Schoolmarm ‘Somewhere at Sea’

“Let’s Go,” Says Flier Schoolmarm

MISS MILDRED DORAN, 22-year-old school teacher of Flint, Michigan, wants to be the first woman to make a transpacific flight, and she’s on her way with PILOT AUGIE PEDDLAR, who considers himself lucky in winning the job. Two aviators vied for the privilege of transporting the fair passenger, and on tossing a coin, Peddlar won. They arrived yesterday at Fort Worth, Texas, on their way to Long Beach for the hopoff in August. – P&A photo.

Oakland Tribune (Oakland, California) Jul 17, 1927

Schoolmarm ‘Somewhere at Sea’

MISS MILDRED DORAN, the flying schoolma’am of Flint, Mich., lone representative of her sex in the Dole race, whose plane, named after her and piloted by Auggy Pedlar, has been missing between here and Hawaii for more than 23 hours. No word of the craft’s position has been picked up by radio stations or the numerous navy and merchant vessels along the route of the flight.

Oakland Tribune (Oakland, California) Aug 17, 1927

Story Of Miss Mildred Doran’s Life Told By Artist In Sketches

She was born in Flint, Michigan, the daughter of William Doran.

When 16 her mother died.

She worked her way through high school as a telephone operator. William Malloska learned of her struggle and staked the girl to a teacher’s course at Michigan State Normal School.

Taught school at Caro, Mich.

When the Dole Prize was announced, Malloska decided to enter a Flint plane.

He joked with his protege. “How would you like to go?” he said without meaning it much. She tossed a coin between Pedlar and Sloniger and Pedlar won.

The Miss Doran had to make a second start after turning back when engine trouble developed.

Planes and ships started combing the Pacific for the lost flyers.

New Castle News (New Castle, Pennsylvania) Aug 20, 1927

By WILLIAM H. RITT

Exclusive Central Press Dispatch to The Kingsport Times

CARO, Michigan. — As grim, gray United States destroyers and great battle planes glided over the waters of the Pacific ocean in desperate search for Miss Mildred Doran, Caro school teacher lost in a plane with two others, a little boy sat on his porch steps here and wished aloud that he could help “somehow” to find her.

The little boy is Richard Goodell, 11, the “most spanked” boy, according to other pupils, in Miss Doran’s class. But now the spankings are past and all Richard wants is to hear that Miss Doran is on her way back to Caro to tell the children of her fateful flight toward Hawaii.

“Miss Doran was one of the best teachers a person ever had,” Richard will tell anyone. “She never spanked very hard, and then she always hit us kids on the hand, just a little. I guess we deserved a lot of it. Gee, she was nice, though.”

Marjorie’s Very Own Plan

While Richard worried over Miss Doran’s fate, little Marjorie Moore, nine, put into effect a plan of her own. Marjorie began saving her pennies, doing without ice creams cones and “shows” in order that her small fund might grow all the faster.

“As soon as I get enough money,” Marjorie said, as she helped hunt for a picture of Miss Doran at her home, “I’m going to spend it for a trip to California. Then I’m going to help them hunt for Miss Doran.”

Marjorie is the type of little girl who dreams a great deal. The other night she had a dream.

“It was the nicest dream,” she said. “I dreamt that I took an airplane and found Miss Doran. She was so glad to see me. I picked her up and we came back to Caro in my plane. All the people just hollered they were so glad to see her back again.”

Then there is Geraldine Jones, a little eleven-year-old, who hasn’t missed an edition of the city papers distributed in Caro since Miss Doran, John Auggy Pedlar, pilot, and Lieutenant V.R. Knope, navigator, flew away in the plane named after the young teacher.

“I think I was one of the first persons Miss Doran told that she was going to make the trip,” Geraldine said, proudly, as she scanned some headlines in a vain hunt for the good news. “I didn’t want her to go. I was afraid. You know the Pacific ocean is awful big, and airplanes aren’t so good, anyway.”

