This Day in History: 1935-07-13

Miss Helen North, Librarian of the Mahwah Library for the previous fifteen years, was struck and killed by a train in an unprotected crossing in Suffern. She had gone to Suffern to visit her dentist and was crossing the tracks to get the local to go back to Mahwah. She apparently waited for a freight train to pass and did not hear the Chicago Express coming around the curve. She had been brought up in Brooklyn, after her birth in Montague, NJ in 1894. She had lived in Mahwah for 20 years with her sister Miss Johanna North, the Principal of the Cragmere School #7 (now called Betsy Ross). She was well known and loved in the community for her tact and personal attention to library patrons of all ages and backgrounds. (Bristow)