History

April 18, ‘Murder near the Wythe Hotel’

April 18, 2014 Brooklyn Daily Eagle
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Good morning. Today is the 106th day of the year.

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TODAY THE OPERA Company of Brooklyn will be presenting a concert performance of “The Barber of Seville” by Rossini at 8 p.m. at The Glicker-Milstein Theater at Barnard College. … TOMORROW A POP-UP shop hosted by Word bookstore of Greenpoint will launch at the Wythe Hotel. The shop will last for a week, and will feature 150 titles and special talks. … IT’S CELEBRATE EARTH Week at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, and they’re hosting tons of great eco-conscious activities for kids. Check out Eco art at 11:30 a.m., or learn about the sea (and touch some of its creatures) at the Touch Tank at noon. … Pioneer Works is organizing a Red Hook Hackathon today at 7 p.m. Food will be provided free by local vendors. All ages, backgrounds and levels of experience are welcome. Visit hackredhook.com for more information.

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NOTABLE PEOPLE BORN today include actresses America Ferrera, Melissa Joan Hart and Hayley Mills, and actors Robert Hooks, Eric McCormack, Nick Moranis and David Tennant.

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IN 1982 THE CONSTITUTION Act in Canada replaced the British North America Act of 1867 with the Canadian Constitution Act of 1982, providing Canada with a new set of fundamental laws and civil rights. It was signed by Queen Elizabeth II, at Parliament Hill, in Ottawa, Canada.

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TODAY IS GOOD Friday. It is the oldest Christian celebration, commemorating the crucifixion. The day’s name is a possible corruption of God’s Friday. It is observed in some manner by most Christian sects and is a public holiday in many nations.

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IT IS THE ANNIVERSARY of the original Yankee Stadium. In 1923, more than 74,000 fans attended opening day festivities as the New York Yankees inaugurated their new stadium. Babe Ruth christened it with a game-winning three-run homer into the right-field bleachers. In his coverage of the game for the New York Evening Telegram, sportswriter Fred Lieb described Yankee Stadium as “The House that Ruth Build,” and the name stuck. The stadium hosted its last game on Sept. 21, 2008, when the Yankees played the Baltimore Orioles. It was demolished in 2010.

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THE 1775 MIDNIGHT ride of Paul Revere and William Dawes started at about 10 p.m. today. They rode to warn American patriots between Boston and Concord of the approaching British.

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IT IS THE ANNIVERSARY of the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. The business section of San Francisco, some 10,000 acres, was destroyed, and nearly 4,000 lives were lost.

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ON THIS DAY in 1883, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported on a murder that occurred on the corner of Park and Vanderbilt avenues in Fort Greene near the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The victim was Diedrich Steffens, 35, of 108 Wythe Avenue in Williamsburg (two blocks from what is now the Wythe Hotel). He shared a first name with his murderer, Diedrich Mahnken, 38, a well-known grocery man who did business close to the spot where the shooting occurred. The two Diedrichs were acquaintances, both German immigrants who had come to the country when they were young. They were even related by marriage. However, Mahnken was certain that Steffens was carrying on an affair with his wife (though everyone involved, as well as other friends and family, insisted that this was not the case). Mahnken seems to have shot Steffens three or four times upon randomly running into him near his place of work, with a gun that the Eagle compared to that used two years earlier by Charles J. Guiteau in the assassination of President James A. Garfield.

  • Special thanks to “Chase’s Calendar of Events” and the Brooklyn Public Library


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