Though it was county fair week at Caro, in the shops and on the street, at the postoffice and at the little brick railroad depot Miss Doran and her plight were the chief topic of conversation. The elders, unlike the children, believed there was no hope.
An Airplane Descends!
One afternoon an airplane suddenly appeared above Caro, swung over the town and settled in a field to the east.

Miss Doran’s former pupils, watching in the street, and filled with the absurd hopes of childhood that it might be the biplane in which she departed, bounced up and down in glee.

But Ole Louck, station agent at the small railroad station, stopped his game of horseshoes with some passengers waiting for the only southbound trains of the day, long enough to sadly shake his head.

“Nope,” he said, “she’s gone. Miss Doran took a brave chance, but failed. And this town has lost a very fine little citizen, too.”

The Kingsport Times (Kingsport, Tennessee) Aug 31, 1927

The map shows an imposing total of ten trans-oceanic flights this season, but against them were nine failures, costing more than a score of lives. Among the season’s heroes were Lindbergh (above), Byrd (left) and Chamberlin (below). Among the victims was Miss Mildred Doran (center insert), lost on a flight to Honolulu.

Appleton Post Crescent (Appleton, Wisconsin) Nov 17, 1927

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MLIVE 2008 article:

Memorial lost, just like air pioneer Mildred Doran, says Flint Journal columnist Gary Flinn

* * * * *

MLIVE 2011 article:

Nephew sheds new light on Flint woman Mildred Doran’s tragic final flight

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On YouTube:

Dole Air Race (1927)

*  *  *  *  *

By BERYL MILLER

Old father neptune seems to be bearing out the age-old superstition of sailors that women who dare the sea bring ill luck, misfortune and disaster.

Of eight trans-oceanic women flyers who have dared Neptune’s wrath, just two have escaped death. These are Amelia Earhart, who barely succeeded in reaching Wales on an attempted flight to London, and Ruth Elder, who was rescued by a freighter when forced down at sea.

Latest victim of Neptune’s ancient curse is Mrs. Beryl Hart, who was lost with Captain W.S. MacLaren, in an attempt to cross the Atlantic with the first load of airplane freights.

Eight aviatriees? who risked their lives over teh swirling sea are shown above:

1 — Mrs. Frances Grayson, who, in her plane, “The Dawn,” took off from Roosevelt Field, L.I., for Newfoundland, two days before Christmas, 1927, for a trans-Atlantic flight. Neither she nor her companions, Oskar Omdahl, Bryce Goldsborough and Fred Koehler, were seen again.

2 — Mildred Doran, the pretty Flint, Mich., school teacher, who left her blackboard and on Aug. 16, 1927 roared away from Oakland, Calif., toward Hawaii in an attempt to win the $35,000 Dole prize. She and her crew, John Pedlar and Lieutenant V.R. Knope, went to a watery grave.

3 — Mrs. Beryl Hart, who, with Captain W.S. MacLaren, in the monoplane, “Tradewind,” disappeared en route between Bermuda and the Azores on a proposed flight from New York to Paris, recently.

4 — Amelia Earhart, whose trimotored plane, “Friendship,” landed at Burry Port, Wales, June 18, 1928, after a 2000-mile flight from Newfoundland with Wilmer Slultz and Louis Gordon.

5 — Hon. Elsie Mackay, who sailed away to oblivion, March 13, 1928, in the plane, “Endeavor,” on a proposed flight from England to America with Captain Walter Hinchliffe.

6 — Lilil Dillonz?, Austrian actress, who got as far as the Azores in her intended flight from Germany to Newfoundland, late in 1927, and after repeated attempts to continue, gave up the venture.

7 — Ruth Elder, who barely eluded Neptune’s clinches when her plane, “The American Girl,” was forced down at sea, luckily alongside a freighter, on her attempted flight to Paris, in 1927, with George Haldeman.

8 — The 62-year-old Princess Lowenstein-Wertheim, who, with Captain Leslie Hamilton and Colonel F.F. Minchin of England, were lost on a flight from England to Canada in the “St. Raphael,” on Aug. 8, 1927.

