because of an incident that occurred one Saturday afternoon. My mother had asked my father to kill one of our roosters for Sunday's dinner. He went out to catch the rooster but the rooster, sensing something, proceeded to run all around the yard, eluding my father. In the process of trying to catch him, my father turned very suddenly and banged his eye on one of the poles holding the pigeon roost. He came into the house with the biggest blackeye I ever saw. My mother, seeing what had happened, gave me a quarter and told me to hurry to the Crescent Drug Store and get two leeches. I remember running up to the drug store, the druggist putting two leeches in a small bottle, and then running home, where my mother took the leeches and put them on my father's face, one on either side of the swelling which had, by this time, almost covered the whole side of his face. As she put the leeches on, they immediately began to suck up the black blood and they continued doing this until they were about five or six times their normal size when they fell off. It was horrible to see those things on my father's face, but apparently there was no pain associated with the blood-sucking. When they fell off, there was very little swelling left. Needless to say, my father cut that rooster's head off with a vengeance.

Next to our house was an open lot or field. Right next to our chicken yard was a big old barn that was boarded up · for many, many years, that was owned by Capt. Bill. At one time his family used to garden it and then later we used it as our baseball field where the neighborhood kids played ball.

Many evenings in the summer I would be hauling water for the garden and the kids would holler over, "Come on, Chuck we need a second baseman," and my mother would shout hack that they should be doing the same thing for their parents.

One year I remember that field was used as a storage area by Allison & VerValen's Lumber Yard, for storage of a large quantity of lumber, which was piled on the lot. We used to climb all over the huge piles of lumber, but nobody ever stole a stick of it. I'm inclined to think it was just before World War I.

Previously I mentioned the Hollow; that's where we played football on Saturday morning. There were no goal­ posts to kick the football between, just lines marking the ends of the field. Most of the time we played against Henry Hahn's Dirty Dozen.

Another place we played ball in later years is down in the Mud Hole, just south of where Doig's factory is now located at the junction of Maple Avenue and West Street. The problem with that field was that left field and right field were on a slope since the shape of the field was more of less like a bowl.

Games played: Miggles or marbles, kick the can, similar to ice hockey, baseball and football. Swimming at Capt. Bill's or Fowler's Gap. In winter pompeying on ice. When the ice wasn't frozen too hard and had a springy, rubber-like effect, we would run across it to the other side of the pond, usually at the Gas House Pond. Sometimes we would crack the ice and fall in: then we would go up to the Gas House and take our shoes and stockings off and dry them over the boilers.

One game of marbles we played: we would draw a circle, put the marbles in the circle, put the hand on the ground, and place a shooter, usually a glassie or steel marble, between the thumb and first finger and shoot the marbles out of the ring. The marbles you shot out of the ring were· yours. You kept this up until you missed and then it was· the next fellow's turn. This was called the knuckle­ down game.

Another marble-game we played: we would get a cigar box and cut a hole in the center just a little larger than a marble. You would take a marble and hold it in your hand at the belt line and see if you could drop it in the hole. If you did, you won five or ten marbles, depending upon the owner of the box.

Most of the marbles in our early years were made of clay and brightly colored. Later on we got the glassies, aggies and reels and steel. In the wintertime on a Sunday afternoon, we walked out to the middle of the Hudson to watch the skaters and the horses and cutters, a light sled, oftentimes racing.

I remember Judge Tompkins coming up from Nyack and racing with our local politicians.

Lou Hoyt, who had a garage on New Main Street, where the Provident Savings and Loan Parking Lot is now located, was a sports racer. Occasionally he would drive on the ice, go up to Stony Point or Grassy Point and come speeding down the river, slam on the brakes and go swirling round and round. He always had an audience of several hundred people.

On other occasions we would walk across the ice to Croton on the other side. It was fun sliding on the ice and after a short stay there we would start the five-mile hike back. It seems on the way back we were always bucking the wind and we would get very cold and would have to run to keep warm, always vowing never to do it again, but the next Sunday we repeated the same thing.

Another familiar sight in the Mudhole in the fall was the slaughtering of the pigs. This was somewhat a com­munity-affair. Quite a few of the people kept hogs and in the fall the men would gather on a designated Saturday and start a fire under a big bathtub. One man who had a reputa­tion for knowing where to stick the pig to kill it had that chore; another would catch the blood for bloodwurst, and then the pig was dunked into the hot water to clean off the bristles, and when the pig came out, it was lily-white. Then they would hang it up and butcher it into hams, pork-chops, slice off the fat for rendering into lard, and the intestines were washed and cleaned to be used for sausages.

In the early part of my life, my father worked for DeNoyelles Brickyard during the months weather permitted brickmaking. After the brickyards shut down, sometimes he would work on the highway in order to work out his taxes, or on the railroad when there was a heavy snowfall, keeping the switches clear, either at West Haverstraw or at Weehawken. At other times he worked at Rockland Lake cutting ice when the lake froze.

When my father was working on the brickyard, the kids whose parents worked on the yard were let out of school fifteen minutes before twelve to carry lunches to their fathers. We would practically run home, pick up the lunchbox, and take it to them. Their lunch hour was something like fifteen, twenty minutes. In the meantime, while they were eating their lunches, we would be running along the riverfront, sometimes fishing or otherwise occupying ourselves, and then return home to eat our lunch and run back to school.

Between Maple Avenue and Clove Avenue, the West Shore Gas Company was located; later it was absorbed by the Rockland Gas Company. It was the custom of most of the people in that part of the village to go to the Gas House dump where they would dump their ashes and cinders. There was always a small quantity of coal that didn't burn and we would pick this out of the ashes, put it in baskets or boxes and haul it home in a wagon. There was a certain part of the day when they did this, and there was always a gang of kids waiting around for them.

We did most of our swimming at Captain Bill's, which was located on First Street across the street from his house. You walked down a set of steps to the beach. They had a small dock and boat house at the river's edge. As I recall it, the Kavanagh's lived in the house and operated the boat dock. Many of the kids from the village swam there, as that was about the best beach in that area. Later on, as we got older and could swim better, Fowler's Gap was the favorite place to swim.

Growing up, while attending school, we did most of our homework on the dining-room table, except on occasions when my father held classes in what we would now call Americanization classes, preparing men for citizenship. My father boasted that he had helped and sponsored something like sixty people for citizenship. On those occasions, my father would have the men, usually three or four, in the dining-room, teaching them to write their names and telling them what would be expected of them in the way of who our President was, our Governor, Senators, Congressman, and other questions which would be asked of them by the presiding judge.

My father loved to tell the story about one man, Mr. Katulock, who apparently had failed once or twice. Be seemed to get the President, Governor and the representatives mixed up, or sometimes would just stand in front of the judge speechless. On that particular occasion, Judge Tompkins was the Supreme Court Judge, and from my father's frequent appearances with prospective citizens, he got to know him, particularly through Heman Purdy, who was County Clerk for many years.

On this occasion, Mr. Katulock appeared before the Judge and when questioned, he again got the various government officials confused, at which time the Judge told him to sit down.

After the various people had all appeared before the Judge, Mr. Purdy went up to the bench and spoke to the Judge. Then Judge Tompkins called my father up to the bench and said, "Andy, do you think Mr. Katulock would make a good citizen? and my father's reply was, "If I didn't think so, I would never have brought him here, to which the Judge replied, "On your recommendation I will give him his citizen­ ship." My father loved to tell us how proud he was that a judge would take his word, and in future years when preparing the men, he would stress he had a reputation to live up to.

