Oscar Hill came to Newark from North Carolina with his wife, Agnes Hill, and her daughter, Bernice, in 1953. The three lived in an apartment above the Howard Bar, where Oscar Hill worked until it closed, after having previously tended bar at nearby Maxie’s. After his wife left him and her daughter sometime before 1957, […]
Michael Pugh lived with his mother and brother, Andrew, at 340 15th Avenue near the corner of Hunterdon Street. Mrs. Pugh had lived in that apartment for the past 20 years. Around 11:00 P.M. Sunday, July 16th, Michael was outside playing with his friend “Smokey” when his mother called him upstairs to take out the […]
Michael Moran was a captain in the Newark Fire Department and lived at 66 Eastern Parkway with his wife, Ann, and six children. Moran, a 15-year veteran in the fire department, would help out with chores at a charity mission, the Little Sisters of the Poor, on Central Avenue in his off-duty time. Around 10:00 […]
Leroy Boyd had lived in Newark for ten years, after moving to the city from his birthplace of Virginia. There, he had two children with his ex-wife before relocating to Newark. By the summer of 1967, Boyd lived in a second-floor apartment on Belmont Avenue, just south of Avon Avenue, and worked at a paper […]
James Sanders, Jr. lived at 52 Beacon Street with his parents, Mable and James Sanders, Sr., and ten siblings. Mrs. Sanders had moved to Newark from Richmond, Virginia when she was 17 and worked as a nurse’s aide at Parmer’s Nursing Home in Summit, NJ. Of her eleven children, Mrs. Sanders told journalist Ron Porambo, […]
Rebecca and Ozell Brown moved from High Springs, Florida to Newark in 1961—the same year they were married. Mrs. Brown, a nurse’s aide at Orange Memorial Hospital, and Mr. Brown, a construction worker for Francisco Construction Company in Cedar Grove, lived in a third floor apartment in the Hayes Homes project with their four children, […]
Isaac Harrison left Jamaica in the 1910s for a new home in Burlington, New Jersey. There, Harrison and his wife, Evelyn, started a family before eventually moving to Newark in 1943. The Harrisons raised nine children in Newark while Isaac worked in iron foundries around the city. In February of 1967, Evelyn passed away and […]
Mrs. Hattie Gainer had lived in the Hayes Homes project at 302 Hunterdon Street for over twenty years. Those in the neighborhood knew the 54-year-old woman, who suffered from terrible arthritis, to sit in the window of her second floor apartment and chat with friends on the street as they passed by. Mrs. Gainer’s daughter, […]
Frederick Toto was a Newark native who joined the city’s police department in 1962. Detective Toto lived at 56 Smith Street with his wife, Ethel, and their three children. The morning of Friday, July 14th, Toto returned home to his family around 8:00 A.M., after having completed a 24-hour shift the previous day and night. […]
Eloise Spellman lived in a 10th floor apartment in the Hayes Homes project at 322 Hunterdon Street. Mrs. Spellman shared this apartment with her eleven children, ranging in age from six-months to 18 years of age. On Saturday, July 15th, Mrs. Spellman was in the apartment with all of her children, along with two of […]