News-Palladium (Benton Harbor, Michigan) Jan 15, 1931

Deadly Fire at Keenan & Jahn’s

Image of Detroit Hook & Ladder Co. No.8 from Detroit Historical Society   (not the firemen in this article)

SAD FATALITY.

Several Lives Lost in a Fire at Detroit This Morning.

FIVE FIREMEN KILLED.

And Quite a Number of Others are Seriously Injured.

CRUSHED BY A WALL.

One Bystander Killed and Several Injured — Loss About $60,000.

Image from the Burton Historical Collection

DETROIT,. Oct. 5. — Fire at 7:45 o’clock this morning completely gutted Keenan & Jahn’s furniture store at No. 213, 215 and 217 Woodward Avenue, entailing a loss of $60,000 on the stock and $25,000 on the building. The fire started in the boiler room and shot up the freight elevator shaft, obtaining such headway that the firemen were unable to save any portion of the building contents.

Six men were killed and four or five were severely injured by the falling of the walls.

The name of the dead are:

MICHAEL DONAGHUE, chemical engine No. 1.

PIPEMAN RICHARD DELY, engine No. 9.

PIPEMAN JOHN PAGEL, engine No. 9.

MARTIN BALL, engine company No. 9.

JULIE G. CUMMINGS, truck No. 8.

FREDERICK BUSSEY, a clerk.

The injured are:

FRED DRAHEIM, engine No. 8, badly injured.

E.E. STEVENS, chemical engine No. 1, badly injured.

MICHAEL C. GRAY, badly hurt about head and body.

LIEUT. PATRICK O’ROURKE, engine No. 8, badly injured.

F.E. STOCKS, pipeman engine No. 8.

BARTHOLOMEW CRONIN, pipeman engine No. 8.

JOHN B. NEWELL, truck No. 2.

LESLIE E. McELMURRAY, fireman.

THOMAS GURRY, fireman.

HENRY HERIG, inspector.

None of the last six maned are badly injured.

The floors of the building fell in at 9:15 o’clock, and the front and rear walls immediately collapsed. The men of Engine company No. 9, chemical No. 1 and truck No. 2 were working in the windows and doors of the ground floor in front. In the rear the men of engine No. 8 were playing on the fire from a bridge that spanned the alley. The men wee working close to the rear walls when they collapsed and they were completely imbedded in the debris. Every man in the company except the captain was more or less injured, and Frederick A. Bussey, an inspector who was standing beneath the bridge, was killed.

The work of rescue was immediately begun, and in fifteen minutes the men who had been working in the alley had been taken out.

The firemen working in the front of the building did not fare so well, however. When the first cract of the falling floors was heard the men started to run, but the walls came down on them so swiftly that all were buried under tons of brick and mortar. The walls did not fall outside of the middle of the sidewalk, and the last brick had scarcely touched the walk before the work of rescue in front began.

The first body recovered was that of Lieut. Donaghue. Then the bodies of Pagel, Dely, Cummings and Ball were taken out in succession. Michael Gray was badly injured, as was also E.E. Stevens.

The building was a five story brick with 12-inch filled walls, and it is said that it had been condemned as being unsafe. The insurance on the building foots up $10,000 and on the stock about $50,000.

Fort Wayne News (Fort Wayne, Indiana) Oct 4, 1894

Image from Shorpy (click link for huge, very detailed and awesome image)

This is Woodward Avenue in 1910. Keenan & Jahn still have a furniture store located there, but according to the following information posted at DetroitYES!, it is not on the same block as it was at the time of the fire. I am not sure if the  Keenan & Jahn Furniture store in the smaller picture above is pre-fire or post-fire, but it in the big image from Shorpy, the store is located in a corner building, while the other appears to be sandwiched between two buildings.

From DetroitYES!:

One of the persons who already commented on Shorpy about this photo has provided the wrong location for it. He apparently did not know that Detroit renumbered all of their street addresses in 1920 because he used the old 260 address on the building at the far left to provide the Google Street Views.

