Yonkers car owners donated their automobile bumpers to our scrap metal drive; the volunteers are replacing them with wooden bumpers. This project was initiated by the Yonkers Junior Chamber of Commerce to obtain every scrap of metal our country needed to build the vehicles and weapons we needed to “brong our boys back home.”
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, Chair of Revolutionary Yonkers 250 and President Untermyer Performing Arts Council
Monday, October 7th
October 7, 1941: Three people— Anthony Rossi, Mary and Samuel Butterworth– were thrown out of bed by a tractor-trailer slamming into their home at on Central Park Avenue. The driver parked the truck in front of a nearby diner on Central Park Avenue to have an early breakfast; within a few minutes later, the truck rolled into the Butterworth home, damaging house walls. The embedded truck had hit the house with such force, it could not be removed until the house was shored up by emergency utility workers.
October 7, 1942: While speaking to the Yonkers Kiwanis, Edward Oakley, survivor of the Lexington lost in the Battle of the Coral Sea on May 8, 1942, spoke about his rescue. Men floating in the water had passed the word to swim towards the destroyers, not to the cruisers. Why? Men on destroyers got better food!
Known as “Lady Lex,” she went down with 35 aircraft, and 216 crewmembers; the Lexington was the first ship lost in WW II. Ships nearby rescued 2,770 men from the Lexington, the USS Sims and the USS Neosho.
Tuesday, October 8th
October 8, 1941: The Yonkers Board of Education “was interested in learning” where dismissed Deputy Superintendent of Buildings and Maintenance Alfred Corbin was; the Board wanted Corbin’s school keys, records, books and Yonkers’ license plate. Special delivery and registered letters sent him were “returned to sender.” Corbin’s special Board of Education license plate was the only one that had been issued to a school employee. Additionally, the office of Chief Assistant DA William Horan was trying to find him to question him regarding a Grand Jury probe about Yonkers.
Corbin hadn’t been seen since collapsing while being questioned in Superintendent Ankenbrand’s office.
Wednesday, October 9th
October 9, 1776: General William Heath dispatched infantry, light horse troops and artillery to the Nepperhan Bridge and the Manor House to assist two American ships beached just below the Manor Hall
October 9, 1942: Industrial Arts teacher Fred Tidaback taught the first Preflight Aviation Class at Yonkers High School. Yonkers had three rooms dedicated to the training: the first. One room had a plane, wind tunnel, benches and a library case. The second room had tools and an aircraft engine, while the third had work benches. The plan was for him to teach at Yonkers High in the morning and at Roosevelt in the afternoon.
Thursday, October 10th
October 10, 1941: The Reverend Alexander Leedie of St. Peter’s Church was ordained a Catholic priest; the first African American Catholic Priest from Yonkers and Westchester County, he had served as a sanctuary (altar) boy at St. Peter’s.
October 10, 1943: The US Army presented their “Action Overhead” Aerial show at the Empire City Racetrack. Structures especially built for the demonstration were bombed and ignited by missiles from the Army planes.
Friday, October 11th
October 11, 1942: Vera Robinson of Pondfield Road West and Chief Petty Officer Bert Rothing, USN, of Ravine Avenue, shared the honor of being the first people to donate their bumpers to the “Bumpers for Victory” drive in Larkin Plaza.
October 11, 1943: Movies of “tomato-growing” employees at the Yonkers Refined Syrups and Sugars plant went international! The film, made by the US Army Signal Corps, showed Sugar House workers caring for thousands of plants grown on top of a company warehouse at the foot of Vark Street. It was sent to Army camps all over the world to show our fighting forces “what the folks on the Homefront were doing!” A Company VP said shortly after a Signal Corps officer read about the company efforts to support their employees in The Herald Statesman, photographers appeared to film their story. The rooftop garden was a company suggestion to make fresh vegetables available to their workers. An estimated 30,000 pounds of vegetables had been produced and given to the workers.
Saturday, October 12th
October 12, 1776: Units of the American Army lay entrenched in camps on Valentine Hill, where Washington made his headquarters before they headed to White Plains.
October 12, 1942: Mrs. Herold Robinson of Pondfield Road West and Chief Petty Officer Bert Rothing, US Navy, shared the honor of donating the first pair of bumpers in the “Bumpers for Victory” drive held in Larkin Plaza.
Thanks to the cooperation of the Yonkers War Salvage Committee, The Herald Statesman and the City of Yonkers, all the major newsreel companies and picture services filmed this moment, showing the world Yonkers had taken leadership of an important patriotic war salvage program.
Sunday, October 13th
October 13, 1894: Two important golf tournaments were held at St. Andrews of Yonkers-on-the-Hudson Golf Course, the first United States Open tournament for professional golfers and the first National Amateur Golf tournament. Willie Dunn, who taught golf in Biarritz, won the professional tournament out of four entrants. Dunn received $100 and a gold medal for his efforts. L. B. Stoddard of Saint Andrew’s won the amateur tournament.
October 13, 1976: President Gerald Ford visited Mayor Angelo Martinelli at Yonkers City Hall; he signed the State and Local Fiscal Assistance Amendments of 1976, while hundreds of school children and adults cheered. Besides our esteemed Mayor, other New York dignitaries witnessing the bill signing were Governor Malcolm Wilson, of Yonkers, Senators Jacob Javits and William Buckley, several Councilmembers, and city hall employees.
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
