Freak Storm Reportedly Drowned Dozens of People Off Pelham Shores in 1922

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On a beautiful, lazy late afternoon in the spring of 1922, nearly twenty thousand people descended on City Island to swim and fish in Long Island Sound.  It was June 11, 1922.  Hundreds and hundreds of canoes, skiffs, rowboats, sailboats, and other watercraft plied the waters around City Island from Execution Light to Hunter's Island and beyond.

Bathers crowded local beaches on City Island, on Hunter's Island, and on the mainland.  Indeed, hundreds of bathers crowded onto the property of the City Island Bathing House to enjoy a lovely Sunday afternoon.

Shortly before 5:45 p.m. that day, the proprietors of the City Island Bathing House noticed something strange on the horizon.  It looked like a monumental, dark-colored wall approaching.  Though it took a little time, it became clear that a massive storm was approaching quickly.  The proprietors began shooing bathers out of the water as the storm quickly overtook the region.

All hell broke loose.  One eyewitness described the storm as a "Kansas twister."  Winds were clocked as high as 88 miles per hour.  The skies unleashed a "white blanket" of hail.  Within moments, hundreds of pleasure craft in Long Island Sound were capsized.  Many drowned immediately.  Others fought for their lives and clung to capsized craft in the heavy waves and high winds.  Volunteers at life saving stations on City Island and Hunter's Island launched small craft and began dragging exhausted excursionists out of the heavy waters.  One rescuer tried to save a drowning man, but was dragged under by the man.  Both drowned.

Everywhere there were heartrending scenes.  In one rowboat, eight people including a young mother and her infant daughter were tossed into the waters.  One of the passengers tried to save the baby.  She sank beneath the waves, as did the infant.  The distraught mother clung to the side of the rowboat as others tried to keep her from going under the heavy waters.  A tree fell into a chimney at a hotel on Boston Post Road.  The tree and chimney collapsed the roof and crushed a couple to death inside.  Lightning killed two people.  Others were electrocuted by downed power lines.  A new Ferris wheel in an amusement park on nearby Clason's Point was blown over into the waters of long Island Sound, killing seven and injuring 35.  

Fifteen minutes later, the storm passed.  Pandemonium began.  Bodies were floating in Long Island Sound.  Rescuers crowded onto launches and began plying the waters of the Sound searching for survivors.  Husbands, wives, sons, and daughters crowded City Island beaches searching for any sign of missing loved ones.  Indeed, according to one account:

"Following the tragedy, City island became a scene of pandemonium.  Many of the men who had gone out to fish had left their wives and children there to picnic.  As soon as knowledge of the drowning became general and heads of the families, sons, and in some instances daughters, failed to return the survivors became hysterical."

All communication with the outside world was cut off.  The storm had severed not only electrical lines, but also phone lines.  Indeed, it was three hours before word of the catastrophe reached the rest of the region including New York City authorities.

Soon bodies began washing ashore from Larchmont to City Island.  The casualty list began to grow.  Confusion reigned.  Newspapers the following day reported up to 75 deaths in the freak storm.  The newspapers published the identities of the confirmed dead, but quoted police as saying it would be days before all the missing persons reports could be resolved and a true tally of the dead would be known. 

One boat rental facility reported that 46 of its rowboats were missing after the storm.  All were in use at the time the storm hit.  People began lining up outside a City Island police station seeking any information they could obtain about their loved ones.  There were so many people waiting for news of missing loved ones that the very long line became a human conveyor belt.  As the person at the head of the line asked police about missing loved ones, if nothing was known, that person would return to the end of the line and wait in line again until reaching the front and asking again.

A local bathing house was used as a makeshift morgue.  There the scenes were heart-breaking.  According to one account:

"There were many heartrending scenes as friends and relatives of the drowned identified them.  So many men, women and children became hysterical that it was necessary for the police to remove them to other parts of the island and keep them under observation.  Relatives of the missing were equally affected."

The freak storm did millions of dollars of damage in the region.  It only took fifteen minutes, but those fifteen minutes unleashed death, devastation, and pandemonium on Pelham and the surrounding region on that late spring day nearly one hundred years ago.

Wreck of Clason Point Ferris Wheel After June 11, 1922 Storm.
Source:  POLICE PUT STORM DEATH LIST AT 75, The Evening
World [NY, NY], Jun. 12, 1922, Vol. LXII, No. 22,073, p. 1, cols. 1-8
& p. 2, cols. 1-3.  NOTE:  Click on Image to Enlarge.

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There were hundreds and hundreds of newspaper articles written about the freak storm on June 11, 1922.  Below is the text of two such articles.  Each is followed by a citation and link to its source.

"POLICE PUT STORM DEATH LIST AT 75
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POLICE PLACE DEATH LIST IN STORM AT 75, WITH BODIES OF 47 RECOVERED
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Biggest Mortality Was at City Island, Where 16 Drowned and 46 Rowboats Are Unaccounted For.
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Seven Killed When Ferris Wheel at Clason Point Collapses -- Property Damage Incalculable.
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The official police estimate of the number of victims of the storm that swept this city and vicinity yesterday evening is seventy-five.  It is known that forty-seven were drowned or otherwise killed.  The estimate of seventy-five is based upon the number of inquiries that have been made about missing persons at Bronx and Westchester Police Stations.

Thousands visited the Fordham Morgue to-day and looked at the bodies there.  It would appear that most of the visitors were looking for missing relatives.  From the number of rowboats, canoes and motor boats that have been washed ashore along the Sound beaches between the Harlem River and Greenwich, Conn., the estimate of seventy-five victims in this vicinity seems to be low.

The greatest loss of life by drowning was at City Island, where the storm came with terrific fury and hundreds were caught far from shore in canoes and rowboats.  One boathouse at City Island reported to-day that forty-six rowboats rented yesterday before the storm are missing.

At New Rochelle James Stroker lost his life while trying to rescue five Italians from a capsized rowboat.  Stroker and Charles McGrath of Larchmont were on shore and saw the rowboat capsize.  They went out in a launch and saved three of the five men.  Two of the Italians were drowned and one of them dragged Stroker down with him.

The body of a young man wearing a blue sweater, white trousers and white shoes came ashore at Larchmont Yacht Club shortly before noon.  There were no identifying marks on the clothing.

Harry Klein of No. 1619 Washington Avenue, the Bronx, reported to the City Island police to-day that Sadie Dexler, 19 years old, a stenographer, of No. 496 East 174th Street, was drowned in the storm.  According to Klein, he and Miss Dexler were in canoes a short distance off shore when the storm broke.  The canoes were capsized.  He made an effort to save the young woman, but she was swept from his reach.