Using the 1910 Detroit City Directory, I’ve confirmed that that this photo was actually taken from Grand Circus Park where Park Ave. (foreground) intersects with Woodward. [Google Street View]

According to the 1910 Directory, the building on the right was the Grand Circus Bldg. at 261-271 Woodward. Its tenants included “Keenan & Jahn Furniture” (261-263), “Goodyear Raincoat Co. and Rubber Store” (265), “H.R. Leonard Furniture” (267-269) and “T.C. Mau Furrier” (269). Sharing the 271 address were “A.L. Le Gro, Dentist” and “Frederick W. MacDonald, Dentist”.

Shocking Murder — Seven Persons Butchered and Burnt in the Night

Shocking Murder — Seven Persons Butchered and Burnt in the Night.

ST. JOSEPH, May 22, 1856.

Last night one of the most diabolical and terrible murders occurred within four miles of this city, that ever shocked a community or outraged humanity.

Mr. Jacob Friend, with his wife and five children, resided in a neat cabin, embowered by ancient forests, upon the border of the beautiful lake which lies just below our town, and cultivated, in a quiet, but profitable way, a piece of land which he had reclaimed from the wilderness. — The banks of the lake are dotted with these simple habitations, and neighbors were all around him, but his house was not visible to any in consequence of the intervening foliage. The hall of a man or the barking of a dog, could, however, be distinctly heard.

Young Barada was there last evening, and left them all in the enjoyment of health and happiness. This morning a young lady was passing, and found the house and its inhabitants in ashes.

The news spread like wild-fire, and in a few hours many from our city and neighborhood were on the spot. The natural question with every one was, how so many persons could have been burned in one room.

The cabin contained but one room, about sixteen feet square, with two doors, a window and a fire-place. The window and the fire place were in the opposite ends, and the two doors in the opposite sides. One either side of the window, with their feet towards the doors, had stood the beds in which the family slept. From where the beds stood, egress was easy and convenient through the window and doors.

It was hardly possible, then, that seven persons — a man of forty-five, a woman of forty, a young man of eighteen, a girl of sixteen, and three small children, could have been burnt from fire originating in the fire-place. There were too many ways of escaping. Nor for the same reason could they be burned to death, if the fire had been communited to any part of the building. The conclusion, then, before any examination, was, that murder, most foul and unnatural, had been busy with his bloody knife, before the fire was ignited.

This conclusion was confirmed by silent evidences which lay around. There in the corner, near the fire-place, was a skeleton, and there, just in front of the fire-place, was another; and where the beds had stood, were all the others — a large one with the smallest clasped in its arms, and the rest clustered near. These were evidently the mother and children. Those near the fire-place, the father and the son. By one of the latter was a large knife; and by the other, a three pronged pitchfork, with points extremely sharpened and in front of the house a revolver was found.

The jury of inquest are now sitting. — They have arrived at no further conclusion, as yet, than that it was a horrible murder. They will take measures — indeed are doing so already, by examination of witnesses and the weapons found — to trace the murderers. God grant that they may be found and brought to justice. This is the sentiment and prayer of every good men in our country.

No event has ever given our community so serious a shock. Our people have been always noted for their liberality, and personal security. It has been unusual to fasten the doors at night, and sometimes in summer, even to close them. — There are not five houses in a hundred with locks upon them. They, nearly all, have the strings always hanging out. — This horrible midnight assassination, therefore, has been more startling than an earthquake, and the whole country are aroused. There must have been more than one engaged in this fiendish work.– They will be traced, I have no doubt. If “murder will out,” then this must certainly be soon developed. I will inform you of further discoveries. Mr. Friend was a good, industrious and prosperous man. —

As I was told to-day by a neighbor, his excellent character and upright deportment made him enemies among the reckless and dissipated. It is said he had a dispute with one of this class, a short time since, about a hog. It was also thought that he had several hundred dollars in gold saved up. What induced the murder, therefore, must have been jealousy, hatred or cupidity; or, perhaps, all.

