EMPORIUM NOTE: There was a too-short story in a recent edition
of the Olean, N.Y., newspaper about a reunion of long-lost brothers
who hailed from Emporium.

The April 18 story told of a “long-overdue family reunion” by
Dave and Pete Perry who apparently gathered at a plaque honoring
their great-grandfather, a policeman in Olean killed in the line of
duty more than a hundred years ago.

As for the brothers, the story quotes brother Pete talking about
his brother: “I never met him, he was never talked about by the
family.”

Dave was the one who stumbled upon information about his lost
brother while looking for information about his father for a
passport. “I called back to Emporium, Pa., where we were all from
originally,” he said. “One thing led to another and here we
are.”

“Here” was an alleyway next to the County Municipal Building
where a memorial to police Capt. Timothy Hassett is affixed to the
brick. Hassett was shot through the head Feb. 21, 1909, trying to
prevent a burglar at the Droney Lumber Co.

Dave and Pete journeyed from Michigan and California,
respectively, to pay homage to their relative. We found the story
of the policeman interesting in itself.

The police captain apparently was father to seven children and,
in those days, there was no such thing as a pension when someone
died. Compounding the tragedy, Hassett’s widow was killed by an
automobile two years later. She was one of the first people to be
killed in a car in Olean.

What this meant, of course, was that the seven children –
including Dave and Pete’s grandmother – were orphaned. The
grandmother was only 5 or 6 years old at the time.

The reunited brothers plan to continue their research in
Olean.

“We come from one of those families that separated,” Dave told
the newspaper. “We just met a month ago after all these years.”

LOCATOR: Don’t know if our readers have seen the TV program,
“The Locator,” on Saturday nights. In it, a Fort Myers, Fla., man
and his team of researchers conduct investigations in the hopes of
re-joining people who have been estranged from family members. This
story from Olean would have everything a TV program could want –
history, an emotional story of reunion, and the background on the
slain officer’s family.