Among those reported missing were Miss Rita Anderson of No. 103 Centre Street, City Island, an eighteen-year-old stenographer, and B. A. McLaughlin, a young man who had taken her out for a row on the Sound from Lane's Beach.  They returned home late last night, explaining that their boat had been swamped by the waves kicked up by the storm.  When they righted it, the oars were gone.  It took them three hours, paddling with their hands to reach Nevin's Dock on the Bronx shore.

Moe Buskin, twenty-three, No. 230 Miller Avenue, Brooklyn, a salesman, is believed to have drowned.  His friend, Don Selvin, No. 1220 42d Street, Brooklyn, reported to the police of the City Island Station this morning.

'There were four of us in a canoe,' he said, 'and the storm came upon us between Hart's Island and Half Moon Beach.  Three of us, including Mr. and Mrs. Gerald Moss, managed to cling to the upset canoe and were rescued by a lighter.  But Buskin drifted out with the tide.'

The 50-foot sloop yacht Viking capsized in Larchmont Harbor.  Three women were caught in the cabin of the yacht.  To rescue them it was necessary for the crew to swim to shore, get axes and steam out to the yacht in a launch and cut a hole in the hull.  The women were uninjured.

The Sound shore of Westchester was in darkness last night.  Officials of electric light companies say it will take a week to repair the damage done in a few minutes.

Carl Vollmer, twenty-two, of Pennyfield Road, Bronx, was reported missing to the police by his mother, Bella, to-day.  He went canoeing off City island yesterday and has not returned.  It is believed he was drowned.

Death came not only by drowning.  Some were killed by falling trees; others were struck by lightning and others were electrocuted by fallen high power feed wires.  The catastrophe was made worse by the cutting off of communication when telephone wires were broken.  Most of those who were killed and injured were far from their homes.

RAILROADS WASHED OUT AND TRAINS STALLED.

Up-State there are reports of railroads washed out; highways blocked by fallen trees and gutted by torrents.  The City of Oneida was five feet under water for an hour.  Syracuse reports a loss of $1,000,000.  

Scores of the 3,000 trees recently planted in Central Park were uprooted.  

Seven persons were killed and thirty-five injured when a Ferris wheel at Clason Point Park in the Bronx was torn apart and blown into Long Island Sound.  A man was killed by a live wire in Newark.  A tree was blown on the brick chimney of Red Lion Inn on the Boston Post Road, killing a mother and daughter at a table.

Motor cars were abandoned in many parts of the metropolitan district by their owners in seeking safety.  One woman left her car near Hackensack only to be killed by a falling tree, and a similar fate overtook a man near Piping Rock. L. I.  A condemned tree in Mount Vernon fell on a woman and child, killing both.  These are but a few of the accidents, hundreds of them of a minor nature.

The storm swept up from Pennsylvania, through New Jersey and New York, the wind at times having a velocity of 88 miles an hour.  Before passing out to sea it split into three distinct but short disturbances.  It was the second storm of the day which did the most damage, the first being mild.

Many who saw the approach of the afternoon storm, which lasted only about fifteen minutes, said it resembled a Kansas 'twister.'

Valentine Fendrich, chief of the Fire Alarm Telegraph Bureau, sent out every man in his department to repair storm damage.  Fifteen lines were broken in Brooklyn, ten in the Bronx and five in Queens.  Comparatively little damage was done in Manhattan, where the wires are all underground.

Mr. Fendrich said that the overhead wire system in other boroughs were at the mercy of a storm such as that of yesterday and he meant to use the experience to emphasize his recommendation that the wires in Brooklyn, Queens, Bronx and Richmond be put under ground as rapidly as possible.

Credit for reducing the total of casualties was given by the police to-day to the management of the City Island Bathing House.  Attaches seeing the black clouds approaching called in the hundreds of bathers from the water and when the first fierce gust of wind broke all the pleasure seekers were safely under shelter.

Among the 20,000 holiday makers about the island were the regular summer colony, week-end campers and many visitors.  The storm descended suddenly at 5.45.  Bathers and others on the beach escaped easily, but few of the boats could reach shore.  Just how many persons were picked up from the water by life-savers and members of nearby boat clubs never will be known.

MOST OF THE VICTIMS IN SKIFFS AND CANOES.

The known casualties were mostly off Execution Light, six miles east of City Island; Rat Island, three miles east, and an island a mile north, in waters known as fishing grounds.  Most of the overturned boats were skiffs and canoes, many containing women and children.  Those who aided in keeping down fatalities after the first blast were crews of the two stations of the United States Volunteer Life Saving Corps on City Island and Hunter's Island, and the members of the City Island, Metropolitan, Stuyvesant, Morrisania and Oak Point yacht and boat clubs.  In many cases girls and young men were dragged from the water by the experienced water men just as they were about to succumb.

The police boat John F. Hylan and other boats of the Marine Division played powerful searchlights on the water all night, but early to-day no further bodies had been recovered.  The police were waiting for the tide to turn when it was expected other bodies would be washed ashore, but they continued grappling.  

City Island at 4 A. M. was still in darkness and the telephone wires were still down, not even the Fire Department there having a connection.

THE DEAD.

PETGOLD, MARY, fifty-two, No. 3416 Levere Street.
KAPLAN, BEATRICE, thirteen, No. 346 Pacific Street, Brooklyn.
KOHLER, AGNES, three, No. 236 West 11th Street.
RIGOFF, MARION, No. 1472 Seabury Place, the Bronx.
[Illegible], JULIA, twenty-six, a stenographer, No. 848 Whitlock Avenue.
FARLEY, PATRICK, thirty-eight, No. 41 Commerce Street.
BUSKIN, MOE, twenty-three, No. 200 Miller Avenue, Brooklyn.
LONDON, MORRIS, twenty-one, No. 734 East 165th Street, the Bronx.
REITTER, ISIDOR, nineteen, No. 21 Charles Street.
KEINING, JOHN, thirty, No. 2416 Levere Street, Bronx.
KEINING, GEORGE, two and a half years.
PFOFFENDORF, ALFRED, six months.
DEXLER, SADIE, nineteen, No. 496 East 174th st., Bronx.
STROKER, JAMES, No. 32 Union Avenue, New Rochelle.
GRATTINO, JOHN, No. 234 East 105th Street.
GUIDE, SALVATOR, No. 1957 First Avenue.
Unidentified man in yachting apparel washed ashore at Larchmont Yacht Club.