There was no direct transportation from Haverstraw to New City. There was an Erie train you could take to Spring Valley, then change to another Erie train to Nanuet and another one that would take you to New City. The connections weren't too good, so the men would walk from Haverstraw to New City.

Years later, when I was working with Judge Doscher, I pinch-hit for a speaker at the White Plains Courthouse at ceremonies for new citizens. It seems the day before the ceremonies the man scheduled to speak met with an accident and was hospitalized. On the way home from the courthouse, Judge Doscher informed me he was asking me to speak to the new citizens. When I said I didn't have any idea what to talk about, he said, "'Why don't you tell them about your father's Americanization classes?" I went home that night, sat down at the typewriter, and made a few notes. The next day word got around the courthouse in White Plains that I was to address the new citizens, and my fellow reporters all gathered in the back of the courtroom to hear my remarks.

I didn't dare look to the back of the courtroom for fear of some of them making me laugh or upsetting me. I remember also telling the new citizens what this country meant to my father as well as to other people; and, having just a few days prior to that being at the graduation exercises at West Point, I brought in the opportunities in this country, citing General Eisenhower, who had graduated from West Point in the bottom third of his class and yet rose to the highest office this country could bestow on any citizen.

At the conclusion of my remarks, the immigration officer in charge of the affair came up to me and said he thought it was one of the best talks given to new citizens he had ever heard, and my fellow reporters, who had come, to sort of razz me a little, congratulated me. My reputation apparently got around, for a few years later Judge Bailey, another Supreme Court Judge with whom I worked when he was first elected to that post, asked me to speak in Rockland County, where I again used my father's work as a basis for my talk.

Haverstraw in those days was divided into various sections: the extreme lower end of the village was called Dutchtown and those who lived there were Dutchtowners. A little north toward the village was the Mud Hole and the Mud Holers. From Canal Street up to Main Street we were known as the Streeters, and up on Broadway was Henry Hahn's Dirty Dozen.

In the wintertime we used to sleighride on Pop Wilson's Hill, and then later on, when we got older, we used to go down to the Short Clove and ride Jesse Mead's or Tom Ryder's bobsleds. They were huge affairs, handmade, and would carry about ten people on them. I believe Mead's was a little larger. As I recall, he had a steering wheel from an old car, whereas Ryder's had a stick-like affair similar to the Flexible Flyer. We would haul the sled up to the Short Clove and start at the other side of the railroad tracks, where the rock cut is now. In those days, before the cut, we would start at the top of the hill, go down across 9W, across the tracks, which would make sparks fly like a Fourth of July celebration when the steel runners hit the tracks, go down to Riverside Avenue, through the Mud Hole, and sometimes go as far as Canal Street. It was quite a haul pulling this heavy bobsled and usually we would quit after two trips, and then some others would take our places.

Talking about sleighrides, I remember my one and only time going for a hayride. I don't remember whose birthday it was, it might have been one of the Campbell girls, whose father worked for Fritzy Ossman, who owned a livery stable. He took us over to New City. This was a big treat. It was a bitter cold day, and we all huddled in the back of this long horse-drawn sled which was pulled by two horses. When we got to New City, we went to Pop Weiner's Hotel and crowded around a big potbelly stove trying to thaw out. They served us hot cocoa and cake. This later became Jerry Carnegie's, Jerry having married Pop Weiner's daughter.

In the spring we would make popguns out of elderberry sticks, clean out the center of one piece about five or six inches long, make a ramrod with a piece of steel wire, insert it in another piece of elderberry stick, and get green nanny­ berries, insert it in the center of the cleaned out portion and with the ramrod shoot it out the other side. It was surprising what a sting it would give you if you were hit with it. The only place that we knew where the nannyberries grew in profusion was the south side of Conklin Avenue, south of St. Mary's Church. We would usually gather a supply on our way home from catechism on a Saturday morning.

It seems everybody or at least most of the fellows had nicknames. My brother Mike was nicknamed Apple because of his rosy cheeks. Skinner Bryson called me Crabapple, but most of the others called me Chuck. (There is a note here: insert other nicknames here. I've found two pages on which Daddy apparently wrote down the names as they came to mind.)

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The colored people in Haverstraw used to have revival meetings which were generally held on the Flats, the area south of the DeNoyelles engine house and across from where Harry Zeh's bus garage is now located. They were held in a big tent. We would crawl under the tent and listen to the preacher who generally was a fired-up speaker, full of hell and brimstones and the congregation would punctuate his remarks with "Amen" or "Hallelujah" every few minutes.

We loved to listen to their singing and clapping of hands. During some part of the revival meeting, which usually lasted a week, they would baptize the new member. I recall going to two such baptisms at Captain Bill's, where they would wade out about waist-deep and the preacher would dunk the new members.

On other occasions we would go to the Calvary Baptist Church, which was located and still is on West Street, particularly in the summer time when the windows were open and listen to the singing. The Burtons, Whites, Spruells, Browns were some of the families that attended the church regularly. There was no vandalism or desecrating of property in those days; everybody had respect for the other person's religion.

On that note, while I only did this once, the kids in the neighborhood of the Jewish Temple on Clove Avenue used to hang around the Temple where one of them would be given the job of lighting the candles on Friday night, for which they were given a dime on Saturday. I had been asked by Mrs. Allen (Bischberg) on this occasion, since we dealt with the store. I was given to understand that they couldn't handle money after a certain time on Friday, thus the payment on Saturday.

I don't know how old I was, but for two winters I tended the furnace for the Anness family on First Street. It was my job to take the ashes out and to keep the cellar clean and stoke the fire after supper. I also did this for Hannah Frankel after school and on Saturday would haul the ashes up from the cellar. She ran a millinery shop at the corner of Main and Fourth Streets.

In the evenings after supper, after I finished my chores of filling the washtubs for the garden, after the ballgames, we would generally start a small fire in the ball field lot next to our house and roast Mickeys. · we would generally swipe a potato or two from home and roast them over the fire.

No matter how burned they were, they seemed to taste so good--we would repeat this many time. On occasions we were joined by Jake Phillips, who lived two doors from us. Jake would tell us ghost stories. He always told us the barn next to our chicken yard was haunted. We never would venture into it although the door was held closed by a loose board, and finally the board fell off or was ripped off. On one occasion, he asked us if were brave enough to see if ghosts really inhabited the place if he went with us

Of course we didn't want to be chicken, so we all agreed. We all cautiously entered the place tip­ toeing and started up these wide stairs. It was dusk and there were no windows in the barn and it was quite dark inside. When he got us all to the top of the stairs, he suddenly turned around and hollered, "Ghost" and practically flew down the stairs, making it down in two or three steps.

Of course a few of us were knocked down in the process, and everybody concluded that they had seen the ghost and that the place was really haunted. I believe it was later that winter that sometime in the early morning hours a fire broke out in that barn and destroyed it. I remember my parents waking us up, telling us to get dressed because there was a fire next door and they were fearful it might spread. The firemen- arrived, but by that time the place was engulfed. What was left was torn down, and this enlarged our ball field.

I remember that, when we were very small, we would, go to the various houses on First Street, generally to the kitchen door, and wish the people a Merry Christmas, for which we were rewarded with a bag of hard candy or some cookies. Jenny Pinkman was a cook and maid for the Anness family and would be extra generous to us. I don't remember who. the cook and maid was for the Everett Fowlers, but she likewise was good to us.

