Allentown Memories

From low income sections of center city, to expensive suburbs, Allentown and the Lehigh Valley is becoming home to more and more newcomers. I'm afraid the time will soon come when local memorabilia will have little appeal. Fortunately, for those interested, some impressive collections still exist.  David Bausch, former County Executor and authority on Automobile Art, is also a expert on things Allentown. Then there are the many small collections, home of the hidden treasures. Above is an early aerial photograph of the Allentown Fair. Those interested in the recent commotion concerning the 19TH Street Theater District may find the upper right of the photograph interesting. There is no theater, there are no houses on Saint George Street and most of the buildings seem to to garages and automobile in nature (don't tell Auto-Zone). This gem is probably from the late teens or early 20's, and comes from the Thomas Reed Collection. Thomas is aka Z1pyro, long time expert shooter for Zambelli Firework Company. He retired several years ago, and we who appreciate fireworks, notice his departure.

reprinted from July of 2008

ADDENDUM:Allentown recently lost David Bausch. For those of us interested in local history and politics, he was the dean. While his annual Christmas party brought the past and present together, his breakfast clubs were a more contemporary, daily event.

Allentown Memorabilia

The time and market for Allentown memorabilia has come and gone. With a changing population, and the graying of the older town folks, objects of our history are destined for the landfill. Even the local historic society concentrates on shows of general interest, such as Abraham Lincoln. In addition to having been a retail mecca, Allentown manufactured a large assortment of products. Allentown was stamped on tools, knifes, and metal products of all kinds, distributed nationwide. A local regional food product was the hard pretzel, a variation of the traditional German soft pretzel. Allentown had several pretzel companies. Miller's operated out of their factory at 732 Tilghman Street, between 1944 and 1978. In the coming months this blog will profile some of these Made In Allentown products, before litter and meaningless slogans became our legacy.

reprinted from July of 2013 

CLICK HERE for this baby boomer memory and 35 others in my booklet at the Amazon bookstore

The Corner Market

Although I doubt that there will ever be a show at the Historical Society, or brochures at the Visitors Bureau, perhaps nothing encapsulates the history of Allentown more than the corner grocery stores. Allentown proper, is mostly comprised of rowhouses built between 1870 and 1920, long before the era of automobiles and suburban supermarkets. Most of the corner markets were built as stores, and over the years many were converted into apartments. Up until the late 1940's, there may have been well over a hundred operating in Allentown. Some specialized in ethnic food. The bodega at 9th and Liberty was formally an Italian market. Live and fresh killed chickens were sold at 8th and Linden, currently H & R Block Tax Service. A kosher meat market is now a hair salon on 19th Street. The original era for these markets died with the advent of the supermarket. In the early 50's some corner stores attempted to "brand" themselves as a "chain", as shown in the Economy Store sign above. That market is at 4th and Turner, and has been continually operating since the turn of the last century. Ironically, as the social-economic level of center city has decreased, the corner stores have seen a revival. Most of these new merchants, many Hispanic and some Asian, know little of the former history of their stores, but like their predecessors, work long, hard hours.

ADDENDUM: The above post is reprinted from 2009.  The sign shown above has been removed or sold. When my parents were first married, they lived next door and would patronize the same store.  My grandparents lived nearby on the corner of Chew and Jordan Streets.

ADDENDUM 2: the Economy Stores sign shown, apparently came from an early A&P format in 1912 when they leased small stores. If this particular store was such an A&P, or just dressed later with a reused sign, I have yet to determine.

ADDENDUM APRIL 12, 2024: When I took the photo back in 2009, I was friendly with the long time owner, from having managed apartments in that neighborhood. Both she and the enamel sign are now long gone. When I told the current owner that members of my family have been coming into that same store for over a hundred years, he looked at me as if I was from another planet. There are very few long time store owners that I still know.

CLICK HERE for this baby boomer memory and 35 others in my booklet at the Amazon bookstore

Allentown's History Not Aging Well

A recent comment to this blog wondered how Pip The Mouse and the Liberty Bell Shrine were faring? Pip was the famous annual Christmas window display at the iconic Hess Brothers Department Store. The Liberty Bell was hidden in Allentown at the Zion Church during the Revolutionary War. 

Students of this blog know that the disregard for history is one of my many complaints about the NIZ. Beautiful mercantile architecture was destroyed to accommodate  the NIZ real estate scheme. Meanwhile, the art deco post office on 5th Street goes to unclaimed seed, and the Art Museum is going to abandon its important role on that street.

Zion Church gave their historic property to Gregory Edwards. Considering that his church on 9th Street has looked less than pristine since he has managed it, the future for Zion doesn't look promising. Those interested in Pip or the Liberty Bell will have to do research at the Historical Society, at least for as long as that lasts.

The Dinosaurs Of Sumner Ave

Up to the early 1950's, Allentown was heated by coal, and much of it came from Sumner Avenue. Sumner was a unique street, because it was served by the West End Branch of the Lehigh Valley Railroad. The spur route ran along Sumner, until it crossed Tilghman at 17th Street, and then looped back East along Liberty Street, ending at 12th. Coal trucks would elevate up, and the coal would be pushed down chutes into the basement coal bins, usually under the front porches of the row houses. Several times a day coal would need to be shoveled into the boiler or furnace. By the early 1970's, although most of the coal yards were closed for over a decade, the machines of that industry still stood on Sumner Avenue. Eventually, they took a short trip to one of the scrap yards, which are still on the same avenue, but not before I photographed them.

reprinted from 2011

photocredit:molovinsky

CLICK HERE for this baby boomer memory and 35 others in my booklet at the Amazon bookstore

Hamilton Street's Golden Era

By the early 1950's, our major department stores were operated by the second generation owners. Max Hess Jr. become a merchandizer of national reputation. His store windows presented displays as sophisticated as any major city. One holiday novelty exists to this day, Pip The Mouse, and can be seen at Zion Church. The fourth floor toy department had eye popping, life sized, automated stuffed animals from Germany. Needless to say, Santa Claus was on duty at Hess's.

Families had their favorite department store. While my mother patronized Hess's, others were loyal to Leh's and Zollingers. Although I'm sure that their Christmas displays were also top notch, I have no personal memories. While we now charge citizens to drive through a park with lights, downtowns used to compete with attractive displays. Allentown was famous for the Bell Lights on our iconic light posts, which would rock back and forth, as if ringing. Although times have changed, this blog will remind those few who remember.

reprinted from December of 2012

CLICK HERE for this baby boomer memory and 35 others in my paperback at the Amazon bookstore

The Little Bridge of Lehigh Parkway, Part 3

The little bridge is just off the parking lot by Robin Hood. When I started my blog, the small spring pond and raceway to the miniature bridge were completely overgrown. I prevailed upon the then separate Watershed Dept. to allow it to be cleaned up. Although the bridge is being currently kept cleared, the pond and raceway is again very overgrown.

The deviation away from our traditional park system began in 2006, when during Ed Pawlowski's first term, he hired a park director not familiar with Allentown, and its iconic park system. Worse for the traditional park system, was that several members of the Trexler Trust were part of Pawlowski's kitchen cabinet, and didn't assert themselves in regard to the parks.

Nothing has been more detrimental to our traditional park system than the park department cooperating with the Wildlands Conservancy, starting with a weed wall in Trout Park. The Conservancy has no interest in parks, but rather nature. Worse, the Trexler Trust is now funding this desecration. THEY SHOULD BE TAKEN TO COURT FOR VIOLATING TREXLER'S INTENTIONS. THE FEATURES NOW BEING IGNORED WERE COMMISSIONED BY TREXLER HIMSELF.