There were many heartrending scenes as friends and relatives of the drowned identified them.  So many men, women and children became hysterical that it was necessary for the police to remove them to other parts of the island and keep them under observation.  Relatives of the missing were equally affected.

The wind, which struck Pelham Bay at 5.45 and blew until 6 o'clock with the fury of a hurricane, left in its wake a scene of desolation.  Trees were uprooted, buildings were unroofed, windows were shattered and telephone and electric light wires were blown down.

This resulted in the severing of all communication with the island.  As a consequence, news of the tragedy did not become generally known outside until three hours after its occurrence.  The island police were handicapped, as they could not summon ambulances or aid except by crossing the bridge leading to the mainland by motor.


Lieut. Reilly went over about 9 o'clock and flashed word to Police Headquarters.  In the meantime yacht clubs in the vicinity and crews of two life saving stations started the work of rescue in motor boats.  They were joined when darkness fell by the police boat John F. Hylan, which cruised about, throwing its searchlights over the waters.

Scores of amateur fishermen, men, women and children, were rescued, clinging to the keels of their overturned boats.  Others had been carried close enough in to wade ashore.  Many of the boats were without occupants.  

'There is no way of knowing just how many were drowned until several days have elapsed,' said Lieut. Reilly.  'Many of the people who come here on Sundays to swim or sail are from Manhattan, Brooklyn, and New Jersey towns.  We shall have to wait until we check up with families who report missing persons who left home with the intention of coming here to spend the day.'

ALL NIGHT HUNT FOR BODIES OF VICTIMS.

One of a party on a yacht owned by Tom Conrad, a song writer, told last night of the rescue of three men from a swamped motor boat on the Sound.  The hail was to thick it formed a blinding white blanket, he said, and the yacht passed the boat before the men were seen.  They went back and pulled them out of the water.

The waters of the Sound were dotted with overturned boats, hats and articles of clothing, he said, for a distance of several miles.  At the Stuyvesant Yacht Club on City Island members saw that a catastrophe had happened.  They jumped into boats and joined the rescue work.

All night hundreds of persons knowing that members of their families had gone to City Island for the day, went there by automobile or in any other way possible.  They lined the street in front of the police station asking for information of relatives and friends, and when there was no information passed down to the foot of the line to ask again later.

The search by the police caused additional excitement among the crowds.  Patrolmen laden with hats, pocketbooks, parts of women's and men's clothing, shoes and stockings came to the police station.  The pile grew larger every minute and the work of tabulating the articles was handicapped by the fact that the desk Lieutenants and Sergeants pressed into service had to work by the light of candles, oil lamps and lanterns.

Mrs. Petgold and Agnes Kohler, three years old, two of the identified dead, were in the rowboat with six other persons who were rescued.  The storm caught this party in Pelham Bay.  The boat overturned almost immediately and all were thrown into the water.

Mrs. Petgold, who tried to save the child, sank at once, and the others of the party, including Mrs. Katherine Kohler, the child's mother, managed to keep afloat.  Mrs. Kohler was saved by members of the Stuyvesant Yacht Club.  Albert and Edward Ottes and F. E. Acker of the Hunter's Island life-saving station rescued Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Thessendorf of No. 333 East 118th Street, Miss Anna Bursall and another person whose name was not obtained.

FOUR MEN MISSING FROM LAUNCH IN THE SOUND.

A 33-foot glass cabined launch drifted into the float of the Clason Point Yacht Club, Clason Point, the Bronx.  Its Custom license is 171.  A man who reported the finding of the launch said he had seen the boat earlier in the day with four men on it, but no trace of the men was found when the launch drifted in.

the police of Greenwich, Conn., early to-day notified Detective Sergt. Wiessmer, of the Missing Bureau at Police Headquarters, that Gladys Redinger, twenty-four years old, of No. 803 East 116th Street, had been taken to a hospital in Greenwich last night after being rescued from Long Island Sound.  John Anderson, of No. 4138 Disney Avenue, the Bronx, who, the police say, was the rescued girl's fiance, was drowned.

William Taylor, nineteen years old, of No. 2063 Crotona Avenue, the Bronx, who aided in rescuing ten or fifteen persons thrown into the Sound from rowboats off City Island, was taken from his home early this morning to Fordham Hospital suffering from submersion.  Taylor assisted in the work of rescue until he became exhausted and had to be rescued himself.  After being attended he was taken to his home in an automobile, and after telling his family of the horrors he had witnessed and saying nothing of the heroic part he himself had played in the rescue work, the young man collapsed.  

According to reports received at Police Headquarters Anderson and the young woman were canoeing on the Sound and were caught in the storm.  The canoe was overturned and its occupants thrown into the water, Anderson swam with the girl to the canoe and helped her cling to it.

The yacht 'Countess,' owned by J. B. Dunbough, of No. 177 Summit Avenue, Mount Vernon, passed nearby and went to the rescue.  Miss Redinger was reached in time and lifted into the yacht.  Anderson, his strength exhausted in holding his fiancee against the side of the canoe, lost his hold on the boat and sank beneath the water before rescuers could reach him."

Source:  POLICE PUT STORM DEATH LIST AT 75, The Evening World [NY, NY], Jun. 12, 1922, Vol. LXII, No. 22,073, p. 1, cols. 1-8 & p. 2, cols. 1-3.  

"50 DIE IN STORM IN GREATER N.Y.
UPSTATE PROPERTY LOSS TO RUN INTO MILLIONS
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SCORES OF PLEASURE BOATS OVERTURNED AS WILD GALE SWEEPS LONG ISLAND SOUND
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Eight Bodies Recovered -- Police Believe 30 More Missing -- Pandemonium Reigns at Sunday Resort as Hysterical Women Fail to Find Husbands and Sons -- Six Perish as Ferris Wheel Is Wrecked.
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TWO KILLED WHEN TREE CRASHES THROUGH ROOF ON DINNER PARTY
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NEW YORK, June 11 -- Fifty persons are reported to have been drowned off City Island in Long Island Sound when the mad storm that hit the city late today capsized scores of small pleasure craft.  Eight bodies have been recovered and thirty more persons are reported missing.

Twenty thousand holiday-makers went to City Island today and half went out on the waters of Pelham Bay.  It was jammed with boats of every description when the storm hit it.  Few had opportunity to get ashore.  The known casualties occurred off Execution Light, which is about six miles east of City Island; Rat Island, about three miles east, and another island nearby.

