Category: Albany

From British Pathé, another historic view of Albany’s riverfront, this time from 1931. The title is “Albany to New York — 117 outboards race 136 miles,” but this brief bit of newsreel only shows the first couple of minutes, giving us some fabulous views of both the Albany and Rensselaer riverfronts. On the Albany…

Well, that’s the title of this brief film from British Pathé in 1925. The description is “Motorboat beats express train. Over 142 mile run from Albany to New York. Harmon N.Y. the Express changes from steam to electric power, but boat still leads. USA (U.S.A.).” Here we see only 39 seconds, 10 of which…

More biographical sketches of Albany notables from 1910’s “New York State Men: Biographic Studies and Character Portraits.” These are names that fans of Albany history run across from time to time, but may not really recognize. Andrew Sloan Draper – Commissioner of Education, was born at Westford, N.Y., in 1848. he was graduated from…

In 1910, editor Frederick Hills put out a tome through the Argus Press titled “New York State Men: Biographic Studies and Character Portraits.” It opens with a slightly pompous foreword by Bishop Doane (“One reads the life story, often, in a face….”) and goes on to list any number of men of accomplishment, those…

The first Rufus Wheeler Peckham was a noted Albany lawyer, congressman and judge who perished in the sinking of the Ville du Havre. His sons also became pretty notable. Wheeler Hazard Peckham was born in Albany on New Year’s Day, 1833. He went to Albany Academy and Union College, and was one of the…

Rufus Wheeler Peckham (the first) was born in Rensselaerville (to Peleg “One G Short of a Pirate” Peckham and his wife, Desire) in 1809, and raised in Cooperstown. He graduated from Union College and then studied law, was admitted to the bar at 21, and eventually became district attorney of Albany County. Following that,…

In 1854, Lippincott, Grambo & Company of Philadelphia published “A New and Complete Gazetteer of the United States.” It being 1854, the title wound on: “Giving a Full and Comprehensive Review of the Present Condition, Industry, and Resources of the American Confederacy: Embracing, Also, Important Topographical, Statistical, and Historical Information from Recent and Original…

This is Company C of the 93rd New York Infantry in Bealeton, Virginia, in August 1863. The 93rd was also known as the Washington County regiment and the Morgan Rifles. According to Phisterer’s New York in the War of the Rebellion, the regiment was organized at Albany by Col. John S. Crocker on Feb.…

Yesterday we showed a handbill from the Eagle Tavern, sometime after 1845, promising that it had been regenerated to what it had once been. Turns out it had once been quite the place indeed. Cuyler Reynolds’s “Albany Chronicles” listed any number of notable events that had taken place at the Eagle. It said that…

This undated image from the Library of Congress depicts the Eagle Tavern at the corner of Broadway and Hamilton Street in Albany: We have leased the Eagle Tavern for a Term of years, and have cleansed and regenerated it from top to bottom. No exertion on our part shall be wanting to make the…