HOW CASEY THE COP SPELT “KOSCIUSZKO” (1904)
Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes.
The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations.
Do you know the history of YOUR house?
********************************************************************************************************************************
Andrzej Tadeusz Bonawentura Kościuszko was a Polish military officer who helped the U.S. to gain independence from the British during the Revolutionary War.
Because of his dedication there are numberous public locations named after him – including a street in Bed-Stuy.
Even more numerous, though, are the tales about the difficulty in spelling the man’s name. The best tale, though, involves a tail – and a horse and a policeman.
SPELLING KOSCIUSZKO
“There was once an Irish policeman who was responding to the presence of a dead horse on Kosciuszko Street. Upon arriving at the scene of the dead horse, Casey began to write his report. When he got to the part where he was supposed to write the location in which the horse was discovered, the policeman faltered.
“He did not know how to spell the street name.
“So, Casey looked at the horse and then at his report, and he thought. A few moments later, he shoved the half-finished report in his cap, grabbed the horse by its tail, and began dragging it down the street to the corner of Marcy Avenue. Once there, he stopped, pulled the report out from his cap, and added the ‘location’ of the dead horse – ‘Marcy Avenue.'”
By the way, back in the day when horses were relied upon for their horsepower, they were falling dead in NYC on a daily basis. A dead horse on a street was actually a very common sight. By 1880, for a fact, the city of New York was removing an average of 41 dead horses every day.
That adds up to about one dead horse at least every 2 1/2 months on Kosciuszko Street.
Make that “Marcy Avenue.”
Poor Casey.
———————————————————————————————————————–
Brownstone Detectives is an historic property research agency. Our mission is to document and save the histories of our clients’ homes. From our research, we produce our celebrated House History Books and House History Reports. Contact us today to begin discovering the history of your home.