Ten Thousand Were Fishing.

It is estimated by Lieut. Joseph Reilly of the City Island detectives that no fewer than 10,000 persons were fishing off those places when the storm broke.  After it had passed and the sky cleared, the waters of Pelham bay and Long Island sound were dotted with overturned rowboats, launches, canoes and yachts.

The police immediately started the work of rescue.  At 9 o'clock tonight eight bodies had been recovered, and Lieut. Reilly said he was making a conservative estimate when he put the bodies to be recovered at thirty.

Scene of Pandemonium.

Following the tragedy, City island became a scene of pandemonium.  Many of the men who had gone out to fish had left their wives and children there to picnic.  As soon as knowledge of the drowning became general and heads of the families, sons, and in some instances daughters, failed to return the survivors became hysterical.

All communication by telephone with the island was cut off by the razing of wires and telephone poles, and this hampered the police.  They improvised a morgue in one of the bathing pavilions and as rapidly as the bodies were recovered they were taken there for identification.

Six Killed on Ferris Wheel.

Six persons were killed and more than forty hurt when the wind caught a huge Ferris wheel at a Clason Point amusement park and crushed it to the ground.

A women and her seven-year-old daughter were crushed to death and several other persons injured when an oak tree blown by the wind crashed through the roof to the crowded dining room of the Red Lion inn in Boston Post road, carrying with it an old-fashioned stone chimney.

The dead were taken from the cars that were thrown into the sound.  The wheel, 100 feet in diameter, was constructed only recently, park officials said, and was considered one of the best in the country.

The dead:

Louis Dorotio, 524 Edith street, Old Forge.
Emily Lawyer, New York.
Mrs. Pasquale Kreda, New York.
Idella Vanderpool.
Pellegrino Fasuk.
Unidentified boy.

Among the seriously injured were:  Pasquale Kreda, Kenneth Lawyer, Anita Schalk and Anna Fleet.

Paul Simon, owner and operator of the wheel, was arrested on order of Assistant District Attorney Quigley on a charge of homicide.

The bodies of seven canoeists caught in Long Island sound off City island at the height of the storm were washed ashore after nightfall.

Girl Blown Overboard, Drowned.

Miss Edda Smith, seventeen, walking with a companion along the Reservoir road at Ossining, was blown into the water and drowned.  

Charles Emerson, New Rochelle clothing manufacturer, was rowing in Echo bay with his wife and three children when the storm broke.  He managed to row to shore, then died from a heart attack.

A tree fell across a party of motorists seeking shelter on the Brookville road near Locust Valley, Long Island, killing Harry Halleran of Oyster Bay, and seriously injuring his three men companions.

Unable to reach shore in the stiff wind, Jack Lowenthal, twenty, was drowned while swimming in East river.

Two Killed by Lightning.

Concetti Basiataso and his ten-year-old son Anthony of Mount Vernon were killed when a tree, under which they had found shelter in the Bronx, was struck by lightning.

Two men were killed in Newark, N. J., when they came in contact with electric wires torn down by the wind.

A massive decayed tree on the New York - Westchester county line at Mount Vernon fell, crushing to death Mrs. Cassie Cacavalle and her infant son.

Moe Ruskin, one of a party of canoeists in Echo bay, was drowned.  Three other members of the party swam to shore after the canoe capsized.

Ten excursionists on the ferryboat Hildegrad, returning from Interstate park, N.J. to West 158th street, were injured when the wind tore a lifeboat from its davits.  In falling the boat struck the railing of the lower deck at a spot where about a dozen passengers had gathered for shelter, then it slid into the river and disappeared.  Sidney Jacob, fourteen, was badly hurt and was taken to a hospital.  Others injured were able to go to their homes."

Source:  50 DIE IN STORM IN GREATER N.Y. -- UPSTATE PROPERTY LOSS TO RUN INTO MILLIONS, Buffalo Courier [Buffalo, NY], Jun. 12, 1922, Vol. LXXXVII, No. 163, p. 1, cols. 1-8.  

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Destructive Blizzard Hammered Pelham 104 Years Ago Today

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With yet another Nor'easter bearing down on the little Town of Pelham and expected to howl over us beginning this evening, it seems appropriate to recall another Nor'easter that slammed Pelham and the New York City region one hundred and four years ago today and tomorrow (March 1-2, 1914).  The massive storm was, at that time, the largest and most destructive storm to crash into Pelham since the massive Blizzard of 1888 that hit on March 12-13, 1888.  To make matters worse, the storm followed on the heels of another blizzard that had blanketed the area with snow on February 14, 1914.  The snow from that Valentine's Day storm had not yet entirely melted.

At about 7:00 a.m. on Sunday, March 1, 1914, rain began splattering across the Pelham region.  Though the temperature was about 35 degrees all day long, by mid-morning the rain turned to a heavy snow that began to collect as slush on the streets, sidewalks, ground, and grass.  It clung tenaciously to trees throughout the region.

Around noon that day, the wind began to howl.  At times later in the day wind gusts reached 85 miles per hour -- well above hurricane-force winds.  As one might expect, trees and large tree branches throughout the region began toppling -- many onto electrical lines, trolley lines, telephone lines, and utility poles.  Others fell across roadways including a particularly large tree that fell across Boston Post Road at Fowler Avenue in Pelham Manor, taking down electrical lines with it.

Trolley lines ground to a halt.  The storm became so bad that trolley cars in the Village of North Pelham and in the Village of North Pelham became stranded on the tracks.  The problem often was not that the trolley cars were stuck in heavy snow but, instead, the tracks became so slippery with the slushy snow that trolley motormen inadvertently burned out the motors of the trolley cars trying to get the cars to move along the slippery tracks.  Trolley cars sat stranded in the midst of Pelham streets for much of the day and evening as the storm raged.

Only ten or twelve inches of snow fell in the Pelham region during the Nor'easter of March 1, 1914.  The howling wind of the gale, however, did tremendous damage.  The next day, United Press reported that at least eight people had died in the New York region during the storm.  The same report stated:

"With railroad tracks piled deep with snow, telegraph and telephone lines down, and traffic of every sort completely tied up, the entire east was today paralyzed in the grip of the worst storm in years.  A blinding snow driven before a high gale continued to swirl and drive through the storm section this afternoon.  Railroads canceled trains entirely.  No attempt was made to carry passengers and reports were lacking on trains from the west due in here yesterday.  Losses as the result of the storm will probably run into the millions.  Meagre reports received from the railroads indicates staggering damage has been done by the high winds and the heavy snow.  A foot of snow has fallen here up to noon today.  Weather bureau officials said the storm might abate this afternoon or tonight, but the tie-up is now so complete that it will require days for the cities and town of the east to dig themselves out."

