The NYS Environmental Facilities Corporation (EFC) has awarded $638 million in grants to municipalities statewide for water infrastructure projects and Town of Indian Lake in Hamilton County was the biggest winner among Adirondack communities. [Read more…] about NYS Awards $8M in Clean Water Project Grants to Adirondack Communities
Dannemora
The 10 Deadliest Accidents in the Adirondack Region
Some of tragic accidents have occurred in the Adirondack region.
Here is a list of the ten believed to have been among the deadliest: [Read more…] about The 10 Deadliest Accidents in the Adirondack Region
Remembering Murdered Game Warden William Jackson
The LaGoy brothers were rough. A neighbor near Severence, on the road between the village of Schroon Lake and Paradox Lake in the Adirondacks, once wrote a letter to a local newspaper asking for a telling retraction.
“I was not lost,” D.S. Knox wrote. “My wife was much excited by the delay of about an hour of time over due, thinking as I have an organic heart trouble, caused to give her alarm, and not ever thinking of any of the LeGoy family causing any harm as neither of us believe that any of the LeGoy family ever would cause any personal harm without a provocation.”
It was rather important to Knox to make it clear to the world, that even if his wife had been talking out of school, neither of them harbored any ill will toward the LaGoys. [Read more…] about Remembering Murdered Game Warden William Jackson
The 1892 Troy Murder of William Wesson
On the evening of June 27, 1892, in a St. John’s Street boarding house in South Troy, New York, 66-year-old Thomas Jones was nearing the end of a three-day bender. He was fond of drawing a .32-caliber pistol and showing it off, something Jones had done repeatedly that day, much to the alarm of others. He hadn’t been on the job for several days at the Burden iron works, and had argued repeatedly with a coworker and co-resident of the boarding house, 22-year-old William Wesson, even offering to fight him in a duel. It was dismissed as nothing more than the ramblings of an old, annoying drunk. [Read more…] about The 1892 Troy Murder of William Wesson
Dannemora’s Death House Historians Podcast
This week on The Historians Podcast, Adirondack author Larry Gooley discusses two books he was written about Dannemora Prison in Northern, New York.
His most recent book is Dannemora’s Death House: The Crimes and Fates of 41 Killers Sentenced to Die in Clinton Prison’s Electric Chair.
Listen to the podcast here. Buy the book here. [Read more…] about Dannemora’s Death House Historians Podcast
Jack Lagree: Dannemora’s Bobsled Guru
Long before the 2015 escape of Richard Matt and David Sweat, the word Dannemora instantly conjured images of the prison. While the high wall dominates the landscape, the village does have other historical connections, some of them in the world of sports, including one through the person of John “Jack” Lagree. Jack was a native of Churubusco, a tiny hamlet in northwestern Clinton County.
Blessed with engineering talent, mechanical skill, and a strong, traditional, North Country work ethic, he rose to national prominence in the world of bobsleigh competition (referred to hereafter by the more popular term, bobsled). [Read more…] about Jack Lagree: Dannemora’s Bobsled Guru
Dannemora Escapee Jack Williams: At First, Too Big to Succeed
The one-year anniversary of the infamous Dannemora prison break recently passed, so here’s the story of an inmate linked to a pair of unusual breakouts, excerpted from my book, Escape from Dannemora.
Despite media stories claiming early on that Richard Matt and David Sweat were the first-ever escapees from Clinton Prison, some in the past did it in even more spectacular fashion, and overall, hundreds managed to escape under various circumstances. Among them was Jack Williams, a participant in two Clinton exits involving unusual components featured in no other Dannemora escapes. [Read more…] about Dannemora Escapee Jack Williams: At First, Too Big to Succeed