Week of December 19
December 18, 1875 – 150 YEARS AGO
Rockland County Journal
AROUND HOME
☞ Will the ladies of our village try to get along this year without the use of wine or other intoxicating liquors, at their New Year’s reception table?
☞ Go to the Fair at Stephen Merritt’s residence this (Friday) evening. Admission free. A view in the Art Gallery alone will more than pay you for going.
☞ There is a Japanese tomato plant in DePew’s Conservatory, bearing two tomatoes just ripe. The tomatoes are of a darker hue than those of our country.
☞ “Broadaxe” has a poor opinion of Nyack, but an exalted one of the little hamlet on our north line. Well, maybe if we are very good we may go there when we die.
☞ On Monday morning a large three-master schooner arrived with four hundred cords of cedar for Messrs. Storms & Penny—the largest cargo ever received here at one time.
GRADUATING FOR SING SING
“Lonny Kirk,” as he is known in Nyack, is a young man respectably connected, but for “ways that are dark and tricks that are vain” there are few his equal, and on several occasions he has received the special attentions of Hubbell and Sheriff Bensen. On Friday evening last, he arrived on the ferry-boat and at once went up to his grandmother’s residence where he has always found a home and welcome. He had not been long in the house when the most unmistakable evidences of fear and dread were apparent in his actions and countenance, and he soon informed his maternal relative that he had seen Hubbell watching him, and if she would give him some money to pay his way he would quit the village. Fearing his imprisonment again the kind old grandmother gave him a sum of money, and on Saturday morning last he started for New York, but not, however, until he gave evidence of his gratitude by stealing his grandmother’s gold watch and chain, which were missed soon after his departure. It is now known that the story of being watched by Hubbell was false and was concocted to get money from the only one who has cared for him for years, and whom he has just robbed.
December 19, 1925 – 100 YEARS AGO
Rockland County Times
ORANGEBURGH SITE SELECTED — Broadacres Farm to Be Used as Insane Asylum Location
[Image: Postcard of a bird’s-eye view, looking west toward the front entrance of most of the buildings in the Rockland Psychiatric Hospital Complex. Courtesy of the New City Library via NYHeritage.org.]
The State has purchased 600 acres of land in Orangetown, this county, for a new State Hospital to relieve the congestion in all of the State institutions for the insane in and about New York City, and Attorney-General Albert Ottinger approved the title to the tract Tuesday. The consideration for the land is $142,843.
The land consists of nineteen separate parcels which were owned by the Broadacres Dairy Farms, Inc. This land, together with other land of the Broadacres Dairy Farms Inc., has been used largely for dairy and agricultural purposes. There is a number of buildings on the property used for the housing of the dairies of the company. A portion of the land is wooded.
The property is located on the Northern Railroad of New Jersey. [It] is immediately north of the New York New Jersey State boundary line and is within easy access of the city.
This is the site for the institution selected after the plan to locate the institution near New City in which a number of County politicians and easy money getters were interested had fallen through.
INDICTED FOR BIGAMY — Mrs. Elizabeth Smith Indicted by Grand Jury for Having Two Husbands — Case Awaits Settlement
Rockland County is again in the limelight if publicity in the Metropolitan papers about a Grand Jury hearing at New City constitutes the limelight. Mrs. Elizabeth Smith, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Banghart Stalter, who was charged with bigamy before Judge Larkin, is the center of interest. She has been photographed in various poses, interviewed and written up as a feature.
On Tuesday, in accordance with the evidence which left no alternative, she was indicted for bigamy. Mrs. Smith was married two years ago to George Lee giving at that time her age as 16. Her mother, Mrs. Banghart Stalter, now declares the girl was only 14 years of age. Two years later, Mrs. Lee was married to Joseph Smith, who after a family quarrel, charged her with bigamy his charge was true was complete and he could not withdraw it.
If the girl wife is tried and sentenced, it will have to be on a criminal charge with a resultant imprisonment at Bedford [Hills Correctional Facility for Women in Westchester County]. The case is being prosecuted with the help of some outside force, apparently a person interested in having the girl punished. The course of procedure will probably follow that outlined by Judge Larkin before whom the girl was arraigned. He believes that on account of the girl’s youth and her probable ignorance of wrongdoing the second wedding without divorce from her first husband was illegal. This, by removing one of the husbands would get her out of the predicament of being too much married.
The girl in telling of her life with her first husband stated her preference for having husband number two as her choice of a life mate. The matter now lies in the hands of County Judge Mortimer B. Patterson.
December 18, 1975 – 50 YEARS AGO
The Journal News
MAIL VOLUME DOUBLES — SANTA’S SEASON KEEPS POSTMAN BUSY
Stretching, the imagination a bit, there are some striking similarities between Charlie Jones, a postman in Nyack, and Santa Claus, whose headquarters are farther north.
Each has a nimble vehicle (Jeep for Jones, sleigh for ‘Claus); both find this the most exhausting time of year; and finally, the two seem to enjoy their work more as Christmas nears.
“People love to get mail now,” said Jones, who lags 45 minutes behind his regular schedule delivering packages and cards during the two weeks before Christmas.
“I guess it’s a psychological thing,” he said. “They never know what’s inside and I like the feeling that I bring it to them.”
The volume during the holiday season is so great that Jones, who has a fairly typical route, makes his rounds twice—once for packages and again for cards and letters.
Two rounds are necessary because, he said, “you’re going to feel pretty foolish carrying something like that in your bag.” Jones pointed to a long wooden box with a return address in Alaska. He guessed a fishing rod was inside after noting that the recipient is an ardent angler.
In his nine Christmas seasons as a mailman, the 30-year-old Jones has seen little fluctuation in mail volume despite changes in the economy
“Christmas is once a year,” he said, “and people always seem to buy.”
The county postal operations are also trying to cope with the holiday flood of mail. Postmaster Thomas Byrne, who heads the county mail handling from the Suffern headquarters, said some of the men are slowed by as much as two hours in their deliveries during these weeks.
The period from Dec. 10 to 24, he said, doubles the daily volume to more than one million pieces a day. On a peak day, two million pieces of mail are handled by local postal workers.
Byrne said that additional burdens this year are an austerity move in the U.S. Postal Service against overtime and fewer seasonal workers being hired.
“It’s amazing,” he said. “In spite of higher costs and economic problems, people still want to send things.”
This Week in Rockland (#FBF Flashback Friday) is prepared by Clare Sheridan for the Historical Society of Rockland County. © 2025 by The Historical Society of Rockland County. #FBF Flashback Friday may be reprinted only with written permission from the HSRC. To learn about the HSRC’s mission, upcoming events or programs, visit www.RocklandHistory.org or call (845) 634-9629.