The region, of course, dug out of the snow, cleaned up the damage and, where necessary, rebuilt.  The Nor'easter of 1914, it seems, was merely another reminder like the Great Blizzard of 1888 why we say that March comes "in like a lion."

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"MOST DESTRUCTIVE BLIZZARD IN TWENTY YEARS SWEEPS SECTION
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Trolley Service Completely Out of Commission Up to an Early Hour this Afternoon -- Telegraph and Telephone Service Crippled for Time -- Lighting Company Kept Busy Repairing Breaks as Falling Trees Tear Down Wires -- 85 Mile Gale Brings Ruin in Its Path -- Money Loss is Going to be Heavy -- Streets Filled with Snow and Slush
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Spreading ruin in its path, a blizzard that was more destructive than that of any in the last 20 years swept over Mount Vernon yesterday and last night.  Today the following are grim reminders of the visitation:

Ten-inch sheet of snow, ice and slush over everything, making many crosswalks impassable and converting sidewalks and gutters into slushy lakes which look innocent enough but in which pedestrians sink ankle-deep in water.

Much property damage, consisting of broken windows, signs, doors, trees, telephone poles.

Crippled traffic on railroads and trolleys.  Trains behind tine, while for nearly 24 hours not a wheel has turned on the trolley lines except where men tried to operate snow plows and sweepers, but the snow is so heavy that they made little progress.

Lighting system threatened by falling trees and poles.  Southern section of city without light.

Hundreds of telephones out of commission caused by snapping wires.

Deliveries of foodstuffs delayed or entirely prevented.

More snow fell today, considerably hampering the work of digging Mount Vernon out.  To make matters worse, the temperature began to drop this afternoon.  A cold wave would convert the slushy snow into thick ice.

Public schools in Mount Vernon are shut down today, it being realized that to send children out of their homes in such weather would be jeopardizing their lives.  While the storm was at its height last night few persons ventured out on the streets and consequently many churches were dark.

A northwest gale that at times attained a velocity of 85 miles blew unceasingly last night, accompanied by a precipitation that alternately turned from snow to rain and some times mixtures of both.  All in all, it was one of the worst nights on record here.  While the storm did not result in nearly as much snow as the famous blizzard of 1888, nevertheless while it was far more destructive and fierce than anything within the memory of the present generation.

With snow covering the ground from the blizzard of February 14, which had succumbed somewhat to three days of thaw, rain began to fall yesterday morning about 7 o'clock.  Those seeing the rain welcomed it, thinking it would be the means of washing away what remained of the previous snowfall.  However, the rain soon turned to snow and soon the streets were full of slush.

People emerging from church at neon, found that they could not step anywhere without sinking over their rubbers into the watery slush.  The temperature was over 35 degrees all day.  In the early afternoon the wind arose, flinging rain and snow all about.  The snow fell fast, great big flakes that soon covered up the slush.  There were few flakes although the wind raged.  The snow, very damp and heavy, lay where it fell.

Those who had left their homes in the morning to go visiting found themselves in a bad fix on returning home.  Persons were thrown to the ground and became soaking wet.

Mayor Fiske was at his office yesterday afternoon and with Deputy Public Works Commissioner Benedetto did what they could to relieve the conditions that were fast growing worse.  A half hundred snow shovelers were sent out to clear the crosswalks, but at 7:30 p.m., buffeted about by wind and wet to the skin, they gave up their task.  City snowplows and gutter plows were sent out, but the snow was so heavy that little could be done yesterday.

Today sixty men were sent out to clear the crosswalks and drains.  No further steps will be taken to remove the snow, Mayor Fiske said, until it is seen what new developments take place.  It is impossible, he said, to haul the slush.  Consequently no carting of snow was carried on.  No garbage collections were made today.

Everybody clean off sidewalks, not only the walks, but their gutters, too, was an order issued by Mayor Fiske.  The mayor notified the police department to enforce strictly the city ordinance which provides that snow and ice must be removed in a certain time.  The ordinance in question will be 
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(Continued on Page Five.)

MOST DESTRUCTIVE BLIZZARD IN CITY
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(Continued From Page One).
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found in an advertisement on the first page of the Argus.  Prosecutions will follow neglect to obey the law, Mayor Fiske said.

A wagon manned by three city employes started out this morning to make the rounds of the city, picking up parts of broken trees.  Eight snow plows were also put to work.  Six gangs of seven shovelers each were sent to the various wards, one gang going to each ward except in the Fourth ward, where two gangs were detailed.

'There's no use trying to haul this stuff away,' said Public Works Commissioner Harlow.  'It is too heavy.  It is packing down well and the wagons and autos are not having so much difficulty as they did two weeks ago.'  The commissioner added that there has been one continual round of complaints from persons wanting crosswalks cleared.

Lieutenant Clark at police headquarters is suffering from writer's cramp today after the many reports of storm damage that occurred.  The flag pole on the city hall snapped under the pressure of the gale.  Three men were sent onto the roof today to pick up the remnants.  The following reports of damage were made at the police station.

Telephone wires down at Stevens avenue and West Lincoln avenue.  East Sidney avenue near the fire house.  Electric light wires down at Fifth avenue and First street, Sand street and Gramatan avenue.  Lights were reported to have burned the Fourth avenue and Fifth avenue bridges slightly before being put out.  An electric light wire burned a tree on Third avenue near Third street where the cable broke.

A large branch was reported to be hanging from a tree on Ninth avenue near Fourth street.  It was removed by the department of public works.  A Western Union cable snapped on South Railroad avenue.  Scores of large limbs were blown from trees, and in some instances whole trees went down.  Trees were damaged at Brookside avenue near Fourth street, Mount Vernon avenue and Short street, before 137 Summit avenue, Third avenue, and Fourth and Fifth streets, Fourth street between Third and Fourth avenues.

Windows were blown in at the Anderson Realty office, Third avenue and First street;  Marcus Bros., grocers, 495 West Lincoln avenue.

A broken trolley pole was found hanging from some wires at Mount Vernon avenue and West street.

A section of the large sign board on top of the building on the northeast corner of Fourth avenue and First street, facing East First street, was blown down.  The signboard was plastered with wet snow and this fact together with the wind caused the board to collapse and topple over.  The section facing Fourth avenue did not blow over.

