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Correction
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That’s three-quarters of a cup of flour. Not 2¾. The Gazette apologizes to anyone who tried to down one of these walnut bars. (1978)
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Stradivarius Fever
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From the Schenectady Gazette in 1931 comes the unlikely story that “Alco Worker’s Violin May Be Stradivarius.” The violin that Adam Swarski, 400 Cutler street, has played accosionally [sic] to amuse himself for the past few years, may bring him a fortune, if it lives up to recent expectations. Swarsky [sic], a carpenter for…
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Freihofer’s Swedish Bread
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Anyone of a certain age (which is to say, my age or more) probably has fond memories of Freihofer’s, when it was a very important local brand, perhaps the local brand of bread and cakes. It was delivered, first by horsewagon and then by truck, right to our homes; we would put a sign…
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WGY Food Stores ad
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In case you wondered whether the WGY Food Stores made use of their connection to radio, here’s how their ads looked in 1931. Lower down in the ad (not visible here) is the promise that “Housewives everywhere are enjoying the radio program over WGY by Mrs. Rankin, Home Economist of WGY Food Products Company,…
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WGY Food Stores
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It seems incredible that there was once a very large chain of grocery stores named for one of the first radio stations in the country, and even more incredible that no one seems to remember it. But it’s true. In 1930, approximately 130 independently owned grocery stores in “virtually all cities and villages within…
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The Roll of the Dead
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Tonight is the anniversary of the Schenectady Massacre, which took place over the night of February 8 and 9, 1690 – 323 years ago. And so now, the roll of the dead. The most thorough and reliable account is Pearson’s “History of the Schenectady Patent,” and so we can’t do better than his account…
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The Schenectady Massacre
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On the night of February 8, into the morning of the 9th, 1690, 60 residents of the frontier village of Schenectady were massacred by a raiding party of French soldiers and their native allies. Monsieur De Monsignat, identified as “Comptroller General of the Marine” in Canada, wrote an account of the massacre that is…
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An Unguarded Moment
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So how did Schenectady, a stockaded community, come to be unguarded at a time when it was known the French and their allied tribes were looking for opportunities to retaliate? The answer is unsurprising to any New Yorker: politics. In 1689, New York and New Jersey were governed as part of the Dominion of…
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King William’s War
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The French and Indian Wars, which stretched out from 1689 to 1763, were a series of conflicts in the colonies of New Netherlands, New England, New York, and New France that very much reflected European political disputes. The first of them, King William’s War, was the New World theater of the Nine Years’ War,…
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Preface to a Massacre
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Amidst a war between France and England, tensions between rival bands of Mohawks, and a rebellion within colonial government, the residents of the stockaded community of Schenectady found themselves on the pointy end of international and colonial politics on a cold winter night 323 years ago this week. In 1661, Arent Van Curler (also…