Fullwidth – Page 73 – GOODSPEED HISTORIES

The Story of ‘Little Jim,’ Part One

August 4, 2017 By Marfy Goodspeed in Hunterdon Tags: crime

The Murder

Note: Records from the Coroner’s Inquest were discovered after the first version of the story was published. I have since updated the article to reflect the new information found there. It is now a much longer, but even more interesting article.

With all the controversy over the possible demolition of the Union Hotel in Flemington, there has been a revival of interest in “The Trial of the Century,” when Bruno Hauptman was tried for the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby in 1932. But there was another “Trial of the Century” in Hunterdon County more than 100 years earlier, held in May 1828, when a 12-year-old boy was convicted of the murder of a 60-year-old woman.

The Manual Labor Institute

July 15, 2017 By Marfy Goodspeed in Delaware Twp, Gordon, Rittenhouse, Sergeantsville Tags: schools

This is the story of an unusual school in the 1830s run by an eccentric visionary, who sadly failed to make a success of it.

Ducks’ Flat

July 4, 2017 By Marfy Goodspeed in Delaware Twp, E. T. Bush Tags: land titles, schools

Ducks, A Vanished School, and The Dawn of the Space Age
“The ‘Oregon’ and Other Schools,” continued

Ducks’ Flat, view from Route 519 looking north

With a name like Ducks’ Flat, you just know there must be a story there. But first, is it Duck’s Flat or Ducks’ Flat? I pitch for Ducks’, since it must have been a place where migrating ducks would gather. That’s the way Egbert T. Bush saw it. In his article “The ‘Oregon’ and Other Schools,” which I recently published in its entirety.¹