For the first time in years the no school signal, '9-9-9' was sounded this morning at 8 o'clock at headquarters by order for the board of education.  It was a rather unusual coincidence that the no school signals in this city, New Rochelle and Tuckahoe were all sounded at the same time.

Fire Commissioner Howland, early yesterday afternoon instructed Fire Chief Nicholas Ehrbar to issue orders to all of the paid firemen to immediately go on duty at their respective fire houses and to sleep there.  They will remain there until countermanding orders are given.  Chief Ehrbar said that the arrangements at the several fire houses for drawing the pieces of apparatus in cases of fire are the same as those which went into effect on the day of the first blizzard.  There are chains and ropes on the wheels of the automobile apparatus.

In case the auto apparatus of Truck 1 cannot be used the light truck now at headquarters will respond.  It is hoped that residents of the city will continue to exercise diligence in regard to leaving waste paper in the cellar and at the foot of the stairs so as to avoid any possibility of fires breaking out by matches being thrown about.

Not in years has the trolley service in this city been so badly crippled.  Not a trolley car has been operated in this city since last night, up to press time this afternoon.  The trouble is due to the ice on the tracks which formed after the cold set in early last evening and froze the slush in the grooves, and also to the fact that the water in the tracks coming from the melting snow and the slush, got into the motors and caused them to burn out.  More cars were crippled by burned motors than in any other way.

Late in the afternoon the real trouble began and Supt. William B. Wheeler and his assistants were kept busy trying to operate at least a few cars.

First, one of the Chester Hill cars became stalled on East Lincoln avenue near Fletcher avenue about 5 o'clock.  Prior to that the cars had simply crawled along their lines.  Then another car became stalled on the same street and still another one was unable to be operated beyond North Columbus avenue.

It was 7 o'clock when trolley service on the line east of Fulton avenue and Third street went out of commission for about an hour.  This was due to the fact that one of the high tension wires of the Westchester Lighting Co., covered with a blanket of snow, was blown down by the gale and it fell across the trolley wires on Echo avenue, New Rochelle.  Not a car was operated until this wire was removed.  The Pelham manor trolley service was affected also.  Then a short time after that, another of the lighting company wires fell across the wires on the corner of Fowler avenue and Boston Post road in Pelham Manor, and Boston Post road in Pelham Manor, and once more the trolley service between New Rochelle and East Third street was put out of commission.  The trouble was overcome and the situation improved, but not to a great extent as from that time on only a few cars were run between New Rochelle and 177th street.

The Third avenue elevated cars and the Williamsbridge and Mount Vernon cars crawled along until 2 o'clock this morning when one of the big red cars operated by the Union Railway Co., on the Williamsbridge-Mount Vernon line became stalled at 233rd street and White Plains road and then came a blockade.  Not a car was operated on the main line into this city.  After that hour no more New Rochelle cars were operated to 177th street, the cars simply making the loop around First street from Fourth avenue to Fifth avenue and then back to New Rochelle.

The one Harlem station car became crippled when the motor burned out late last night at Scott's bridge.  Both of the North Pelham cars were stalled as were the Fifth avenue cars.  The Fifth avenue line was blocked by a car which could not be moved from Seventh street, near the switch.

The Sixth street and Fulton avenue car became stalled at 1 o'clock this morning at the foot of the hill on Union avenue and Sixth street, the motors burning out as a result of the water and slush on the tracks.

The blockade on the White Plains line began at 3:30 o'clock when one of the large double truck cars on its way to this city got as far as a point between Williams and Cedar streets on Gramatan avenue, when it could not be operated any farther in the snow and there it remained.  The passengers walked to this city in the storm and wind.

No cars were operated between Harlem station and Yonkers this morning and the West Mount Vernon cars could not be run in Webster avenue.

The Westchester Lighting company considers that its escape from any great amount of damage is quite remarkable in view of the fact that in New Jersey and vicinity thousands of poles were blown down.  No a pole owned by the Westchester Lighting company, was blown down in this city and vicinity according to information given out at the offices of the company.  All of the trouble with the lighting system was due to the fact that wires were torn down by falling trees.

While the gale was at its height a tree was blown down on Third avenue, between Second and Third streets.  It carried lighting company wires with it.  It was then about 6 o'clock and the system on Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth avenues south of Third street was out of commission all night.  Superintendent Green had a gang of men at work all night.

A tree was blown down on the corner of Brookside avenue and Fourth street, but the wire which was carried down, only provided current for the pumping station near there and for one or two houses.  Another tree was blown down on Gramatan and more wires of the lighting company were torn down, but again the company was fortunate in that only a few houses on Gramatan avenue were cut off from light.  A part of the lighting system of Bronxville was affected, but as a gang of men was rushed to the scene of the trouble, the wires were put back into place again by 8 o'clock.  A wire came down on First street and South Fifth avenue at a point near the New Haven cut.

The most serious trouble occurred on Fowler avenue and Boston Post road in Pelham Manor about 7 o'clock when a large tree covered with snow collapsed.  The emergency cut in was quickly made, otherwise Mount Vernon would have been in darkness.

The Corcoran Manor section was cut off from electric light in the evening when the when three trees were blown down on California road and wires were short circuited.

Superintendent Green had gangs of men at work all over the city and in neighboring towns untangling wires from trees.  The men were taken to the various places in conveyances and there was one accident.  A wagon was upset in a snow drift on White Plains road opposite Westchester Park.  The driver and his helper were thrown out but escaped injury, but the shafts of the wagon were smashed.  The men could not reach the place they were sent to, so they were ordered to find sleeping quarters for the rest of the night, it being then 1:30 o'clock.

Two hundred telephones in this city and about 600 in the county were put out of commission.  Owen G. MacKnight, traffic manager of the telephone company, said today that the company escaped serious damage.  There was, of course, intances where some wires in trees in parts of the city were carried down by falling branches and these had to be repaired.  The principal trouble occurred where the wires extending from the cable in the subways to the house of the subscriber became covered with ice.  This morning at 11 o'clock there were not more than 50 telephones in the city out of commission.  Mr. MacKnight said the trunk lines held well.  Business was unusually heavy and the entire force of telephone operators, with extra girls were at work at 7:30 o'clock."