The Everett Fowler estate was what is now the Elks Club, which had a large lawn in front, to the side and in the back, which the caretaker kept cut with a hand-pushed mower. The front lawn was fairly steep running down to the river, and it took Mr. Mader, the caretaker and a short man, almost a week to cut the whole lawn. He would just about get it finished when he had to start all over again. This was in addition to his other duties of being the janitor, gardener, and he also drove the team of horses and the carriage which Mr. Fowler had. Everett Fowler was· one of· the last brickmakers to buy an automobile. I can still picture Mr. Mader sitting. up on the driver's seat in a suit somewhat like a coachman's, looking very dignified, driving up to the Fowler front gate, waiting for the Fowlers to appear. They lived in the caretaker's cottage, which has since been destroyed.

Some evenings, if we weren't playing ball, we would go down to the Emiline and Chrystenah docks waiting for the boats to come in. The Emiline plied between Haverstraw and Newburgh, and the Chrystenah between Haverstraw and New York, stopping at Nyack and, I believe, some place in Westchester. There was another boat, the Raleigh, which carried freight between Haverstraw and New York. We would watch the passenger disembark and the freight be unloaded. I was never fortunate enough to have a ride on any of these boats. Next to those docks was the berth of the Cornell Towing Company, where their tugs, that hauled the brick barges to New York, tied up. I remember two of the tugs' names, the Engels and the Mabel.

Some of the boys used to work at the Haverstraw Club, which was also known as the Bicycle Club, setting up pins in their bowling alleys. The members of that club were comprised of the Protestant brickmakers and business­ men. The bowling alleys were downstairs and the billiard tables on the street floor, and I don't know what they had on the second floor, but we surmised it was for card playing. We used to peer in at the billiard players, watching them play. One of the men was Wilson P. Foss, a millionaire, who was the owner of the Trap Rock Company, who won the US championship as a billiard player and then played in England for the world's championship. As I recall, he won the first two games and then lost the next three to some Englishman. He usually played against Fred W. Penny, at that time one of the prominent Rocklands County lawyers. To discourage our standing on a ledge and peering in, they built slanting boards, since I'm sure that our shoes scuffed the front of the building.

When I was working on the brickyard and even before that, in the evening after supper, we would congregate at the fence near Fowler's Gap or in front of the Stink Pot, as we called it, which was located at the junction of West Street and Maple Avenue, where we would sing and harmonize, usually accompanied by a harmonica. I can't remember who played it. Later on, Lib Mulligan played his banjo and Mike Stez the violin. The Kurisko brothers would do the Buck and Wing dances. As time went on, some of the colored people who worked on the Fowler and DeNoyelles yards would join us in the singing and some of the colored boys were very good tap and buck and wing dancers. This would continue until about ten o'clock when we would go our separate ways. There were never any racial tensions between the whites and blacks in those days.

Bread and buns and coffee ca e were purchased at Mardorf's Bakery, where my brother Mike worked, first as a baker and then as a route man. In the summer I would accompany him on his rounds, which started on Broadway, through the lower part of West Haverstraw up the Beach Road to Grassy Point.

There were a few stores and saloons that were sup­ plied with baked goods all the way up to Tomkins Cove. I loved to go with him because he would let me drive the horse, and I could help myself to eclairs and other delightful cookies.

I also hung around the bakery for another reason. Estelle Mardorf, the owner's daughter, had a pony and occasionally she had to deliver some special order with her pony and cart. I would saddle up the pony and sometimes accompany her on the trip. On other occasions she would let me drive the pony around a few adjacent blocks, a real treat.

Haverstraw had a very good baseball team, the Knights of Columbus Caseys. They played such semi-pro teams as the Brooklyn Giants, a colored team, the Paterson Silk Sox, as well as other semi-pro teams from New York and New Jersey. Frank Hessian, Drush Bolog and Vince Lynch were the pitchers. The only catcher I recall was a fellow by the name of Arlington who hailed from some place in Jersey. He had a wicked arm and very few runners ever stole second base on him. After a warm-up pitch, instead of pitching the ball to the second baseman, Arlington would heave it out to the centerfielder. Vic Shankey played first base, Gus Shankey second base, Jacko Anderson shortstop, Al Schnaars and Artie Milburn third base, and the outfielders were Jim Finegan, Jack Scully, Johnny Cooke, Tom Shankey and Harty Hurley.

The best cheerleader the Caseys ever had was Skinner Bryson, who pranced up and down the third base line whipping up enthusiasm for the local team. Skinner's favorite expression was "Hold the phone. Games were played on Eckerson's Field or, as we called it, the Circus Field, since that was where the carnivals and circuses held forth when they came to town.

Waldron's Opera House showed movies and the minstrel shows that were generally sponsored by some local groups. Joe Dunnigan was usually one of the end men; also … Dances were also held at the Opera House.

Washington Hall, owned by Otto Wurm, was the scene of many of St. Mary's dances, as well as wedding receptions and christenings. We were invited to many of the affairs since my father was godfather for some fifty Slovak children.

Plays conducted in Slovak were held in the basement of St. Mary's Church, usually once a year. My sister Mary once played a leading part and my father usually had one of the lead parts.

MARTIN DRISCOLL

Martin Driscoll, who owned the Haverstraw Water Works, among other things, lived on First Street or Front Street, as many people called it, housed his car in a garage on Van Houten Street, not too far from where we lived. Across the street from the garage was a field where the neighborhood kids played ball in the summer evenings. We would have one eye on the ball and the other directed toward First Street for the first sign of Driscoll's car.

As soon as the car was spotted turning the corner, the kids would run over to the garage and wait for the car to stop. Of course, there was much shoving and pushing, and it was really a miracle that no one was injured. Mr. Driscoll would toss the keys to outstretched hands or would throw the keys up in the air and whoever caught, grabbed the keys would open the garage-door, for which he was rewarded with a dime.

For many years it was his custom to run races on Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Labor Day for the kids in the neighborhood. The older boys, the 9 to 12 bracket, would race the length of the street. The younger group ran a shorter race. The prizes were 25¢ for the winner, 15¢ for second, and the third got a dime. We had this to ourselves for a few years, but then word got out and we had kids from the Mud Hole as well as from Main St. and Broadway participate, so the race was tougher because of all the competition.

It was at this same man's farm in Pomona that I got my first job. I was not quite 12 at the time, around 1916. He recruited the kids in the neighborhood to work on the farm. We left Haverstraw on the old Erie Railroad. The station at that time was directly across the street from the New Main Hotel and next to where George Holt has his funeral parlor. We left about 7:30 and got off at the Mt. Ivy station, which was located near where Routes 202 and 45 intersect in Mt. Ivy.

From there we had to walk to the Driscoll Farm, which was located not too far from where The Orchards is now located. Our job was to weed and hoe the corn and potatoes, for which we received 75¢ a day as well as the cost of the transportation. If it rained, we were given duties around several large barns that were located on the property.

I was picked to work around the Manager's house. The Manager was a big Swede by the name of Carlsen who was after the kids constantly because there was so much fooling around. As I recall, there were between twelve and fifteen of us supposedly working. My duties consisted of mowing the lawn and keeping the grounds around the house clean, which wasn't too much since I had the assistance of Carlsen's two daughters. I also had to bring the cow in from the field, but they would do the milking. As I recall, I also fed the three horses they had. The kids were jealous of my assignment since the two girls were always with me. In later years the two girls attended Haverstraw High School, at which time we renewed our acquaintanceship.

