Obituaries (June 1)

Clifford S. Wilbur, 18, of Unadilla [Otsego Co., NY], died Saturday morning in the Fox Memorial Hospital in Oneonta, as a result of second and third degree burns, which he suffered in a truck-car crash in Franklin.  Young Wilbur, who was driving a truck, collided with a parked car owned by Harry L. Feltman, of Franklin.  The gas tank of the car exploded and Wilbur was covered with flames as he was thrown from the truck.  The driver of the ambulance in which the victim was removed to Oneonta was Byron Wyman, of Unadilla, the boy's grandfather, who was not aware of his identity until he was lifting him into the ambulance.  Surviving are his widow, Wanetta Clark Wilbur; an infant daughter, Joanne Joyce; his parents, Wesley Wilbur, of Unadilla, and Mrs. Andrew More, of Walton; three sisters, Mrs. Russell Morley, of Unadilla, Mrs. Ernet Miller, of Masonville and Miss Marjorie Wilbur of Walton; and his grandparents, Mrs. Gertrude Wilbur and Mr. and Mrs Byron Wyman.  A private funeral will be held Tuesday at the Joyce Funeral Home, with the Rev. Yale Lyon, officiating.  Burial will be in Evergreen Cemetery.  [Bainbridge News & Republican, Nov. 20, 1941]

 

Nina Smith Clink, 31, wife of Ottie C. Clink, of the Town of Afton [Chenango Co., NY] and formerly of Bainbridge, died at the Mary Emogene Bassett Hospital in Cooperstown, Thursday night, following an operation.  Mrs. Clink who had been ailing for several years, was taken to the hospital Sunday morning, where it was discovered that she was suffering from a tumor on the brain.  An operation was performed by a brain specialist from Albany, but she failed to respond to treatment.  Mr. and Mrs. Clink lived on the Fred Robbins farm when they came to this section in 1934.  Later they moved to Unadilla where they lived until a few weeks ago when they purchased a small farm on Route 7 between Bainbridge and Afton.  The deceased was a faithful member of the West Bainbridge Baptist Church and was also the organist.  Before coming to this area, she had been a life-long member of the Baptist church of Burchardsville Pa.  Mrs. Clink was a graduate of Montrose High School, Montrose, Pa.  Mrs. Clink was born at Force Lake, Pa., March 8, 1910, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Smith.  Her mother died when she was a very small child.  In 1931, she was united in marriage to Ottie C. Clink, of Silver Lake, Pa.  Left to mourn the deceased are her husband, a son, Paul, nine years old; her father, Frank Smith; a sister Mrs. Hazel Hollenbeck, of Montrose, Pa; a brother, Carl Smith, of Burchardsville, Pa., and two uncles.  Services were held at Colwell's Chapel Sunday afternoon at 2 o'clock with the Rev. R. Lewis Jones, Baptist pastor of Binghamton, officiating.  A service and burial took place at Burchardsville Monday.  [Bainbridge News & Republican, Nov. 10, 1941]

 