Allen County Democrat (Lima, Ohio) Jun 7, 1856

Four Meet Death in Panic

Tashmoo Dock - St. Clair Flats (Image from http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com)

FOUR MEET DEATH IN PANIC.

Drunken man Throws Match Into Gasoline and People Jump Overboard.

DETROIT, Mich., Sept. 4. — Panic-stricken over the flash of flames when a lighted match was carelessly thrown into some gasoline on the bottom of the launch Ben Hur late last night at the St. Clair flats, a number of the thirty passengers on the launch jumped overboard. Four of them were drowned. Their names are:

AUGUST MOGG, Cleveland.

H.J. WEISENGER, Detroit.

MISS BECKER, Detroit.

MISS NEWMAN, Detroit.

The launch was carrying a party of people to the hotels near Algonac from a dance at the Bedore’s hotel. One of the passengers, who had been drinking, kicked open a cock on the engine, which permitted a quantity of gasoline to flow out on the floor.

After lighting a cigar carelessly he threw his match into the gasoline. The fire caused a panic among the passengers, a number of whom jumped overboard. All but four were rescued by the Ben Hur and other small craft that hurried to the scene. The fire was extinguished and the launch was damaged little.

The Fort Wayne Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne, Indiana) Sep 5, 1905

Anna Etheridge: A Civil War Heroine

Anna Etheridge (Image from http://civilwarlogowear.com)

A Heroine.

There is in the 3d Michigan Infantry a real heroine of the war, Anna Etheridge by name. Her father was formerly a man of wealth and influence in Detroit, and Anna in early youth was reared in the lap of luxury, but misfortune overtook him, and broken down in fortune and spirit, he removed to Wisconsin, where he died, leaving our heroine, at the age of 12 years, penniless and almost friendless. At the outbreak of the rebellion she was in Detroit on a visit, and with nineteen other girls volunteered to accompany the 2d and 3rd Michigan Regiments to the seat of war, as nurses. All the others have long since abandoned the field, but she manifests her determination to remain with her regiment until it returns home. She has been with it in nearly every fight — not to the rear, but to the front, under fire, where she assists the wounded as they fall, and has doubtless been the means of saving many valuable lives.

She is provided with a horse, and when the battle commences, gallops to the front, and there remains until it is ended. when the regiment or brigade to which she is attached moves, she rides with the surgeons, or ambulance train, and at the bivouac takes her blanket and sleeps on the ground like a true soldier. So far she has made several narrow escapes — at one time while engaged dressing a man’s wounds on the field, a shell striking him and tearing his body to atoms.

At Bull Run, unaided, she removed a number of our wounded, under a cross fire, to a place of safety, staying by them until after our rear guard of cavalry had left, when she made her way on foot to Centreville, walking in the night, and evading the enemy, who were all around her. General Birney, at one time her commander, mentions her for distinguished bravery in general orders, and cause her to be decorated with the Cross of Honor, which she prominently wears. Gen. Berry, at on time commanding a brigade to which she was attached, spoke of her as having been under as hot a fire from the enemy as himself. She is scarcely ever absent from the command, where she is in camp, usually superintending the cooking, &c., at brigade or division headquarters.

From her association of the last three years it would be natural to suppose she would lose much of her femininity of character, which she has not. She is quiet, modest, and unreproachable in deportment, and exemplary in character — no vulgar word passes her lips. She is 24 years of age, 5 feet 3 inches in height, complexion fair, though now much bronzed, hair light and cut short, and altogether decidedly good looking. She has numerous tokens and letters of acknowledgment from those she has assisted at perilous times, one of which, just shown to me, is a letter from a dying private of an Ohio regiment, containing expression of the most heartfelt gratitude for her efforts to save his life at a time when surgeons and others passed him by, refusing him assistance. It contained a pressed flower, which, he remarked, was all he had to give, “precious to him as the gift of a sainted mother.”

