Early 20th Century Photo of the Yonkers Recreation Pier
By Mary Hoar, City of Yonkers Historian, President Emerita Yonkers Historical Society, recipient of the 2004 Key to History, Member of the Yonkers Landmarks Preservation Board, and President Untermyer Performing Arts Council
Monday, February 5th
1933: Welfare Commissioner Nicholas Ebbitt bought one thousand pairs of shoes from the US Navy. The Navy originally paid $4.50… Ebbitt paid 25 cents a pair! The shoes were given to Yonkers residents who needed them.
1948: The New York Cardiac Home filed an application for a zoning exception; it wanted to build a $900,000 facility on the twenty-four-acre site just south of Samuel Untermyer Park and Gardens. The new facility would provide complete recuperative facilities to sixty cardiac patients.
Tuesday, February 6th
1956: Air Force Major John Caulfield of Douglas Avenue piloted a flight across the Pacific to Hawaii, while USAF physician Lt. Colonel John Norcross delivered a baby! Passenger Norcross, assisted by crewmembers, helped Mrs. John Garnett have her baby girl.
During the Berlin Airlift, Caulfield won the Air Medal for flying 200 missions for “Operation Vittles.” When the US, France, and Great Britain announced in 1948 they would create a unified German state, Stalin cut off land routes surrounding Berlin. British and American forces flew enough food and fuel to sustain the Berlin population, transporting 2.3 million tons of supplies, the largest humanitarian airlift operation in history.
Wednesday, February 7th
1931: Ben Grady, Captain of Yonkers HS Swim Team, repeated winning the National Interscholastic Diving Championship at the University of Pennsylvania swimming championships!
1956: Gestetner Duplicator Corporation leased 50,000 square feet in the former Alexander Smith plant. Gestetner planned to consolidate three separate facilities; its executive office was at 50 McLean Avenue, a store on South Broadway, and a warehouse on Ashburton Avenue. The Yonkers offices were the US headquarters for the international corporation and oldest duplicating machine company in the world!
Thursday, February 8th
1944: Cameo Curtain Company, John Street, received the Army-Navy “E” production award, the first in its field to receive the “E” award. War goods were 91% of its production; it made fragmentation bomb parachutes, insect field bars, sleeping bag liners, mattress covers, and underwear. Cameo began manufacturing war goods June 1940; its first contract was for mosquito bars.
President Marvin Rosenberg explained they received the award because they had “ingenuity of war manufacturing” and completed contracts on time. Cameo also had good labor relations, and low absence and accident rates.
1944: Yonkers asked the US District Court to determine a “fair and reasonable” rent to charge Blair Shipyards for using our Recreation Pier. The papers were filed to answer a condemnation proceeding the Federal Government brought against Yonkers for the company using our pier at the foot of Main Street. The Feds requisitioned the pier for one year on November 5, 1943; the lease was extendable yearly, depending on the War Shipping Administration’s wishes. Blair hadn’t paid a cent to use the pier, and wanted to use more city property for parking.
Friday, February 9th
1942: Yonkers joined the rest of the country by setting clocks ahead one hour to nationwide War Time at 2 a.m.
1982: Yonkers City Council voted to give Yonkers’ Lincoln Letter to New York State as a “restricted gift. Written to thank Yonkers for raising money, the original was raffled in 1864; copies of it were sold to raise money to care for sick and wounded Civil War soldiers. The winner of the raffle presented the letter to “the people of Yonkers,” as he wanted it displayed in our Village Hall for all to see. Yonkers raised an estimated $16,000 at the fair.
Saturday, February 10th
1925: Thomas Butler of East 236th Street announced a bill calling for annexation of the southeastern part of Yonkers to New York City would be introduced in the State Legislature by State Senator John Dunnigan and Assemblyman Thomas McDonald. Proposed sections to be annexed were McLean Heights, Wakefield Park, Lincoln Park, Lincoln Heights and Sherwood Park.
1935: Carrie Otis Thomas, the first female Justice of the Peace in Yonkers and NYS, died. Thomas was the daughter of Colonel Charles Otis, son of the founder of Otis Elevator Elisha Otis; she was born in a house on the site of the Park Hill train station. A leader of the Woman’s Club drive for City Manager government, she was active in the Republican Federation of Yonkers, the Women’s Club of Yonkers and was former chair of the Yonkers League for Women Voters. Mother of Otis Thomas killed in WWI, she also was active in Yonkers Gold Star mothers. In 1933, she went to France with other Gold Star mothers to visit her son’s grave. After her passing, W. Berkeley, Director of Yonkers Museum of Science and Art, paid tribute to her; she donated a large collection of dolls to the Museum when it opened.
Sunday, February 11th:
1942: Herald Statesman staff members spotted Patrolman Ray Connolly entering New York City FBI Headquarters. When they asked the patrolman, dressed in uniform, why he was there, he mysteriously replied, “Can’t tell.” No one in the FBI gave information, and it remained a mystery until someone inquired at Police Headquarters. Connolly was picking up a movie to use for Yonkers Police Auxiliary training.
1944: The Yonkers Board of Education, after a request from our Vocational and Extension Education Advisory Board, authorized School Superintendent William Ankenbrand to create an aviation trades and science curriculum, and submit it to the State Education Department’s Deputy Commissioner of Vocational Education for approval. Equipment from the discontinued School of Aeronautical Manufacturing could be used for the new coursework. The very successful school was a victim of its own success; it closed a few days earlier because it successfully trained and supplied almost 10,000 workers to airports and defense industries throughout the country!
Questions or comments on this column? Email YonkersHistory1646@gmail.com.
For information on the Yonkers Historical Society, Sherwood House and upcoming events, please visit our website www.yonkershistoricalsociety.org, call 914-961-8940 or email info@yonkershistoricalsociety.org.