Jesse S. Wicks, 57, local practicing attorney and formerly a minister of the Episcopal church died at 5:10 Sunday afternoon in the Mercy hospital of injuries received shortly after 11 Thursday night when he was struck by an automobile in Court street, near the Brighton Hotel.  The man sustained a compound comminuted fracture of the left leg, fractures of five ribs, and severe internal injuries, as well as cuts and bruises, as he stepped from between parked automobiles to cross the street.  His injuries included hemorrhages of the right suprarenal gland, the gland above the kidney, and other internal hemorrhages and injuries.  Three ribs on one side were fractured and he also suffered considerably from shock.  The driver of the car, John W. McAdams, 29, of Syracuse, said he was proceeding south in Court street at 15 miles an hour, according to a report made to city policemen, when Wicks suddenly stepped into the path of the car.  McAdams said that he was unable to avoid the accident, but stopped his car after Wicks dropped to the pavement.  In the McAdams car at the time was R.E. VanAkins, Akron, O., District manager for the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.  Funeral services will be held Wednesday morning at 11:15 in St. Paul's Episcopal Church following a private service at 11 at the Cummings Funeral home.  Rev. Condit N. Eddy, rector of the church will officiate.  Burial will be made at Worth [Jefferson Co., NY].  Surviving him are his wife, Mrs. Emma F. Murrock Wicks, and four children, Miss Emma Frances Wicks, who resides with her mother in the town of Rutland, near Burrville; Jesse S. Wicks, Jr., a corporal in the U.S. Army Air Corps, stationed at Trinidad off the northern coast of South America; Midshipman John W. Wicks, a student in the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md.; and Private Willard Wicks, private in the U.S. Army air corps, stationed at Eglin Field, Fla.  Mr. Wicks held an LLB degree and A.B. Degree and for years was an active clergyman of the Episcopal church prior to taking up the practice of law, once serving as archdeacon in Texas.  On the day before the accident he appeared in supreme court as counsel in a divorce court.  He was born Aug. 22, 1884 at Afton, N.Y. [Chenango Co., NY], the son of William and Emily Combs Wicks.  At 18 he was graduated from the Bainbridge high school of nearby Bainbridge, and after serving a clerkship in a Bainbridge law office, he entered Union Law School at Albany, from which he was graduated in 1908 with his degree of LLB.  Feeling that he preferred a ministerial rather than a lawyer's career, he entered the service of the Episcopal church and attended the theological school of Kenyon college, Gabler O., from which he was graduated in 1911.  That college conferred the degree of M.A. upon him in 1914.  In 1911 he was ordained a minister of the Episcopal church in Cleveland, O. by Bishop Andrew Leonard.  he continued his studies at Defiance College, Defiance, O., from which he received his A.B. degree in 1913.  While a student of Defiance college, he served Grace Episcopal church of Defiance.  In 1916 he received his B.D. degree from the General Theological seminary, New York City, after completing a correspondence course.  Mr. Wicks was made archdeacon of the Amarillo diocese of the Episcopal church, a diocese which included northern Texas, in 1913.  He held that position for five years.  In January, 1918, he was sent to Cuba, where he served as a missionary in the Havan diocese.  In 1919 he was transferred to Oklahoma, eing located in Miami, and had charge of the social service work in four or five missions.  He remained there in that capacity for about three years and then was appointed rector of St. Paul's Episcopal church at Greenville, a position he held two years.  From Greenville he was sent to Petosky, Mich., where he was director of the Church of the Redeemer.  Leaving the Michigan Church, he came east in 1927 to take up the practice of law and established his residence with relatives near Burrville in the town of Rutland.  For a time he served as clerk in the law office of the late Attorney William H. Gilman.  In 1928, just 20 years after his graduation from law school, he tried the bar examinations and was admitted to the bar.  Since then he has practiced law here.  For a time he maintained office space in the offices of the late Attorney T. Arthur Hendricks, with whom he became acquainted while both were students in law school.  He was a member of the Jefferson County Bar and belonged to the Masonic Lodge in Defiance, O.  Mr. Wicks married Miss Emma Frances Murrock of Copenhagen, a school teacher and daughter of William and Sophia Murrock, of that village on June 30, 1915.  When the couple first met, he had charge of the Episcopal church at Port Leyden for the summer and she was attending summer school in the village.  At the time they met he was a student in Kenyon college.  Later they attended Defiance college together.--From a Watertown paper.  [Bainbridge news & Republican, Nov. 20, 1941]

A communication to the Scranton Republican from a Hollisterville correspondent, dated Feb. 2nd, gives the following particulars of a strange occurrence.  "On Friday, Jan. 23, the wife of Henry Seek, a shoemaker residing at Dutch Flats, Wayne county, went into her husband's shop and conversed with him a few minutes, after which she went directly to the nearby.  Scarcely had she stepped inside the door when she was heard to fall heavily on the floor, where Mr. Seek found her lying apparently dead.  She was laid out as a corpse, and on Monday Jan. 26, the friends gathered and buried her.  Considerable comment was occasioned. however, by the condition of the body, which did not seem to have altogether the appearance of a dead person, and after the funeral ceremonies had been performed the husband and Mrs. Seek's friends began to worry for fear that she had been buried alive.  The more they thought about and discussed the affair the greater became their agitation, until at last, they determined to disinter the body which was accordingly done on Tuesday, Jan. 27, more than twenty-four hours after the burial had taken place, and at last accounts it was lying in the casket in the church at that place, her friends asserting that she is not dead, but in a trance.  [Afton Enterprise, Feb. 19i, 1891]