The grave of Captain Randall at Sailors’ Snug Harbor, engraving from Harper’s Weekly, August 31, 1867; courtesy of the Noble Maritime Collection.

The Noble Maritime Collection (Building D) presents Mysterious Harbor, a lecture and slide presentation by author and historian Patricia Salmon.

Salmon will address a range of strange occurrences at Sailors’ Snug Harbor and on the Staten Island waterfront.

Included in her stories are You’ll Expose Me, I Know You Will, the murder of the Reverend Quinn at Sailors’ Snug Harbor; A Rum Raid Gone Awry, a tale of murder and robbery in the days of Prohibition; and Revenge Renews Our Happy Love in Heaven Forever, the story of the murder of Dr. Charles W. Townsend on Westervelt Avenue.

Dead Among the Rocks recalls the eerie tale of Mary Tobin, who disappeared somewhere near Bard Avenue and Richmond Terrace as she walked to the Sailors’ Snug Harbor train station. Salmon will also take a look at the history of Monkey Hill, the Sailors’ Snug Harbor cemetery where 7,000 mariners who died at the retirement home are buried.

A Staten Island resident for fifty years, Salmon has written five books, Staten Island’s Brewery Barons; Realms of History: The Cemeteries of Staten Island;  The Staten Island Ferry: A History;Staten Island: Murderers and Mysteries of the Forgotten Borough; and Murder& Mayhem on Staten Island.The lecture is open to the public.  Admission to the Noble Maritime Collection is by donation; contributions are welcome.