After a day's work we would wait for the Erie, which returned to Haverstraw around 7:00 P.M., or walk home. Unless the weather was inclement, we would walk home most of the time, since we finished work around 4:30 or 5:00 and had to wait at least an hour and a half for the train.

WORKING IN THE CAP FACTORY

My second job was during the summer when I was 14. I went to work in the cap factory where my sister Mary worked. They made men's caps for export to South America. They were the loudest colors and I am sure they would be the "in-thing" today on 125th Street. The shop was run by Morris Schwaatz for his father-in-law.

At first I put buttons on top of the caps with a stamping machine. Later on I helped the cutter who cut the patterns. We would take a roll or bolt of cloth and stretch it on a long table, about ten, twelve feet long, smooth out any wrinkles and continue laying one layer on top of the other until the whole roll was used up. Then the cutter would take and chalk out the patterns for the various parts of the cap, the peak, etc. He would then cut the cloth with an electric machine, keeping the various parts together, which I distributed to the various sewing-machine operators, who worked on a particular part of the cap, some sewing the sections together, others the ·peaks, etc. This factory was run on a piece-work basis, where they were paid for the work done. The sewers were very experienced people. The faster they worked, the more money they made, and woe to you if you let their supply run out and they had to wait. The people in this factory made more money than the other shirtwaist factories operating in Haverstraw at that time.

I had as a helper Joe Mader, who lived near us on Canal Street at that time. He was a year or two older than I was, and when the cutter failed to show up, Joe and I, along with Morris, would do the cutting. It was tricky cutting the patterns so as not to waste any material. I was also the janitor, for which I was paid $2.00 a week for sweeping up the bits of cloth from under and around the machines, which used to fill bags and bags and leave them out for the garbage truck to pick up. One day, being the enterprising young man I was I went to Sam Slack, who was the local rag and junk dealer, and asked him if he would buy the little pieces of rags, a sample of which I had with me, most of it being wool scraps; and he told me he would pay me something like three cents a pound since they were wool and clear. He gave me a quantity of bags to fill and I did this for a few weeks, when the proprietor one day asked me why I was sorting the cloth from the sweepings and, foolishly, I told him I was selling the rags. From then on he cut out the $2.00 a week I had been getting and all I got was whatever I received from the sale of the rags, which was more than the $2.00 he was paying me.

It was while working there that another incident occurred to me that I well remember. After working in the factory all day and cleaning up after the others left, this particular day was a very hot day. I gulped down my supper and ran down to Fowler's Gap to join some of my friends swimming. I remember jumping off the dock and was going to swim across the Gap, but when I got a certain distance, I don't remember what happened, whether I got a cramp or what. I went down and was in the process of drowning when Buster Ryder saw my predicament. He was only about 11 or 12, but an excellent swimmer. He grabbed me and hollered for assistance and Joe Pehush helped bring me to the river bank where they worked on me until I was revived.

An odd incident occurred years later, when we were on our honeymoon. One of the Haverstraw papers had a column entitled, "What happened ten years ago," and in that column it recited this occurrence ten years before. Mrs. Simko, who was one of our Sharp Street neighbors, apparently didn't read the caption above the article or through gossip from others got the idea that I had drowned while on my honeymoon and was inquiring of the neighbors if this were so, when somebody finally straightened her out. They had the neighborhood upset, particularly my two sisters who didn't want to mention it to my mother.

THE ELKS CLUB CLAMBAKE

The Elks Club, which in those days was located on the east side of First Street across from the Oscar Reynolds residence, had an annual clambake, which was held on their grounds near the river. It was one of the season's big affairs for the Elks, well attended by their members and guests. For two summers I got a job there cleaning up the tables of clam shells, helping husk the corn and whatever odd jobs there were to do at the bake. For this we each got a dollar and all the watermelon and corn we could eat. These were much-sought jobs, and you had to register with the steward of the Club well in advance of the clambake. As I recall, the steward was Willie Hoppe.

MR. GILLIES' HELP

Big Ben Topping was the chauffer for the Gillies family. Mr. Gillies was in the insurance business. He had an office on Broadway and their home was on South Street and the garage or barn was on Van Houten Street diagonally across from our house. Ben had a small room in one part of the garage, which at one time was a stable before the auto­ mobile came along. Their car was a new, shiny Franklin, kept in one part of the garage and the rest was used for storage. Upstairs, in what was formerly the hayloft, a colored man by the name of Herb Burton, who was some distant relative of the Burton family who lived on Van Houten Street, slept up there on a mattress thrown on the floor.

He had a big hernia and walked with a considerable limp. He did some chores around the Gillies property, gardening, etc. I don't recall any other employment that he had. Sometimes he would share his meals with Ben, but quite often he would send us kids to Stasko's store for a box of Uneeda crackers and a can of sardines, or a can of Campbell's pork and beans, which would comprise his evening meals. Occasionally my mother would send over a pail of soup to him.

LEARNING NOT TO SMOKE

We used to help Ben shine and wax the car for which we sometimes would be rewarded with a dime, other times with a "Thank you.'' On one occasion, Joe Collins, who lived over on Maple Avenue, and I had polished the car but were not· rewarded with the time and Joe was a little incensed for not getting paid. After Ben left to take the car on some errand, Joe stole two Italian stogies cigars which Ben kept in his room. We went across the street behind the lumber piles that Allison & Ver Valen had stored there and smoked the cigars. I got very sick, throwing up, so much so that Joe took me home telling my mother I got sick from something.

I was sick for two or three days, throwing up every time I put any food in my mouth. I never told my mother this or I would have been in for a good tanning. In later years, as I was growing up and teen-agers were smoking, as I got around to different parties, etc., where everybody was smoking, if I tried a cigarette, I would almost immediately head for the bathroom. I could still taste that stogie; and after this happened several times, I concluded it would be better not to smoke than to spoil my fun as well as that of those I was out with, which has saved me probably hundreds of dollars in my lifetime.

SUMMER ACTIVITIES

We went fishing at Captain Bill's for eels and sunfish, and I would get a scolding from my mother because I wouldn't eat the fish. Crabbing was another summer sport for us, usually crabbing off the DeNoyelles property or the cofferdam. Occasionally we would go down to Bay Shore swimming, while my folks would be visiting our relatives who lived in the Malley houses.

The Fourth of July was generally celebrated with a parade by the firemen, Boy Scouts, end the various veteran organizations, a few survivors of the Civil War and the Spanish-American War. Races were held, starting from the Bank Corner to the top of the High Tor and back. It was a grueling race and the winner, as long as I can remember, was Cooney Urban. Some of the others· participating were Eukie Gansen, Charlie Lane and Irv Rose. I know there were others, whose names I don't recollect.

THE VILLAGE POLICE

When I was growing up, our police force consisted of Chief "Kig" Ford, Bernie Fox, Hughie Sheridan, Jack Coyne; later on Frank Hessian and one of the part-time policemen was Bucky Buchanan, who lived next door to our house on Sharp Street. It was rumored around the village that after Cleary shot his son-in-law that "Rig" Ford's gun carried no bullets in it.

