2021 – Mom’s Stash of Teaneck, NJ, P.D. Accident Photos ‘40s to ‘60s
(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on January 30, 2021)
These were found in a folder that was inside a raggedy manila envelope. The folder was labeled “COMMITMENT”(?). There were a lot more photos in the folder, but these were the……..uh, “best”. Mom had worked for Teaneck in the Violations Bureau for 30 years and was known to every cop in town.
Why she had this particular collection in that folder is beyond me, but here they are, in sequence. If they have information on the back, that will follow each picture:
This is westbound Route 4 in Teaneck near the Englewood border in 1948. I have no idea why the police needed to take pictures of a real estate office on the highway, but I’m including them so we can all add new meteorological terminology to our vocabularies via the description that was on the back of the second image: the weather was………“Dull”:
These show two hit-and-run accidents on May 3, 1953. I’m not sure why the Teaneck police shot one of them in Englewood (second photo):
Big-time crime on November 19, 1957: two “trailors” stored on a large gas station lot. I wonder if the station got off on a technicality (the spelling error made by Lt. Det. E. Norton):
Hey……….does the “E.” stand for “Ed”? I seem to recall an “Ed Norton” from the 50s (“Hey, Ralphie boy!”). Note: further research reveals a TPD Lt. Det. Edwin Norton, so “Ed” it is!
More high crimes and misdemeanors uncovered by Lt. Det. Norton on July 12, 1958:
Here’s some more of his photography on July 8, 1960:
These last five accident photos are undated and contain no information:
In the same folder, I found this July 24, 1962 letter attached to the November 5, 1963 picture below it, though I’m not sure if they’re related. And what is “Year Yard”? Could it be “Rear Yard”?
So many questions…………….especially, “Why did you bring these particular photos home to keep?”
We will continue to guess. Thanks, Mom.
The things some people collect!
(…………like I should talk, right?)
Those are actually very interesting shots in your mom’s collection because I love to see roads that I am familiar with from back in the day when I was growing up in Wayne and Franklin Lakes…and I think that everyone likes to see car wrecks (or am I just kind of twisted?). New Jersey’s main roads in Bergen County looked better when they weren’t all lined with cheesy overpriced identical “townhouse” condos, Starbucks and big box stores!