Source:  MOST DESTRUCTIVE BLIZZARD IN TWENTY YEARS SWEEPS SECTION -- Trolley Service Completely Out of Commission Up to an Early Hour this Afternoon -- Telegraph and Telephone Service Crippled for Time -- Lighting Company Kept Busy Repairing Breaks as Falling Trees Tear Down Wires -- 85 Mile Gale Brings Ruin in Its Path -- Money Loss is Going to be Heavy -- Streets Filled with Snow and Slush, The Daily Argus [Mount Vernon, NY], Mar. 2, 1914, No. 7387, p. 1, cols. 1-7 & p. 5, cols. 1-4.

"Conditions Worse In New York -- Railroads Cancel Trains And Death List Is Reported Growing
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(By United Press)
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New York, March 2. -- With railroad tracks piled deep with snow, telegraph and telephone lines down, and traffic of every sort completely tied up, the entire east was today paralyzed in the grip of the worst storm in years.  A blinding snow driven before a high gale continued to swirl and drive through the storm section this afternoon.  Railroads canceled trains entirely.  No attempt was made to carry passengers and reports were lacking on trains from the west due in here yesterday.  Losses as the result of the storm will probably run into the millions.  Meagre reports received from the railroads indicates staggering damage has been done by the high winds and the heavy snow.  A foot of snow has fallen here up to noon today.  Weather bureau officials said the storm might abate this afternoon or tonight, but the tie-up is now so complete that it will require days for the cities and town of the east to dig themselves out.

Eight deaths have been reported so far in New York and vicinity.  Five have perished in New York.  One man was killed by a fallen live wire in Trenton.  Two cleaning railroad tracks were killed by a train on Long Island.  Reports from outlying districts are lacking.  The coal and milk situation is acute.  Not in years have coal dealers received such demands for fuel while being absolutely unable to fill orders.  No milk was received in the city today.  Most of New York went to business today on the subway.  Surface cars stood on their tracks, snowed in by great drifts, and Brooklyn was completely snowbound.  From all parts of the coast came reports of vessels in distress.  None left their piers today and incoming steamers were held up outside the harbor.  So great was the danger of disastrous fires in New York that 500 firemen were detailed to patrol the streets.  'Way Down East' village scenes were enacted in upper Broadway.  The wind during the night drove the sleet into keyholes and when the temperature dropped, locks were frozen solid."

Source:  Conditions Worse In New York -- Railroads Cancel Trains And Death List Is Reported Growing, The Daily Argus [Mount Vernon, NY], Mar. 2, 1914, No. 7387, p. 1, cols. 2-3. 

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Terrifying Pelham Lightning Storms in 1895 and 1906

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The lazy late summer evening turned ominous rather quickly in the Pelham region on September 12, 1895.  Judge Van Cott and one of his relatives, Mme. Albert, were relaxing on the veranda of the Judge's beautiful home on High Island.  On the back porch of the home, Civil War Veteran Joseph Alicolos was relaxing with his pipe as curls of tobacco smoke swirled about his head.

Angry clouds gathered; the wind began blustering.  Judge Van Cott heard a tent in his nearby orchard flapping.  He hustled down the steps of the veranda and into the orchard to secure the tent before the rain began.

Mme. Albert knew a thunderstorm was brewing.  She also knew it was time to retreat inside and wait for the Judge to return.  She wore a lovely straw hat.  Though it was secured to her hair with hat pins, the relentless winds tugged at her lovely chapeau.

Mme. Albert arose from her veranda chair.  Instantaneously a blinding flash and explosive clap seemed to stagger her.  The lightning bolt killed her before she fell to the veranda floor.  Her straw hat was in tatters.  Her hat pins were melted.  Her eyebrows and eyelashes were entirely burned away.

The bolt continued into and through Judge Van Cott's home.  On the back porch, it knocked the pipe out of the teeth of Joseph Alicolos, then leaped to a post three feet away and exploded it into splinters.  The walls of the home "were scarred as if by red hot pokers."  Alicolos was stunned, but unhurt.  Judge Van Cott's life likely had been saved by the sound of the flapping tent.  

The lightning storm became even more tragic and horrific as it spread eastward.  Mrs. Oliver Bennet was caught outside in Roselyn during the storm.  The lightning struck her.  The bolt ran down her right side, leaving bluish black streaks, but did not kill her.  

At Oyster Bay, lightning killed a horse owned by New York broker Thomas Young, Jr. and knocked his coachman, Thomas Palmer, unconscious for "several hours."  The lightning also struck Young's barn and burned it to the ground.  Several farmhouses near Watertown were struck by lightning and burned.  At West Sayville, Seymour Burr was struck by lightning and severely burned.

The high winds of the same storm also did tremendous damage.  Descriptions of a "whirlwind" during the storm suggest the region was struck by a tornado.  Indeed, a heavy water tank cover was sucked into the sky and carried eight miles away where the winds smashed it into a fence, demolishing the fence.  The winds blew down trees.  Indeed, "fallen trees block[ed] the highway in many parts of the country."  According to one accounts although the storm lasted only an hour, "It was the most severe storm in years."

Severe weather, of course, long has been a part of Pelham history.  Indeed, I have written before about severe lightning storms and the damage they have done in our region.  See Tue., Sep. 13, 2005:  A Lightning Bolt Out of the Blue - Electrical Storm in 1895.

Occasionally, there are inspiring stories of survival in the face of such terrible lightning storms in Pelham.  One such incident occurred at noon on Saturday, July 21, 1906.  

Mrs. William Christal of Ninth Avenue in the Village of North Pelham was engrossed in the care of her nine-month-old infant on the first floor of the family home.  The skies darkened; winds howled; she heard the rumbles of thunder.

Mrs. Christal suddenly realized she had left a bedroom window open upstairs.  She stood from an armchair and gently laid her sleeping baby on the cushion of the chair next to a throw pillow also on the cushion.  As the storm swept over the neighborhood, she raced upstairs to close the bedroom window.  

No sooner did she reach the bedroom than there was a blinding flash and simultaneous explosive clap of thunder.  Mrs. Christal felt the electrical shock and staggered.  Nevertheless, she turned and raced back downstairs to her baby.

There, on the armchair where she had left the infant, was a pile of plaster and rubble from a portion of the ceiling above blown apart by the lightning bolt.  She raced to the chair and scrambled to claw away the plaster.  Beneath the plaster and debris was the pillow that had been knocked on top of the baby, protecting it from the force of the falling plaster.  Her child was unhurt.

