The Sunday Drive

My family wasn't much for recreation.  My father worked six days a week, from early morning until early evening.  We did go for a long car ride on Sundays.  Back then gasoline was cheap, and having no destination wasn't thought of as wasteful.  Children were more content to sit in the back seat and look out the window, now they want a video screen in the vehicle.



Even children's play then involved more imagination and interaction.  Howdy Doody was just a puppet on strings, who spend most of his time talking to an adult, Buffalo Bob, can you imagine?

 Sitting in that back seat in the mid fifties, I might well had



my "coonskin" hat with me.  Fess Parker was a genuine American hero.  It mattered little if he played both Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone, both were king of the wild frontier.  The ride probably lasted for two hours and then we would go to a restaurant to eat dinner.  Compared to now, there were very few restaurants.



My mother would cook all the other meals that week, and we probably ate out more than most.  Supermarkets were the new rage in food shopping, but the butcher, baker and candle stick maker were still going strong.  If my father headed west or south, chances are we ended up at Shankweiler's Hotel, famous for chicken and waffles.   They were at the intersection of Old 22 and Route 100.  The building still exists and currently is a bank.  The family also owned another hotel on Route 309, which had an adjoining Drive-In movie venue.



If my father headed north or east,  we would end up at Walp's, which was on the corner of Union Blvd. and Airport Road.  Walp's was a much more urban place.   While Shankweiler's was an old country inn,  Walp's was built as a modern restaurant.  I enjoyed those rides, they were a learning experience.

reprinted from previous years

Knockdown At The Garden

You could knock Joe Louis down, the problem was when he got up. Shown above, Louis's former sparring partner, Jersey Joe Walcott, circles above Louis. Louis had returned from four years in the service, and resumed defending his title. Walcott himself would eventually become champion, but not this night, not against Joe Louis.

Madison Square Garden, December 5, 1947

DECEMBER OF 2012 IS FIGHT MONTH, WITH 29 JOE LOUIS ERA FIGHT POSTS

Allentown's New Highway of Mischief

I've been an opponent of bikes in the parks for a long time. The photo above is actually from an interview with Fox News many years ago which appeared on the Hannity Show. Now that Allentown is again gearing up their plans to interconnect the parks, I'm again sounding the alarm.

Back when that interview took place, the cyclists were suburban yuppies in spandex and helmets.  While that group is civilized, the danger was their speed  combined with old folks like me walking around.  The new danger is the junior thugs with electric bikes. Unlike the spandex yuppie, consideration isn't even something they aspire to.

The park interconnection will become a highway of mischief, with no police cars.  I know that there are destinations where bikes, motor vehicles and tourists respect each other, Allentown isn't one of them.

I'm an advocate for being site appropriate. In Allentown parks, the Riparian Buffers are weed walls.  In this era of dirt and electric bikes, interconnecting the parks will become another well meaning mistake.

Molovinsky For Allentown

Before this Molovinsky On Allentown blog began in 2007, there was Molovinsky for Allentown mayoral campaign in 2005. If you think that this blog is ignored by the Morning Call now, you should have seen the treatment they gave me in 2005. Actually, you couldn't have seen it, because they ignored my press conferences and only mentioned me in a smearing way. Although I was on the ballot as an independent, they never once published my photograph, or any picture with me in it.

I bring this up now, nineteen years later, because of current news about the Allentown Parking Authority. I was on their case, even back then. I held a press conference in front of their then headquarters at 10th and Hamilton Sts. The MC reporter ignored me, and instead interviewed the Authority's director at the time, and wrote about the wonderful things the Authority was doing for Allentown. 

The roof of that headquarters was the original Park&Shop parking deck, first in the country! When Park&Shop became less viable, the Allentown Parking Authority was started to take the big boys, including Morning Call owner Donald Miller, off the hook. The Parking Authority has been a behind the scenes handmaiden for the big boys ever since. 

Currently, the building is a satellite police station. The Tuerk administration now wants to sell it back to the Authority. The mayor is offended that some people think a shenanigan might be cooking. Whatever the backroom deal is, I'm sure you'll never read about it in the Morning Call.

Pictured above in 2005, I'm explaining the recent history of a restored house on Liberty Street. It had been restored, at our expense, three times in two years. If you want to know more about that, you won't find it in the Morning Call, they ignored that news conference too.

shown above screen grab from WFMZ

A Call To Arms

The above poster was circulated on social media Tuesday afternoon. The photo used, taken by this blogger last year, features many of those activists who feel disenfranchised by the Tuerk administration. At issue on the citizen side is which non-profits are supported by city hall, and which aren't.  At issue on the city council dais is the decorum of the protesters. 

If all the above wasn't enough for a lively meeting, not all city council members are on the same page. While Candida Affa is traditionally a staunch supporter of current administrations, Ed Zucal shares more and more sentiments with the citizen side. The protesters are particularly interested in a proposal to divert left over grant money to the general fund, as opposed to funding more non-profits. This proposal was forwarded by both Affa and Zucal, illustrating the ongoing dynamic tension between council, city hall and the activists.

One of the protesters is Jessica Lee Ortiz. This past weekend her organization, The Ortiz Ark Foundation, ran a highly successful, well publicized Easter Egg hunt at Stevens Park. 

Everyone has their own agenda,..I'm always promoting long overdue WPA restorations in our park system.

ADDENDUM: Jessica Lee Ortiz and the non-profit advocates prevailed. The city will set up applications and a scoring system for allocation of $1.2mil.

Municipal Wishful Thinking

One of the things that annoys me most is municipal wishful thinking. Perhaps nothing exemplifies that more than bicycle lanes. 

In the grit of real center city, cyclists are pre-teen boys, who haven't yet acquired enough for their unlicensed dirt bike. Instead, they pop wheelies on their bicycles, like their older brothers do on their loud dirt bikes. and ride down the middle of the street. 'They practice going the wrong way, and ignoring traffic lights. 

Meanwhile, in Delusionalville, elected officials  takes credit for the bicycle stencil grants, wasting our tax dollars on complete uselessness. I remember the trash compactors, as if they would solve the littering problem.

If my tone sounds somewhat more bitter than usual, it's because I think time's running out for the Allentown I knew. This city west of Bethlehem will still be called Allentown, but it won't resemble anything I remember. Likewise, I'm sure the old timers in Reading can say the same thing.

As I peck away on the typewriter with this municipal obituary, I do take solace from pictures of an inner city Easter Egg hunt.  Those mothers want better for their children. I would have liked to see more fathers there, but there were some. These are tougher times in every way than my Allentown was. All these new buildings on Hamilton Street mean nothing except to the few people who own them. The smoke stacks are long gone, and so are the high paying union jobs that they fostered. Immigrants still want to come here, the left over bones from our industrial past are still more than from where they come from.

How to fold this all together, the memories with new realities, is a tough recipe. 

Radio Molovinsky Wishful Thinking PodBlast

The Bicycles Of Allentown youtube by Gary Ledebur