(Look Back with Bob Enoch - Photo Illustration - MetroCreativeConnection)

NOTICE. My Wife Susan, having left my bed and board; this is to warn all persons from harboring or trusting her on my account. Money due me if paid to her will not be acknowledged.

[signed] Frederick Duke, Lubeck, W.Va.

The Parkersburg Daily Times

Feb. 9, 1866

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Railroad Improvement

There is an improvement in the depot of the railroad, by the addition in the office below, of a restaurant, where passengers, when trains are late, can get a cup of coffee and eatables, and not be detained but a minute or two. It will let passengers on in time with a wholesome state of stomach. [This would have been at the Sixth Street station and may have been Parkersburg’s first fast-food restaurant!]

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Robbery

The way freights clerk’s desk in the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was yesterday opened and robbed of about $300, while the clerks were at dinner. We think, perhaps, there was some want of care in the security of the money, but it has been customary in the office, for years, and no blame, as we think, should be attached to the clerk for unusual negligence. It was simply in pursuance of a common custom. We regret that the sub agent now in charge, as well as the gentlemanly clerk, feel it very deeply. There is no clue to the robber.

The Parkersburg Daily Times

March 15, 1866

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DAILY ‘SLICES’ of What We See and Hear

Caroline Street between Market and Avery wants a boardwalk. — Will Father Peadro see to it?

Who knows anything about the “Market House?” Hurry up — we are being bled unmercifully. Thirty-five cents a dozen for eggs.

They’ve got the measles at Yale college. Students dread them worse than Greek or Latin.

A Girl in Wheeling was locked up to keep her “chap” from seeing her, let herself down from a third story window to see aforesaid, only to have the “scamp” tell her that elopements were dangerous.

Lovers of good music will hear something by attending Madame Hickethier’s concert on the 22d inst. at Concordia Hall.

Four things that cannot be kept secret — love, the toothache, tight boots and a cough.

There is a church in New York where pretty girls carry around the contribution plates. Good idea. Try it brethren.

Two million five-cent pieces come from the mint every month. Wonder who gets the most of them, the lager-beer man or the preacher?

An Irishman who heard that all flesh was grass, wants to know whether hay is beef a la mowed.

Horrible — A woman in Michigan has asked for a divorce from her husband because he refuses to wear a moustache. I know some who will never be troubled by any such difficulties.

Excerpt from The Parkersburg Daily Times

Feb. 20, 1867

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A Sagacious Dog

An Irishman in Newburyport has a dog of much intelligence which has become attached to him by a dozen years acquaintance. Last week the dog met with an accident in the Eastern Railroad depot, losing one of his legs under a car wheel. He picked up the dissevered member in his mouth, and went home to tell his master, as best he could, the state of affairs.

The Celt could not kill the dog, nor see him die from neglect, therefore he called a surgeon who amputated the limb, the master holding him in his arms while the operation was being performed, and talking to him as though he was a child. He is now rejoiced to see him running about, happily and lively on three legs and will give him asylum as long as he lives.

The Parkersburg Daily Times

Sept. 13, 1867

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Bob Enoch is president of the Wood County Historical and Preservation Society. If you have comments or questions about Look Back items, please contact him at: roberteenoch@gmail.com, or by mail at WCHPS, PO Box 565, Parkersburg, WV 26102.