The Adams Centinel (Gettysburg, PA)- Aug 23, 1864

NOTE: In the above 1963 article, it states Anna received a clerkship in Washington D.C.,  to help care for her aged father, while in the first article, it states he was dead. I located her in the 1870 and 1880 censuses, which show her living with Charles Hooks, her husband, and listed as a housewife. She did receive a pension for her work during the war. I suppose she could have had the clerkship before she married,  while taking care of her father, as oftentimes some of the details in articles turn out to be incorrect.

A NOTE FROM MRS. F.T. HAZEN.

After one of the numerous skirmishes Annie was missed. The boys who loved her so well, immediately reported to Sheridan that Annie must have been taken prisoner. Sheridan answered “No, I do not think so, she must be attending to our wounded;” but immediately mounted his horse and rode as near the enemy’s lines as possible; using his field-glass he discovered Annie in their camp.

He rode back to the boys, and, pointing in the direction from which he had come, said, “Boys, Annie is there.” Without further command or order there was a general rush to the rescue. A triumphant rescue it was, for they returned not only with Annie, but the boys who had been taken prisoners with her.

Title: Our Army Nurses
Author: Mary Gardner Holland
Publisher: B. Wilkins & Co., 1895
pages 596-600 (Google book LINK)

TO MISS ANNA ETHERIDGE,
THE HEROINE OF THE WAR.

Hail, heroine of the battle-field!
Sweet angel of a zeal divine!
Hail, maiden, whose device and shield,
Sculptured in tears and prayers, will shine,
On Love’s eternal column reared
In memory of the martyred dead,
To be, through coming time, revered,
And sacred to the pilgrim’s tread!

Hail, dauntless maid! whose shadowy form,
Borne like a sunbeam on the air,
Swept by amid the battle-storm,
Cheering the helpless sufferers there,
Amid the cannon’s smoke and flame,
The earthquake roar of shot and shell,
Winning, by deeds of love, a name
Immortal as the brave who fell.

Hail, angel! whose diviner spell
Charmed dying heroes with her prayer,
Stanching their wounds amid the knell
Of death, destruction, and despair.
Thy name by memory shall be wreathed
Round many desolate hearts in prayer;
By orphan lips it shall be breathed,
And float in songs upon the air.

And History’s pages shall embalm
The heroine’s deeds in lines of fire;
Her life shall prove a hallowed charm,
And every loyal heart inspire.
Press on, press on! in glory move!
Unfading laurels shall be thine
To gem the victor-crown of Love,
And sparkle in the realms divine!

Also from the same book:

Many and many a soldier owes his life to “gentle Anna’s” intrepidity. More than once, when the troops showed signs of retreating, she rushed to the front, seized the colors, and rallied them to a charge, shaming many into doing their duty.

Title: WOMEN OF THE WAR THEIR HEROISM AND SELF-SACRIFICE
Author: FRANK MOORE
Published: 1866
pages 513-518 (Google book LINK)

Title: Session laws
Author: United States
Publisher: G.P.O., 1887 (Google book LINK)

HORRIBLE FATE

Wolves

To have to live with this memory; Poor James! Poor John!

A Woodchopper Disables Himself and Is Killed and Eaten by Wolves.

CHEBOYGAN, Mich., April 13. While John and James Gillespie were chopping in the woods near Mullet Lake, a few miles from here., Saturday, James ax slipped and sank into his ankle. His brother John attempted to stench the flow of blood and carry him two miles to the nearest house, but the load and deep snow was too much, and at James’ suggestion John started for the settlement alone, leaving James in the snow. John roused a party of rescuers, who started out to bring James.

On arriving near the place where John had left his younger brother, they came to a lot of blood stains and wolf tracks in the snow, and following the trail they beheld a pack of wolves growling and fighting over a lot of bones and shreds of clothing. The party beat the wolves off with their axes, as they had no other weapons, and took all that remained of James back to Mullet Lake for burial.

New Castle News (PA) 15 Apr 1891

**Has April 15th ever been a good day?