PEDDLED GOODS

We received some of our fresh vegetables, those that we didn't grow ourselves from Frenchy, who had a farm in New City, located back of the High Tor. Also Mike Kushnir's father also peddled vegetables. In the fall, my father would buy about fifty or more heads of cabbage which we made into sauerkraut for the winter. A barrel of potatoes, some apples and 100 pounds of flour made up our winter's supply of staples. Pop would cut the cabbage with a large cabbage-slicer, putting a layer of cabbage which was salted down, then a layer of apples, another layer of sauerkraut, and so on until it was filled. Until you've tasted an apple frozen in sauerkraut juice, you don't know how delicious apples can be.

Our ice came from Gene Goetschius from Stony Point, who peddled his ice from a horse and wagon, later on, a truck. It wasn't until we moved to Sharp Street that we got a refrigerator. Milk was delivered to the house by Ed Geier from New City and ladled into your own pail of container. Later on we got it in bottles, but we used a lot of condensed milk also.

There were various peddlers that came around door­to-door. hawking their goods. One of them was a man by the name of Paster, peddling pots, pans, notions, etc. If he didn't have it with him, he brought it on his next visit. Also we had a fish man who came around with his horse and buggy, blowing a horn as he headed up our street. I can't forget the umbrella man who trudged up and down the streets ringing his bell, shouting "Umbrellas fixed!"

GOING TO WORK ON THE BRICKYARDS

Some of the boys I palled around with were a year or two older than I was, particularly Joe Collins. He got a job as water-boy on the railroad and, of course, when we would meet in the evening, he had money jingling in his pocket, which the rest of us didn't have. My father worked on the brickyards seasonally and every penny had to count, so I wanted to get a job and leave school. I made application for working papers but I was turned down because I was not yet 14. When the summer vacation came around, my father said to me, "If you want to go to work, get a job on the brickyard and see what it is to work hard and you will be only too glad to go back to school." I took him at his word and tried to get a job at Fowler's and DeNoyelle's brickyards, but there were no openings there. I went down to Malley's where

I was able to get a job as trucker. Some of the fellows who worked at Malley's were Jack Urban and Joe Rabatin. They were practically brought up on the brickyards, starting to hack brick when they were 6 or 7, helping their older brothers, and, of course., they were hardened to the task.

I will never forget my first day. I trucked out the pit of brick with the others and thought I had a day's work in, only to find out that was half a day's work and for the other half I had to, hack two-thirds of a yard of brick. If you were experienced, you would generally wind up your day's work about 3:00, 3:30. While it was nearly killing me, I didn't dare quit because there were a few fellows sitting on the sideline razzing me about my slowness, saying, "He'll never make it," and some such remarks. About six o'clock

my father came down to see what had happened just about the time I was about to complete my hacking. I remember walking home, and that was about three-quarters of a mile, from Malley's to Van Houten Street, and it seemed to me like five miles that day. When I got home, I didn't want to eat, I was so tired; I just wanted to go to bed. After supper I headed straight for bed. My mother said she wouldn't wake me the next morning to give me a day's rest. I told her I had to get up the next day as I would never live it down. After about a week it wasn't so bad after the muscles in my arms and legs developed. When September rolled around, my father asked me if I wanted to continue or go back to school. Needless to say, school was my preference, for which I am grateful.

MIKE RYAN'S DANCE HALL

I can't remember when Mike Ryan built his dance hall in back of the family home, but it had a downstairs part which contained a pool room and a room where they played cards and occasionally a crap game. Upstairs was a dance hall and basketball court.

There was a local basketball team which was called the Flukey Five, which comprised Jimmy McCabe and Harry Schuler as forwards, Johnny Goetschius as center, and Frank McCabe and someone else as guards. Other players were Ken Murray, Joey Lefkowitz and Red Curran. Jimmy McCabe and Schuler were very short men but they were very good shots as forwards. They seemed to duck around the taller opponents. It is hard to think they were good being so small as compared to the seven-footers these days. It was a very good team and played teams from New York and New Jersey, generally on Sunday afternoon.

They also held dances at Ryan's, I believe every other Saturday. One dance stands out vividly in my memory. It was shortly after the hall was built and was not used very much. Somebody got the idea of holding a funny hat dance. The men went up to Snedeker's on Main Street, who in the early days was a hat and shoe store. He had a big supply of derby hats in the cellar, which somebody found out about, which he wanted to get rid of. He sold these for a quarter each. There were all types of derbies, tall ones and shallow ones.

The ladies had gone to Hannah Frankel's millinery store and they, too, found some old hats which they bought, or made their own.

The orchestra was composed of Rope Ryan, Mike's brother, on the piano, Lib Mulligan banjo, Mike Stec

violin and a drummer, with Professor Chefo as the conductor. Chefo was a frustrated musician whose dream was to be a big orchestra maestro. He had a baton and would stand in front of the orchestra, waving his baton on the style of Toscanini. Woe to you if you ever laughed at his actions!

The dance was a complete success and was repeated several times. From then on the dances were better attended, with other orchestras playing there; the two most popular at that time were Denny Mitchell's and Eddie Fox's. Later on some local fights were promoted there'. The dance hall burned down in???

Chapter VI

THE BUSINESS DISTRICT

Reminiscing, I was trying to recall some of the stores and business establishments located on our two main thoroughfares, Main Street and Broadway. The old United States Hotel, a three-story affair, was located where the Post Office is now. Across the street was the Kings Daughters Library which still stands today. Next to it was Renn's bar, at the corner of Main and Liberty Street. Fritzy Ossman had a livery stable on Liberty Street. I recall the night it caught fire. What a spectacular blaze it made with all the hay and straw in it! They were fearful that that part of the village would go up in flame, but the firemen managed to confine the loss to the stable.

On the other corner of Main and Liberty was Flynn and Lawson's grocery and butcher shop. I can only recall going there once since they dealt in prime meats and groceries, which were too expensive for my father's pocketbook.

On the same block Martin Lichtenstein had a men's clothing store. Next to it was Levi West's ice cream parlor and restaurant. His reputation for good ice cream was so good that people from around the county came there: for this refreshment. This is where my mother worked when she first came to this country.

Across the street was the Haverstraw Club and in the next block Snedeker's shoe store was located, Lane's Hardware, Speck's Drug Store, later taken over by Mr. Miller, who was his pharmacist. Speck was drowned when his car went through the ice one winter when he was returning from riding up and down the river on the ice. The Bee Hive was a small notions store and then moved to the Straut Building on New Main Street, where they sold furniture, etc. Across the street was a photographer, as I recall, by the name of Terhune, and in the first block of Main Street was Mardorf's Bakery and I can't remember the name of the stationery store, then Grosson's pool parlor, tobacco and newspaper store, and Lagomarino's candy store where we got our penny candy.

Henry Reynold had a grocery store in the block where the National Bank (now Empire National) is located, and the Greeks had a confectionary and ice cream store. Pop Jenkins had a store in that same block where he sold wallpaper and Hannah Frankel had a millinery store on the corner of Fourth and Main.

The National Bank was on the southeast corner of Main, and the Peoples Bank (now the County Trust) across the street on the northwest corner.

Further down New Main Street, the Straut Building, which was an electrical store, lamps, etc., later the Bee Hive, then Pressler's Men's Shop and Ralph Stalter1 s restaurant known for his culinary art in cooking Westerns and Klondikes. If you wanted to know the latest gossip, you didn't have to buy the Times or Messenger, just stop in at Ralph's for a hamburger and coffee. The Majestic Theatre was next to Scalter that featured vaudeville on Saturday afternoon and evenings. Matinees were 15¢ and evenings it was something like a quarter. The theatre burned down years after its opening. To the west of that was the Savings and Loan and in back of that at the corner of Broad Street was Kaiser's Mills, where we bought our chicken feed, later called Kasco, which was sold I believe to Purina or one of the big feed conglomerates.

