Rescue Horse That Beat Death Returns The Favor: Weird News & Oddities

When you think about it (and if you aren’t opposed to a little anthropomorphism for the sake of a story), chasing down a suspect thought to have snatched a woman’s purse on a busy New York City sidewalk was Kelly’s way of returning the favor.

The scientifically safer version of the story is that Kelly wasn’t doing anything other than what he was bred to do, which is run like the wind.

Retired from the racing circuit, the standardbred was saved from the slaughterhouse by a Monmouth County, New Jersey, animal sanctuary and was put into service by mounted police patrolling Manhattan’s Upper West Side.

If this were a children’s story, the horse most definitely would have made the gallop for justice as a give-back.

“I can’t tell you how many times I look at that video,” Standardbred Retirement Foundation executive director Judy Bokman told Patch of the police officer’s bodycam footage. “It almost brings tears to your eyes because you get so proud of these horses you’ve given a second chance. It’s a great feeling.”

Before the foundation stepped in, Kelly was waiting in the “kill pen” to be shipped to another country and killed for meat.

“He’s an exceptional horse,” Bokman said. “He’s extremely handsome, he’s very quiet, he is so unfazed by anything around him. As one could see, in the middle of a New York street, nothing bothered him whatsoever.”

• Read the Patch Exclusive and watch the video: Racehorse Kelly, Saved From The ‘Kill Pen,’ Saves The Day

Can T-Shirts Save A Bookstore?

Artist Filipe Bergson still needs to sell about half a million bootleg T-shirts before he can buy a St. Petersburg, Florida, bookstore, but even if he manages that feat, another hurdle remains.

Long-dormant Haslam’s Bookstore isn’t for sale.

Bergson had sold about 500 shirts when he spoke with a Patch reporter a few days ago.

“I’m doing this one shirt at a time,” Bergson said.

Every Saturday, he pops up in front of the store to peddle his shirts, which feature a drawing he made in college about a decade ago of one of Haslam’s infamous bookstore cats.

Whether he can raise enough to buy the bookstore is something Bergson approaches with a wink and a smile.

Although there’s no for-sale sign on the bookstore’s window, “I’m committed to the bit,” the artist told Patch, adding that if the opportunity to snag it arose, he “wouldn’t say no.”

The iconic bookstore in St. Pete’s Grand Central District, owned by the same family since its founding in 1933, shuttered in 2020 during the early days of the pandemic. It never reopened.

• Read the Patch Exclusive: Artist Tries To Buy Iconic Bookstore ‘1 Shirt At A Time’

Kits Do The Darnedest Things

Foxes are naturally timid and skittish around people, but a kit came running when called by a public works employee in Middleton Township, Pennsylvania, recently.

It needed help. Joe Judge and Dave Kabana were working at a park when they saw the young fox in distress. Its head was stuck in a peanut butter jar.

“I called it, and it just came up to me,” Judge told Patch. “I was shocked that the fox did.”

Although normally shy, vixens are protective of their young and can act aggressively if they think their kits are threatened.

This one watched intently from a distance. It took both men working together to free the fox.

“It feels good,” Judge said. “I’m an animal lover.”

• Read the Patch Exclusive: Kits Do The Darnedest Things; Fortunately Park Workers Were Close By

This Collection Will Turn Your Head

Rosemary Tarnowski says she has spent more than two decades building what may be one of the most complete Minnesota Twins bobblehead collections anywhere.

Now, she hopes it will find a permanent home with the team itself.

The longtime Twins fan has been collecting the team’s bobbleheads since 2000, when she lined up for the first giveaway of a Harmon Killebrew bobblehead.

“I was obsessed by that because I got the first one and I wanted to complete the set,” Tarnowski told Patch.

She figures she’s collected roughly 300 Twins bobbleheads. She also acquired her late brother’s set, which makes her collection significantly larger. Some of the earlier ones, when only about half as many of the collectibles were produced, are rare and sought-after.

Her favorite bobblehead depicts former Twins first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz blowing a bubble with gum.

“It’s so cute,” Tarnowski said.

• Read the Patch Exclusive: This Collection Will Turn Your Head

Why Police Will Welcome Some Drunks

File this under “things that sound illegal but aren’t”: Police in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, are actively recruiting volunteers to get drunk.

Yes, really.

The department says it’s hosting so-called “wet labs,” where willing participants sip provided alcohol while officers practice field sobriety tests. Police won’t be drinking — just observing, clipboard in hand, like the world’s most judgmental happy hour.

The internet, naturally, assumed it was a prank. It is not. It’s legitimate training that departments have used for years, though rarely with this level of viral intrigue.

Details like what’s on the drink menu remain unclear, but it may be the only time in participants’ lives where “officer, I swear I’ve been drinking” earns you a gold star instead of a citation.

• Read more: ‘Not A Joke,’ Police Say Of Call For Drunks

Put Your John Hancock On This House

A house in Boston once owned by founding father John Hancock is up for sale for the first time in generations, something that almost never happens with a historic property like this.

That it’s going up for sale during the 250th anniversary year of the signing of the Declaration of Independence may be more strategic than serendipitous. Hancock was famously the first to sign the founding document.

Interested buyers can put their, ahem, John Hancock on the deed for the National Register of Historic Places-listed home for just $5 million.

The three-story Ebenezer Hancock House, as the property is known, is “reportedly the site where Ebenezer Hancock, Deputy Paymaster of the Continental Army and John Hancock’s younger brother, stored 2 million silver crowns, loaned by the French Government, prior to disbursement to the troops,” according to the listing.

• Read more: Put Your John Hancock On This Historic Revolutionary War-Era Property

Flesh-Eating Bacteria Found

This isn’t good:

A flesh-eating bacterium that has a 20 percent chance of killing a person within 48 hours of developing an infection has been found in Long Island waters.

The situation isn’t hopeless, though.

“We have some incredibly pressing problems,” coastal ecologist and marine scientist Christopher Gobler said this week at a water quality symposium in Riverhead, “but at the same time some incredible opportunities to address those problems.”

Gobler, a professor at Stony Brook University's School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, said “dozens and dozens of locations” in estuaries, harbors, bays and ponds across Long Island don’t meet state and federal standards.

Last year, more than two dozen ponds had the harmful blue-green algal blooms that promoted the growth of flesh-eating bacterium, the common name for Vibrio vulnificus, which only existed in the Gulf of Mexico in the 20th century but has slowly moved up the East Coast.

Scientists hadn’t expected Vibrio to reach the Northeast until around 2080, but in 2023, three people died after being exposed to it off Long Island Sound.

The toxins can also be lethal to pets.

“On Long Island, dogs have gotten sick and died, just from drinking lake water,” Gobler said.

The scientist is confident impaired waters can be cleaned up, but he stressed, "There is no time to waste.”

• Read more: Flesh-Eating Bacteria That Can Be Fatal In 48 Hours Found, But There’s Hope

Lucky Day For Lottery Players

Friday, April 17, was a particularly lucky day in Tewkesbury, Massachusetts, where three winning lottery tickets were sold at two local stores.

One ticket worth $15,000 was sold at TJ Callahan’s Pub in Tewkesbury through the Lottery’s Keno game.

Two additional winning tickets, each worth $10,000, were sold at Route 38 Smoke Shop in Tewkesbury in the “$4,000,000 In The Money” scratch game.

• Read more: April 17 Was The Day To Buy A Lottery Ticket In This Town