Wordless Wednesday: Theta Lambda Sigma

This week's family photo...

City Clerk Sprains an Ankle & Other News

I have a number of ancestors who featured in their local newspaper quite a lot: there's my great-grandmother, who announced every game of pinochle she ever played in the weekly-updates column, and Amy (Merrill) Horey, who chronicled every letter and visit from her children so much that the town began to refer to her sons [...]

Tommy “Bug” Kuznicki: Nothing Short of Sensational

Before my great-grandfather enlisted in the United States Navy during World War II; before he took up professional boxing to pass the time; before he married the Swedish girl from the barn dance outside of town; and before he raised a son of his own, he was a high school student who devoted all of [...]

A Local Hero: Michael Tofil Defends Liberty Ships

Wednesday, December 13, 1941 Michael Tofil was born on August 30, 1926 in Dunkirk, New York to Stanley and Salomea (Kuznicki) Tofil, the eighth of thirteen children. He had eight brothers (Peter, George, Thomas, Joseph, Francis, Leo, Lorence and Anthony) and four sisters (Sophie, Mary, Genevieve and Joan), and the family owned and operated Tofil's [...]

Umbrella Man Robbery on East Front Street

On May 3, 1943, Dunkirk's notorious "Umbrella Man" walked into Tofil's Restaurant on East Front Street and, when the bartender wasn't looking, stole $395 in cash and checks from a canvas bag in the drawer of a desk at the end of the bar. The suspect had paid numerous visits to the city in recent [...]