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This Week in Rockland: Newspaper Excerpts: Flashback Friday: Week of August 25

August 23, 1873 – 150 YEARS AGO
Rockland County Journal

AROUND HOME: FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH OF ROCKLAND COUNTY
       We learn that the above Church, located at Monsey, has purchased the edifice they have been worshipping in, and that they are in a healthy and growing condition. We congratulate them on their success, and trust that now they have become a fixed fact, they may soon be enabled to rejoice in a spiritual baptism. Rev. S. H. Hick is the pastor of this church and has met with and overcome what appeared to be insurmountable obstacles. He deserves success—that is, if perseverance and courage entitles anyone to it. We wish him God speed.

TESTIMONIAL VARIETY CONCERT
       Mr. Thomas J. Finley, the well-known and talented vocalist, at the request of many of the leading citizens of Rockland County, will give a grand variety concert, assisted by the best talent, at Hoffer’s Opera House, Nyack, on Thursday evening, Aug. 28, when he will exercise his peculiar talent in singing extemporaneous songs, as well as set pieces. Mr. Finley’s proficiency in music is too well known to be unappreciated by the community. The performances will include songs, music, dancing, and everything which will afford satisfaction to the audience and an excellent evening’s entertainment. Mr. Finley’s assistants are well-known caterers to popular amusements.

August 24, 1923 – 100 YEARS AGO
Nyack Evening Journal

MOTORCYCLE RACES AT ORANGEBURG TOMORROW
[Image: Track in Orangeburg, ca. 1900. Image courtesy of the Nyack Library, via NYHeritage.org]
       Motorcycle races will be held on the Orangeburg track tomorrow afternoon, starting at 3:30 o’clock, under the auspices of the Metropolitan Motorcycle Clubs Associated.
       There will be solo and sidecar events by professionals and amateurs including five- and three-mile amateur races, Australian pursuit, ten- and five-mile professional events. The special event of the day will be a ten-mile Eastern States amateur sidecar race.
       The riders will include such well-known speed artists as Gene Walker, Gambul Okes, John Seymour, Ralph Hepburn, Paul Anderson, and Fred Spangenburg.

FOURTEEN-YEAR-OLD GIRL ELOPES WITH GEO. MCDONALD
       Sparkill is stirred today over the alleged elopement of Anna Mae Post, a 14-year-old girl, with George McDonald, 34, a veteran of the World War.
       A warrant for McDonald’s arrest was issued yesterday by Judge Oswald A. Bauer at Sparkill on complaint of the girl’s mother, Mrs. Anna Post, charging him with abduction.
       Sheriff Brown, police of nearby towns and northern New Jersey were notified and immediately a search began. No accurate trace of the couple has yet been found, but it is thought that they may have started for Boston.
       According to reports, the Post girl threw a suitcase in which was her clothing from a window of her mother’s hotel, the Mountain House, the other night, and it was taken to another house. It is said Mrs. Post sent her daughter to the Boss meat market yesterday for some meat, and it was not until after Anna Mae failed to return that the mother learned anything about the alleged elopement. She was then told that her girl had left town with McDonald.
       George McDonald is a veteran of the World War. He lost his right arm in the Argonne. After returning from France, he took a year’s vocational training in a government school in New York City and later engaged in the taxi business in Sparkill. It was while he was in the latter business that McDonald assaulted a taxi driver by the name of Scott, who is yet in the Middletown hospital. For this offense, McDonald was indicted by the Rockland County grand jury and found guilty in County Court. Less than a year ago Judge Patterson fined him $1,000 and gave him a year’s suspended sentence in jail.
       McDonald did taxi work for Mrs. Post at the Mountain House. He forged an intimate acquaintance with Mrs. Post and her daughter and was often seen in company with the daughter in Sparkill and Nyack.

August 23, 1973 – 50 YEARS AGO
The Journal News

MUNN INDICTED IN ORANGETOWN POLICE DEATHS
       While flags in Orangetown flew at half-mast in memory of two town policemen who were killed three weeks ago, Campbell Robert Munn was indicted in New City for the deaths.
       He will be arraigned on the 15-count indictment before County Judge Theodore Kelly at 3 p.m. today.
       Patrolmen Michael Reedy and Thomas Kennedy were investigating a minor two-car accident on Route 303 in Blauvelt shortly after midnight on Aug. 2. A car, allegedly driven by Munn and traveling an estimated 80 to 90 miles per hour, plowed through the accident site, struck the two officers, throwing them more than 150 feet.
       Reedy, 32, of Pearl River, and Kennedy, 25, of Orangeburg, were apparently killed instantly.
       Munn faces charges of manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, driving while intoxicated with both alcohol and amphetamines, and possession of marijuana. If convicted, the 24-year-old Orangeburg man could spend between 15 to 30 years behind bars.
       According to Assistant District Attorney Kenneth Gribetz, Munn had “20 times the amount of amphetamine in his blood that you might find in someone taking diet pills under a doctor’s supervision.”
       Gribetz defined manslaughter as “recklessly, causing the death of another” and criminally negligent homicide as “the failure to perceive a risk that an ordinary, prudent man would have perceived.” He said the crimes are “complementary” and not “mutually exclusive.”
       Munn is charged with being under the influence of drugs, alcohol, and “drugs and alcohol” at the same time that night. Gribetz said that, according to experts, the mixture of alcohol and amphetamines is more potent than either alone.
       The district attorney’s office and the Orangetown police have appealed to witnesses to come forward.
       According to District Attorney Robert R. Meehan, the request was made because “all the witnesses we have say that others were there. We would like to hear what they have to say now, rather than later.”
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