Another freezing week... in January 1905
In conjunction with the
Greater Astoria Historical
Society, TimesLedger Newspapers
presents noteworthy events in the
borough’s history
Welcome to January 1905!
Far off in St. Petersburg,
Russia, in an event known as
“Bloody Sunday,” Czar Nicholas
II’s Imperial Guard killed some
500 demonstrators marching
toward the Winter Palace to
present a petition.
Meanwhile, down in
Daytona Beach, Florida, A.G.
MacDonald became the first
person to exceed 100 MPH in
an automobile. Closer to home
in New York City, the Hubbell,
Schubert and Smith musical
Fontana opened on the 14th at
the Lyric Theatre.
Early that month, the region
was walloped by an icy winter
blizzard. In Astoria, the storm
rendered all the main business
thoroughfares impassable,
with large drifts blanketing
Broadway and other avenues in
the neighborhood.
Down near the railyards on
Borden Avenue, at its blustery
height the storm blew off the
heavy wooden cover on top of
one of the 275-foot power station
smokestacks and carried it some
700 feet through the air.
The wintry gusts put a
complete stop to burials at the
sprawling Calvary Cemetery, as
gusts of snow completely filled
COLUMNS
freshly dug graves. With the
snow falling on a Tuesday and
Wednesdays normally being one
of the busiest days at Calvary,
the once bustling necropolis
was nearly empty save for the
howling winds piling drifts of
snow onto her lonely residents.
Perhaps those who came to
rest in the Borough of Queens
early in the 20th century were not
so lonely. Actually, according to
the Long Island Weekly Star that
month, it seemed that cemeteries
were bursting at the seams with
daily new arrivals and a constant
stream of funeral corteges.
In 1904, 21,557 people came to
rest in Calvary. Ferry companies
crossing the East River provided
special accommodations for
mourners, and some nearby
hotels were to a large extent
filled by those paying final
respects to a loved one. For large
processions making their way
from Manhattan or Brooklyn,
the family often provided dinner
at an establishment near the
cemetery for the hundreds of
family and friends who turned
out to bid farewell.
Sometimes people who
come through our borough are
remembered by many. Some
put their names on a place that
impacts the lives of Queens
residents. Dr. Thomas Rainey,
a resident of Ravenswood, was
one of those great New Yorkers.
After he spent many years
and a great deal of his fortune
advocating a Blackwell Island
Bridge spanning the East River
to link Manhattan and Queens,
in January, 1905, Mayor
McLellan vetoed a resolution
from the Board of Aldermen to
name the area slated to be the
Queens anchor for the project as
Rainey Park, claiming he does
not give precedence to naming
landmarks for living New
Yorkers over those deceased.
The city named the property
Rainey Park shortly after the
doctor’s death in 1910.
Charles and Zoe Pechette,
Astoria residents originally
from French Quebec,
celebrated their golden wedding
anniversary that January. They
recalled traversing 90 miles of
frozen, snow-covered Canadian
countryside in a sledge over two
days and nights for their 1855
wedding in Montreal.
When interviewed by a
Weekly Star reporter, Mr.
Pechette wondered how many
prospective brides and grooms
in the 20th century would travel
such a long distance to spend
the rest of their lives together.
Charles Pechette entered eternal
rest in December 1907 at the age
of 77, predeceased by his son,
Charles, Jr., who passed away
one month earlier. Zoe Pechette
went to join her husband and
son in 1924, aged 84. They are
interred in Calvary Cemetery,
Woodside, Queens.
That’s the way it was in
January 1905.
For further information,
contact the Greater Astoria
Historical Society at (718)278-0700
or visit www.astorialic.org.
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