Historical Albion Michigan
By Frank Passic

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Albion 100 Years Ago - MARCH 1916

Morning Star, February 28, 2016, pg. 4

We continue with our theme of "Albion, 100 Years Ago." Week ending March 2, 1916. "The little town of Jonesville, about one-sixth the size of Albion, recently captured a big automobile tire concern which in time will probably be hiring hundreds of men. "Albion might have secured that concern if we had had the proper kind of a Chamber of Commerce or whatever you want to call it," very pertinently stated an Albion business man who has the interest of the city at heart, today."

"The third car of stone for the new post office building arrived in the city Monday and is now being unloaded, City Manager Roland Remley, who was formerly in charge of the work on the building, stated Tuesday. He expected his successor would be in the city any day now. The new man will probably be E. L. Rish, who is at present superintending the work of constructing a federal building for the Callahan-Mandl company of Chicago at Clarksdale, Miss."

"The Albion Glove and Manufacturing Company will soon install more machines in its factory and will be needing more girls for operators, according to Neil Hamblin, the company’s manager."

"Three Bay City men have agreed to invest $3,000 or more in the Calhoun County Coal Mining company, the bankrupt concern that worked the mine north of Albion, providing the creditors of the concern, most of whom are in Albion, will agree to allow their claims to rest for the time being and later take stock in the company to cover them."

"Final Dividend Ends Bank Affair. What is probably the last chapter in the historic Albion National Bank failure, through which $290,000 was lost to the creditors through the double-dealing of the bank’s cashier, H. M. Dearing, was written today upon the receipt by the depositors of the fourth and final dividend from the bank’s receiver, C. A. Korhly, of Washington D. C. which is for 3.4 percent. Three dividends, amounting to thirty percent, had previously been received, making 33.4 cents on a dollar to be returned to the depositors, all told."

Week ending March 16, 1916: "A small three-room house owned by Mike Dubina and occupied by a half dozen foreigners located at the corner of Austin Avenue and Carson Street was destroyed by fire early Sunday morning and the authorities are of the opinion that the blaze was the work of an incendiary."

"Ground was broken Saturday for the new building on E. Erie St. to be occupied by the offices of the Michigan Railway Company and the Consumers’ Power Company. The present plan is to have the two companies located in the same building. The interurban freight-house will be built first and a gang of men is already at work clearing the site."

"Charles M. Aspinall, registered pharmacist of the Van Gorden Drug Store, will leave Mr. Van Gorden’s employment April 1 to accept a position as representative of the National Biscuit Company. His territory will be in the northern part of the lower peninsula."

"Commercial Hotel Raided Sunday. Four Men and Two Boys get Into Police Dragnet fro Drunkenness. Two Go to Jail. Officers raided the Commercial Hotel on West Porter St. Sunday, upon the complaint of the proprietress, Mrs. Cook and arrested four men and two boys, as well as confiscating several quarts of liquor."

"Miss Bessie Redfield, formerly Mrs. George Dearing of Albion, died in Harper Hospital in Detroit Saturday afternoon, following an operation which was performed on Thursday."

"The Dry Goods stock of C. S. Tucker suffered a loss estimated by Mr. Tucker at over $2,000 March 11, when a water pipe on the third floor of the building burst at 10:30 am and flooded the two floors and basement of the store. Inability to learn the source of the flood when it was discovered made the damage much larger than it would have been otherwise."

"News of the death [in October, 1915] of Julian C. Pray, former Albion resident, has reached here from Austin, Texas. Mr. Pray was a telegraph operator in this city a great many years ago and was the son of the late Thomas G. Pray, one of the city’s early residents."

"The Moose minstrel show will occur April 3rd and 4th in the Opera house. It will be a "cabaret minstrel" and every member of the cast will be a Moose."

"The excavation for the new house to be erected for Mr. and Mrs. Carl Schumacher at the southwest corner of Austin Avenue and N. Superior St. has been started."

"Representatives of the George A. Ogle Company, Chicago publishers, are delivering copies of a new Calhoun County atlas in the city at the present time."

Week ending March 23, 1916: "The City Council Thursday evening, prior to their regular weekly meeting at the City Hall, held an informal meeting at the city office for the purpose of discussing the automobile fire truck proposition."

"The sum of $5,200 was settled upon Monday afternoon…as the proper sum the city should pay Mrs. [Harriett Dalrymple] Fred C. Day of Detroit for the plot of ground belonging to her in the southwestern part of the city, wanted by the school board for the site of a new school building and children’s playgrounds."

Week ending March 30, 1916: "City has First Murder. The City of Albion had the first murder in its history shortly before 1 o’clock Tuesday morning, when Ornifo Imperallo, an employee of the Malleable Iron Company was shot down in cold blood on Albion St. in front of the residence of Emery Huff, 408 N. Albion St. Out of about twenty shots that were fired at Imperallo, thirteen took effect and every indications points to the fact that his murderers, who have not been apprehended, must have been at least two in number and probably more. Imperallo had been in charge of the big crane used in the Malleable iron plant."

"When Joe Romanovitch left Albion Sunday afternoon he took three hundred and eighty dollars that did not belong to him according to Mrs. Julia Muszynaka, who lives over the glove factory on West Porter St., and who missed the money this morning. The officers are trying to locate Romanovitch, who is said to have started for Jackson."

"Old Albion Boy Ends Long Service. According to word received from Butte, Montana, where he has made his home for the past thirty years, Levi S. Wild, dean of the old overland telegraph operators and former resident of this city, has retired as commercial manager for Montana for the Western Union Telegraph company. He has seen 53 years of service as a telegrapher. Mr. Wild’s life history is a most interesting one. He was the son of John E. Wild, an Albion pioneer who is still remembered by many of the older people of the city and who owned the land on which the plant of the Albion Malleable Iron Company is at present situated."

Next: HELPY SELFY LAUNDRY

Next 100 Years Ago Article: April 1916

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