Only then did Mrs. Christal realize that she was deaf in her left ear.  Soon, inspection of the home revealed that the lightning bolt had struck the side of the house, knocked off a piece of board, ripped up the floor in a second floor bedroom and knocked off the plaster from the parlor ceiling directly beneath the damaged floor "for the length of several feet."  

The brunt of the lightning storm seems to have been felt in the Ninth Avenue neighborhood.  Tragedy was averted at G. Bowden's barn and paint shop on Ninth Avenue.  There in the barn was a wooden work bench with a large grindstone beneath which were stored pots of paint and oil.  A lightning bolt struck the work bench, charring it and smudging the grindstone with smoky residue.  Yet, only inches away the oil and paint were untouched.  As a newspaper report noted:  "Why the flames did not ignite these Mr. Bowden is at a loss to explain."  Bowden was fortunate the barn and paint shop was not burned to the ground.

Nearby, a tall tree in the woods directly behind Mrs. Christal's home was struck by lightning.  The bark was split and blasted by the bolt.  

These are simply two stories of notable lightning storms in and around Pelham.  Searches, of course, reveal dozens and dozens of news stories over the decades reflecting lightning strikes of homes, trees, businesses, telephone poles, and more.  As one might expect, Since the late 19th century, virtually every neighborhood in Pelham has suffered lightning strikes at one time or another.  Yet, the lightning storms described in today's Historic Pelham article appear to be two of the most notable -- and violent -- such lightning storms in our region.

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"NORTH PELHAM
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Lightning Struck Several Places in This Village on Saturday Afternoon.
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CHILD'S NARROW ESCAPE.
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Was in a Chair Asleep and Pillow Saved It from Fall of Plaster -- Workshop Hit.
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North Pelham, July 23. -- A pillow saved a child's life last Saturday noon, when lightning struck the house of William Christal on Ninth avenue.  It was in the midst of the storm, when Mrs. Christal rushed upstairs to close a window.  She had no sooner reached the bedroom than there was a blinding flash of lightning which was followed by a loud report.  She rushed downstairs, and as she reached the first floor her first thought was that of her nine months' old child, whom she had left asleep in the parlor lying on an arm chair.  As she entered the room she found the baby buried beneath a quantity of plaster, underneath which was the pillow.  She is quite confident that the child would have been killed but for the pillow.

The lightning struck the side of the house, knocked off a piece of board, ripping up the floor in a bedroom on the second floor and knocking off the plaster from the ceiling of the parlor directly underneath for the length of several feet.  Mrs. Christal was shocked by the lightning and was deaf in one ear all afternoon.

The lightning played a prank in G. Bowden's barn and paint shop on Ninth avenue Saturday.  It struck a work bench upon which was a grindstone.  The side of the bench was ignited and from the charred condition of the bench and the smoky appearance of the grindstone Mr. Bowden is at a loss to account for the fact that the barn was not consumed.  Directly beneath where the flames had charred the bench were pots of paint and oil.  Why the flames did not ignite these Mr. Bowden is at a loss to explain.  He considers himself fortunate that the barn was not burned to the ground.

The storm must have centered its destructive forces about Ninth avenue for a tall tree in the woods directly in the rear of the house was struck by the lightning and the bark split.  The storm was very severe throughout the neighborhood.  During the past two weeks Pelham has suffered considerably from thunder storms."

Source:  NORTH PELHAM -- Lightning Struck Several Places in This Village on Saturday Afternoon -- CHILD'S NARROW ESCAPE -- Was in a Chair Asleep and Pillow Saved It from Fall of Plaster -- Workshop Hit, The Daily Argus [Mount Vernon, NY], Jul. 24, 1906, p. 5, col. 1.

"A HEAVY STORM EAST.
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The Work of Destruction in New York by Wind and Rain.
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The Display of Lightning Was Terrifying -- Several Houses Burned, Roads Washed Out.
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NEW YORK, Sept. 13. -- A heavy storm struck City Island last night.  The display of lightning was terrifying.  Judge Van Cott and a kinswoman, Mme. Albert, were on the veranda of the Judge's house on High Island, while the clouds were gathering and the wind growing higher.  The Judge went into his orchard to secure a tent that was flapping and Mme. Albert finally decided to go into the house.

Just as she arose from her chair a bolt of lightning struck her and she fell dead.  The electricity burned off her eyebrows and eyelashes, tore her straw hat in tatters and melted the pins in her hair.  

On the back porch of the same house sat Joseph Alicolos, a veteran of the Civil War.  The same bolt knocked the pipe he was smoking out of his mouth.  It then jumped to a post three feet away and split it into splinters.  Alicolos was not hurt but the walls of the cottage were scarred as if by red hot pokers.

The storm was particularly severe at the east end of Long Island.  Just before sunset the wind rose.  Then there was a lull, and it seemed as if the heavens had opened.  Rain came down in torrents, while the sheets of blinding lightning frightened women and children and drove the bravest men indoors.

The wind, while it lasted, had a hurricane's force.  Trees were leveled to the ground and telegraph and telephone wires were blown down in many places in the suburbs of New York.  The lightning struck in several places.

At Roselyn Mrs. Oliver Bennett was outdoors when the storm broke.  The lightning struck her and ran down her right side, leaving bluish black streaks, but did not kill her.

Several farmhouses near Watertown were struck by lightning and burned.  The roads were washed out in places and fallen trees block the highway in many parts of the country.  It was the most severe storm in years, although lasting only an hour.  

The storm was the severest of the season at Oyster Bay.  Lightning struck and burned a barn owned by Thomas Young, Jr., a New York broker, killed one of the horses and stunned the coachman, Thomas Palmer, who was unconscious for several hours.

At West Sayville Seymour Burr was struck by lightning and severely burned.  His condition is critical.  Telegraph and telephone wires and poles were broken down there and communication was cut off.

Telegraph wires and trees were blown down at Port Jefferson and the forces of the wind smashed the plate glass windows in some of the shops.

The heavy cover of Dr. Jones' water tank was carried eight miles off where it brought up against a fence demolishing it.  Up the Hudson the storm took the form of a whirlwind.  Crosswalks were swept away and deep ruts washed into the roads.

Haverstraw also suffered, many brickyards having been flooded."

Source:  A HEAVY STORM EAST -- The Work of Destruction in New York by Wind and Rain -- The Display of Lightning Was Terrifying -- Several Houses Burned, Roads Washed Out, Santa Cruz Daily Sentinel [Santa Cruz, CA], Sep. 14, 1895, Vol. XXIII, No. 127, p. 1, col. 5 (Note:  Paid subscription required to access via this link).

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