Swift & Company's beef house, which served the Rockland County area butchers, was the other side of the Erie Railroad station, where the line ended, and W. T. Purdy and Son had a furniture store there, later converted to a funeral home by his son, Heman Purdy, now George Holt's Funeral Parlor.

On the other side of New Main was Meyer's grocery store, a drug store, a barber shop, a saloon and next to that was Mike McCabe's Rockland County Times, John Schubert's bicycle and electric shop, Freeman's real estate and insurance office, and Ralph Pick's photo shop. Then P. Dickman built a large store which they occupied until Mr. Dickman died several years ago.

Stores on Broadway, next to Lagornarsino's. was a shoe repair shop, then DeChelfin's jewelry store, Lichter's, Bauer's Bakery and then Baum's Department store, Bernie Fox's poolroom and a few other stores.

On the west side of Broadway next to the bank was Vandenburg's Jewelry, Benny Friedman's 5 and 10, later on Shea's Drug Store, Gillies real estate and insurance, The Messenger, a candy store, Adler's saloon and Dr. Wood'-s house and office and Wood's Drug Store. Allen's men's and ladies' wear store was on the next block, Simon and Son's furniture place next and the Crescent Drug Store next to the, t, followed by Waldron's Opera House and, as I recall, a barber somewhere in between.

Chapter VII

WIDE OPEN HAVERSTRAW

Haverstraw was a wide open town in those days with pool rooms or parlors up and down Main St. and Broadway.

Down near the Post Office was Mickey Donaldson's brother's Tub of Blood. If you don't know who Mickey Donaldson was, he was the Congressional Medal of Honor soldier (World War I) from Rockland County. Across the street was the staid Haverstraw Club. The next block housed Jake Kern's and Flynn's pool rooms. In the next block was Grosson's and up on Broadway was Bernie Fox's, Mike Ryan's, and the Business Men's Club. While they were called poolrooms, the backrooms were used for card games and crap games. The Hole in One on Division Street was another one.

Joe Rabatin, with whom I palled around, was quite a gambler, particularly with dice. He would start at the Tub of Blood where the stakes were small--nickels and dimes-­ and, if successful, would move on to Flynn's or Mike Ryan's. I remember once occasion when we had a date in Nyack to go to the vaudeville show with our dates, and Joe started around 7:00 at the Tub of Blood, won a few dollars, then went to Flynn's, won some more and then up to Mike Ryan's where his luck continued. He had something over a hundred dollars, quite a bundle in those days, when he decided this was his night, so he went across the street to the Business Men's Club, where big money was played. A few passes with the dice and he came out talking to himself, saying, "I should have quit." But we managed to make the second show in Nyack.

Ironically, after Joe was married, he continued his gambling, sometimes not bothering to come home after being paid, he would lose his weeks salary. His wife, Carrie Nation-style, decided to put an end to his gambling by heaving a brick through Ryan's windows. After that he was barred from Ryan's.

THE WELL-TO-DO

Front Street or First Street was the location of many of Haverstraw's well-to-do people, including Everett Fowler (the Elks Club now), Captain Bill's (where Dr. Glass' widow now lives), the Anness family who were related to the DeNoyelle's family, Martin Driscoll, whom I mentioned earlier, later occupied by Major William Welch of the Palisades Interstate Park, John Fowler, later sold to Ed Vandenburg, Oscar Reynolds, the cashier of the Peoples Bank, the Coe family, and the Ira Hedtes family. Hedtes was a general in the Civil War. They were beautiful homes, well-kept, and it breaks my heart when I pass by and see the dilapidated condition of those big houses now turned into multi-apartments.

THE ONTEORA

Sometime around the early 1920's the Hudson River day liner Onteora was housed in the Clay Hole, as it was then called, which is now filled with rock dust from the Trap Rock. A dam was broken through and the river water filled up the deep hole where the clay deposits had formerly been taken from; and that boat, as well as one other, the name of which I can’t remember, were berthed there for one winter. We used to go down when the water was frozen and climb around the decks.

AN OLD FEUD

There was a feud between Mike McCabe, the publisher of The Times, and Thomas Gagan, one of the most prominent Rockland County attorneys. As I recall being told, it stemmed from the time of the Cleary trial when Gagan was District Attorney. If my recollection is correct, Bill Cleary was a tailor in New York City who catered to the police and firemen and was deeply involved in Tammany politics in the City as well as in Haverstraw. His daughter had eloped with Gene Newman, a Protestant, much against her father's will. Cleary, who was Village Clerk at the time, had invited Newman to the Village Hall. Thinking it w s for a reconciliation, Newman appeared in the Clerk's office at the designated time. In the office at the time was Chief Kig Ford, who was sitting next to Cleary. I don't recall if there were some words between them or whatever prompted the action, but Cleary reached over and took the gun out of the Chief's holster and shot Newman. Gagan at that time was the D.A. who prosecuted Cleary. It has been rumored down to today that Tammany Hall had contacted every juror on the panel and from hearing the story many times it was rumored that such and such a juror got a horse, another one had a porch added on to his house, and others received cash-consideration. Cleary was acquitted but then later sent to prison for having used some village funds. The Cleary's were neighbors of ours and I remember my folks telling us about the anxious hours they spent during the trial. One of Cleary's sisters was the Superintendent of our High School.

If that was the reason for the feud I don't know, but what I observed many times was Mike McCabe waiting in front of his Times office for Tom Gagan to pass. Gagan, if he was not at the courthouse or elsewhere, was a man who punctually would leave his office at 12:00 noon to go home to lunch. As Gagan would reach the edge of his sidewalk, McCabe would take his broom and sweep Gagan's footsteps off the sidewalk. It was a common thing for those of us in the Peoples Bank, where I worked, to watch for Gagan and McCabe go through this routine. Gagan, with head held high, would continue walking, paying no attention to McCabe.

SOME VILLAGE CHARACTERS

Fritz Bauer had a bakery on Broadway just south of Baum's Department Store. There was an alley that had a door in front which led to the barn that housed his horse and bakery wagon. Bauer liked to imbibe and, since he serviced a few saloons (they weren't bars and grills in those days), he would take a drink here and there. His last stop was Otto Wurm's on West Street and from being on the road from early morning and with the libation helping, he would fall asleep sometimes at the bar. He would be escorted to the wagon, placed inside and the horse given a slap on the rump, and the horse would trot homeward, across the Main St. and Broadway intersection and stop at the edge of the sidewalk entrance to the alley until someone from the store or a passerby would open the gate and the horse would then go in.

Rev. Walter Hoffman was a familiar sight around the village. He was a frequenter of Adler's, where he rubbed elbows with the villagers. I remember he was a character witness for Sheriff "Bus" Dormann and he was being cross examined by Irving Kennedy about his presence in a bar, being asked if he thought it was a good thing for a minister to frequent bars, and I remember his answer so vividly: "You meet more sinners in a bar than you do in church!"

Gents Brems was Police Justice in the village for years. He was also known to bend an elbow. I recall one incident when Frank Hessian, one of our patrolmen, had been accused of using too much force in the arrest of a crossing guard at the Westside Avenue crossing. At the trial we had a recess about every half-hour when the judge would disappear.

