March 9: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY

March 9, 2023 Brooklyn Eagle History

Share this:

ON THIS DAY IN 1913, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported, “The Catskill Water Supply system is 91 percent completed. Few persons, outside of engineering circles, realize just what this means, and the staggering figures in which the magnitude of this work is usually stated convey but a slight idea of the details of an undertaking that is second only to that of constructing the Panama Canal. The work of the contractors who have almost completed the giant project for creating a daily water supply of 770,000,000 gallons and bringing it 150 miles to houses in New York, has been carried on so quietly that the announcement of the nearing completion of the system comes as a surprise. Watersheds with an area of 900 square miles, created by giant dams; 55 miles of ‘cut-and-cover’ aqueduct; 14 miles of grade tunnels; 7 pressure tunnels; 17 miles through mountains, and a city aqueduct 34 miles in length, at depths of 200 to 750 feet, through which it will take three days for water to reach the city, have all been pushed to near completion with no surface indications in the city except, here and there, mysterious looking green buildings surrounded by high fences, behind which passersby have caught the sound of pulsing engines.”

***

ON THIS DAY IN 1916, the Eagle reported, “COLUMBUS, N.M. — Five hundred Mexican bandits believed to have been led by Francisco Villa crossed the International border under cover of darkness early today and attacked this town, killing fourteen or more American men and women, including six United States soldiers. Latest reports place the number of civilians dead at eight. Eight United States troopers were wounded. When the bandits fled toward Mexico some hours later they were pursued by United States troops who are said to have crossed the border. A large number of Mexican dead were left lying in the streets of Columbus, and at the border the Mexicans were subjected to a flank attack by American troops and eighteen more of their number killed. Several American citizens in Columbus declared they personally saw Villa directing his men, and a portmanteau discovered by a trooper contained Villa’s personal papers. The attack was a surprise. Villa was supposed to have been forty-four miles away, having last night caused a telegram to be sent indicating his presence at a ranch at Nogales.”

***

ON THIS DAY IN 1924, Eagle columnist Frederick Boyd Stevenson wrote, “We had been going over this Big Question of Brooklyn. Then Mr. [Arthur] Somers leaned forward in the leather armchair. ‘I am going to give the people of Brooklyn a sporting chance,’ said he. ‘I have been making plans for a new building for the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce — a building all our own, right here in the downtown section.’ He glanced out the window from that magnificent viewpoint in the lounge room of the Chamber. My glance followed his. There was the harbor. There was the broad expanse of waterfront. There were the piers. There were the ships. There was the Great Eastern Hemisphere — outside our vision, but within our ken. All along the shore to the South were other great wharves — other great ships with backgrounds of towering warehouses — humming machinery — and away to the left of us and to the right of us were tall chimneys of factories — the whirring of wheels in shops, big and little — thousands and thousands of busy workers turning out the products, finished and unfinished, for all the markets in the East, the Middle West and the West, in the South, in the North and in the lands where the great ships go and are lost to sight skirting the horizon. Below us was the rattle of the streets. Great motortrucks were bringing the raw material and the finished material to and fro. Motorcars filled with busy people were passing … And spreading out before us in all directions was this Great Boro of Brooklyn.”

***

Matthew Gray Gubler
Danny Moloshok/Invision/AP

NOTABLE PEOPLE BORN ON THIS DAY include former U.S. Sen. James Buckley, who was born in 1923; “The Bad News Bears” star Joyce Van Patten, who was born in 1934; “On the Wings of Love” singer Jeffrey Osborne, who was born in 1948; “Men in Black” star Linda Fiorentino, who was born in 1960; former N.Y. Knicks player and coach Darrell Walker, who was born in 1961; Oscar-winning actress Juliette Binoche, who was born in 1964; lawyer and journalist Kimberly Guilfoyle, who was born in 1969; “Webster” star Emmanuel Lewis, who was born in 1971; “Criminal Minds” star Matthew Gray Gubler, who was born in 1980; skier and Olympic gold medalist Julia Mancuso, who was born in 1984; and “Pitch Perfect” star Brittany Snow, who was born in 1986.

***

AMERIGO, AMERIGO: Amerigo Vespucci was born on this day in 1454. The Italian navigator, merchant and explorer, for whom the Americas were named, participated in at least two expeditions between 1499 and 1502 which took him to the coast of South America, where he discovered the Amazon and Plata rivers. Neither Vespucci nor his exploits achieved the fame of Columbus, but the New World was to be named for him by an obscure German geographer and mapmaker, Martin Waldseemuller.

***

HAMMER TIME: Mickey Spillane was born in Brooklyn on this day in 1918. The Erasmus Hall H.S. graduate was an enormously popular crime novelist. His best-known books include “I, the Jury” (1947) and “Kiss Me, Deadly” (1952), which feature private investigator Mike Hammer, who has been portrayed on radio, in films and on TV, most famously by Stacy Keach in the 1980s. Spillane died in 2006.

***

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

Quotable:

“The first chapter sells the book. The last chapter sells the next book.”

— author Mickey Spillane, who was born in Brooklyn on this day in 1918