Century Old Photo Reunites Son With His Mom

Social media coordinator Andrea Gorris  found a secret compartment on an antique desk. When she opened it she found "pictures and documents from 1917 about a car crash that happened on the Hudson River,” 

Andrea posted the picture and a synopsis of the documents online, and through community responses, the desk’s owner was identified as 85-year-old Bob Klebe. The desk belonged to his mother and had recently been sold after he and his wife moved into a retirement home.

The photos were of an accident involving Klebe’s mother, her father and her brother during the winter of 1917, when the Hudson River froze over for 43 days and formed an ice bridge. Klebe says his mother, who was 12 at the time, was in a car that began to fall through the ice while crossing from Yonkers to Nyack. He recalls that hockey players rescued her by wrapping a hockey stick around her scarf and pulling her from the freezing water.

Klebe says his family has long known the story but they’d never seen the photos of the car going through the ice. He recalls how his mother loved to tell the story and now they have the pictures that will allow him to share her experience. “I’m just so appreciative of the life I’ve been given and the opportunity to tell the story, because I think it’s a great story, but a lot of people would say ‘no way!’,”