The trial went into the wee hours of the morning and by this time Gents had the shakes, shaking so much that I had to ask him not to lean on the desk because I couldn't write. In selecting the jury, the attorney, who came from Newburgh, never asked any of the jurors if they were any relation to Hessian. It so happened that two of the jurors were related to Hessian. Need I tell you he was acquitted?

Henry Beall was another character around town who would do odd jobs in the village. He never had a steady job but managed to keep himself fed. At one time he slept in the boiler room of the Village Hall, sharing it with Choke the Parrot Haefle. On one occasion someone bet Henry he couldn't eat a whole panful of beans. Henry sat down to a newly baked pan of pork and beans and proceeded to devour the whole large pan that the restaurants use. After he finished he asked for several slices of bread so· he could wipe up the pan.

Choke the Parrot Haefle never had a steady job either. In the spring he would sell pussy-willows up on 9W at the railroad crossing and in the fall he would sell bunches of bittersweets. But he always seemed to have a cigar in his mouth. He was supposedly some shirttail relation of Vic Shankey. In his later years Vic got him admitted to Summit Park, where he would stay a few days, where he had a clean bed and meals, and then would return to his boiler room sleeping quarters.

SKIMMELTONS

Bet you don't know what a skimmelton is. When a married couple returned from their honeymoon, they would be serenaded by their friends and neighbors beating on a pot or pan with a spoon outside their home. ' If they were kids, you would usually be rewarded with a sum of money, which they split up, or, if adults, be invite~ in for coffee and cake or a drink. When we returned from our honeymoon to Sharp Street, we were treated to a skimmelton by the neighbors.

THE KU KLUX KLAN

I recall the burning of crosses on the High Tor by the Ku Klux Klan on two occasions. This would be around 9:00 or 9:30 at night and we would watch from the street as the crosses burned, which sent a shiver down your spine. I recall my mother saying, "They should fall off the cliff for frightening everyone."

BRICKMAKING

These notes are on three separate pages. Daddy must have sent them to Dan DeNoyelles because with them is a letter from him, dated November 15, 1975, in which DeNoyelles’ makes several comments on Daddy’s description. I have indicated to what sections of Daddy's pages the comments refer and have also added DeNoyelles’ letter, since I think Daddy intended to make some use of it in rewriting this section.

Since the art of brickmaking seems to be lost forever in the Haverstraw area, perhaps I should tell you a little about how bricks were made in those days when I worked the yards.

In 1919 and 1920 brickyards were a thriving industry and was sort of a way of life for the community (1). Since my experience was with the Malley yard, I will try to give you a word-picture of what it was like, as best I can recall. The Malley yard was located on the lands where Ward Brothers and the Trap Rock silos stand today at the southern end of the village. The brickyards extended from the Malley yards up the beach all the way up to Tomkins Cove.

The clay for the brick from the Malley yard was cut from a clay pit which was then located immediately north of the yard, which is now filled in with rock dust (1). At that time it was a big hole which had a winding road from the bottom up to a road leading south to the Malley yard.

There the men would slice the clay from the bank with a razor-sharp pick (3), slicing a chunk of clay much like a butcher would slice a piece of meat. The clay was then loaded into a two-wheel wagon drawn by a horse. There was no driver's seat on the wagon, as I recall; the man walked alongsidethe horse (4). The load was taken to the pit which was locater. at the back of the brickmaking machine.

The DeNoyelles and Fowler yards did not have a clay bank. They got their clay from the river. A big dredge or shovel would dig the clay from the river bottom, load it into small railroad cars on a barge and a Cornell tug would tr.0.n bring it to their docks where the cars would be hooked onto the winch which would pull the cars up a trestle and when the cars reached a certain point, they were dumped by a lever and the clay would slide down on both sides of the trestle. The engine room of the DeNoyelles yard still stands today opposite Zeh's school bus parking lot.

When the clay was dumped into the pit, the p i t crew went to work chopping it into smaller pieces and mixing it with coal dust and a sharp sand containing silica, which made for a good strong brick. They shoveled this mixture into a machine which had a revolving mixing-action, somewhat like a blender (5). Generally, there were two or three men in the pit (6), mostly Slovak, Irish or Italian. Very few colored people worked the pits.

In front of the machine stood the striker or molder. To the side of the machine was another small cylinder-type affair, which contained five or six, perhaps more, openings to hold the molds. Into this machine was dumped a certain quantity of sand and brick dust or red dust (7). This cylinder revolved and the sand and dust coated the inside molds.

As the cylinder revolved, the sander, as he was called (8), would take a mold and put it into the press. When this was done, the striker would pull down a lever and the machine would press the mixed clay into the molds and when filled, it was pushed out to the striker, who had a large piece of steel with handles on either side, something resembling a scraper, and would shave off whatever excess clay was on the mold to give the brick a smooth finish. Then he would take the mold and put it on a truck and when six of these molds were on the truck, the trucker would take the newly formed brick and run up the yard to either the short dumper or the long dumper, who would dump the brick on the smooth yard with the face or name facing down, the long dumper being located at the extreme end of the yard and the short dumper at about the middle of the yard. The dumpers were really experts in this in that they could dump a mold only an inch or so apart. The entire output of one yard was about 22,000 brick.

The brickyards would start work very early in the morning to take advantage of the sun drying the brick. The Malley yards had a gang which started around 4:00 A.M., which they called "The Sunlighters." The rest of the machines started around 4:30 or shortly thereafter (9).

The Malley yard had seven machines; most of the other yards had between four and six machines. Each machine had two yards which they worked on alternate days.

The brick that were dumped on this stone-free yard and, after they were dried a certain length of time, the edger, with a particular kind of wood-type thing, would edge the bricks on their sides to continue the drying process. These bricks were generally left to dry overnight (10). The next day they were hacked and placed on a plank that extended the full length of the yard and stacked about four feet high with about a quarter-inch space between them and left to dry for another day, after which they were wheeled into the shed and stacked for burning or drying in a kiln.

The personnel of a gang was two or three pit men, a striker, a sander or molder, five truckers (if the weather had been rainy and the yard soft, six men), two dumpers and a machine boy, whose duty it was to keep the sander filled with red dust and sand as well as doing errands for the crew, including keeping the water pail filled (11).

To make the kiln brick were piled up to the top of. the shed approximately 35, 40 feet high. The truckers or\ men who wheeled these brick to the kiln were so expert in this that they would take two bricks in each hand from the wheelbarrow, slap them together and heave them up to the setter at the top without the bricks corning apart (12). I am told there were some brickyard men who would put a dime between the four bricks and toss it up to the top of the kiln to the setter without the dime falling out.

The crew who stacked the brick for the kiln were experienced men, expert in the art of building arches for the fires. I don't know how many brick would be in a kiln, hut my recollection is that there were at least eight or ten arches to a kiln. Somewhere I heard a kiln was something over a million brick (13). These arches were filled with wood to start the fires and then fired with coal, which burned 24 hours of the day for about a week or so, after which the fires died down and the brick were allowed to cool. When the brick were cooled, they were then loaded on a barge. Wheeling the brick from the kiln was difficult work, particularly if the barge was empty and the tide was high. If the barge was high, the men had to make a running start with the special wheelbarrow made for brick-hauling, which held ~bout 100 bricks, stacked on both sides of the wheel.

The kiln-dried brick (14) were stacked on the barge close together for shipment to New York or wherever they were destined to. Sometimes if the tide was high, they would assign a man on the barge with a long hook, who would hook onto the wheelbarrow and help the man up the narrow plank leading to the barge. Occasionally a man running up the plank would lose his balance and the wheelbarrow full of bricks would go into the river, sometimes even the man being dunked, only to catch hell from the foreman. It was always said you were never a man until you loaded boat. I tried it once and had to give up as I couldn't stand the pace.

After our day's work we would generally go skinny dipping in the river to get cleaned off.

When I worked the Malley yard, there were, I was told, something like 30, 32 yards in operation from Malley's up to Tomkins Cove.

Among some of the names I remember were DeNoyelles, Lynch, Everett Fowler and Son, Excelsior, Archer's upper and lower yards, Renn, Morrissey, Wood and Allison, U. F. Washburn, Denton Fowler and Son, Peck, Garner, Byrnes, Lilburn, Nicholson, Bennett and Dunnigan.

I was curious as to when they started putting names or brands on the bricks and was informed by Dan DeNoyelles, whose family was in the brickmaking business for over 150 years, it was sometime around the 1870's. Before that, millions of bricks were manufactured along the Hudson River without any markings or brands. So if_ you see a brick without a name or brand, you know it was made before the 1870's.

Dan DeNoyelles' Notes

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Jim's Note
Daniel DeNoyelles wrote a number of books about Rockland County and in 1982 published a book about Brickmaking in the area - "Within These Gates" The History of Brick-Making in the Huson River Valley, NY
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(1) The DeNoyelles yard built their trestle for the river clay in 1910, but I am not sure when we all gave up digging clay from the cofferdam and went to river clay.

Malley might have taken clay from the land deposit in the cofferdam while our DeNoyelles made brick from the river clay. I don't know, though at one time all of our yards took clay from the cofferdam which was built in 1883.

(2) As mentioned above, we all took clay from the cofferdam, but when the river was let into the cofferdam (about 1912), all of us used river-dredged clay.

(3) The men cut the clay with a shovel which was razor-sharp and each clay-cutter took care of his shovel as a barber would take care of his razor--take it home at night and occasionally sharpen it.

(4) There was a little ledge on the front part of the clay cart. The men walked alongside of the clay-filled carts (the clay was heavy enough), but going north to the clay bank, they would ride on this ledge which was about 4 inches wide, maybe 3 inches.

(5) The pitshovellers cut the clay and shoveled it onto a conveyer which conveyed the pieces along with sand and coal dust up to the tub where the knives ground up the mixture. At the bottom of the tub there were two wipers (wide knives) which pushed the mixture under the packer or press.

(6) Two men generally worked as pitshovellers. They had to be big and strong. If they were small men or light in weight, the foreman would use three men.

(7) The red dust was iron oxide and along with the molding sand, it would coat the inside of the damp molds so as to let the newly-molded brick slip out easily.

(8) The man you list as sander was the mold pusher and he took the mold off the sander, would tap them a bit to get rid of excess sand, and push them into the machine in front of a lever. The lever would come forward and push the empty mold under the packer or press after the mold pusher had placed another empty mold into the side of the brick machine.

The truckers would take the molds--five at a time-on a little two-wheeled truck to run them out to the dumpers. There were four molds on the sander.

(9) Some of the gangs--the early starters--were known as Moonlighters.

(10) Brick were not left overnight if possible. As soon as the foreman tested the brick so fingers would not leave an imprint, he would give the signal to start hacking or placing the brick stacked on the hack planks. Rain, which was disaster on the open yards, always made brickmakers wary, so brick were hacked as soon as possible.

Personnel

2 Or 3 pitshovellers	1 machine boy
4 truckers (5 after a rain on a soft yard)	1 mold pusher
1 molder	2 dumpers.

(12) As I noted, the truckers ran the new brick in the molds out to the dumpers. Green brick wheelers brought the brick into the sheds and tossed them up to the brick setters as you have noted.

(13) It was cheaper to burn a large amount of brick in a kiln. They were the stove type. Most brickmakers burned 20 arches or 1,000,000 brick at a time, though you could burn as many arches as the owner wanted to.

(14) The brick could not be termed kiln-dried. They actually burned and it all fused together to make a strong brick. The first course of brick in the kiln ignited the second course. The second course burned the third course. Our kilns, and Malley's too, I believe, were 60 brick high

Chapter IX

JBK AND KBK

Then there was the time I was mistaken for United States Senator Kenneth B. Keating. The occasion was a Republican fund-raising dinner at the Bear Mountain Inn. The time, I believe, was in the early 1960's and the tickets were $25.00 per, fairly high for that time. When Judge Henion said he couldn't afford to bring his wife because of the cost, we decided I couldn't afford it either, and so Mom stayed home.

Everybody in the office, including Kathy Walter, who at that time wasn't married and was the judge's secretary, Gene Cavallo, the Judge's law-secretary, as well as myself, were prevailed upon to buy a ticket for the dinner. It was a dressy affair and I picked up Kathy at her mother's home and drove up the Parkway to the Bear Mountain Inn. As I drove up to the entrance to the Inn, one of the Palisades Interstate Park patrolmen rushed over to the car and opened the door for Kathy, and I said I would drive over and park the car in the parking lot, whereupon the officer said, "No, no; just leave it right here." I said, "Right here?" and he said, "Just leave it right here."

So then he proceeded to escort us to the VIP room, where the big shots were assembled, where drinks and hors d'oeuvres were being served; and this officer asked us what we would like to drink and he went over to ··the bar and brought us our drink and had one of the hostesses bring over a tray of hors d'oeuvres, which prompted Kathy to say, "Boy, do you rate around here!"

As Sheriff Buddy Mock, Judge Henion, Judge Skahen and District Attorney Mort Silberman came in, they all remarked that I had a hell of a nerve to park in the front of the entrance whereas they had to park in the public parking lot. At that time I was Clerk in the Justice's Court in Clarkstown, and I had a wide acquaintance with practically all of the PIP cops and I thought it was for this reason I was given the red carpet treatment. It wasn't until we were being escorted into the dining room that Chief Hlavaty, of the PIP police, took me asio.e and said, "Joe, he thinks you're Senator Keating." He was told to look for a white-haired man whose license-plates were KBK. Well, JBK was close.

Speeches

These two speeches were in the same folder with the previous material. Daddy may have been thinking of typing them up or of simply usinq them to recall memories. In any case I thought it would be good to include them here.

The First of them is the speech Daddy gave at his retirement dinner April 3, 1970. The other one reads as if it must have been given at the Courthouse, at some retirement-service there.

I feel somewhat like the drunk who found himself at the edge of the lake in Central Park on a very bright, moonlit night, with the moon reflecting brightly on the water As he stood there weaving, a police officer came along and, fearing he would fall in, nudged him to move on.

The drunk said, "All right, officer, just tell me what's that down there?" indicating the reflection of the moon on the water.

"Why that's the moon," said the officer. The drunk looked at him for a moment and said, "That's what I thought; but what am I dining up here?"

After many, many years of being the silent one in the courtroom, this is a new switch for me.

The time of retirement I suppose in certain respects is a time for reflection--going back over the events that have occurred for over a third of a century. I have a very vivid recollection of my first day in court where I was called upon to record all day a handwriting expert, who later was to testify in the Lindbergh trial. I came into the case in the middle of it and didn't know what the previous testimony was, knew none of the attorneys, and, in fact, didn't know the difference between a plaintiff and a defendant.

I have witnessed a great change in our county, particularly in our county seat, and seen the traumatic change from a nice, quiet, sleepy farming town to suburbia with all its problems and ramifications.