Lehigh Valley Black History

 Colored Voters Association was the predecessor to the Bethlehem NAACP. The matchbook dates to the mid 1940's.

Always The Teacher

Joanne Jackson has always been a teacher, even after she retired. According to The Morning Call, her resignation last night from the Allentown School Board caught everybody off guard. It didn't catch me off guard, but only because Joanne and I are friends on Facebook. From her posts there, I know that her name is no longer Jackson, because she recently married. Also from her posts, I know that she sold her home in Allentown, and that they are living in her husband's home. Because of moving out of the Allentown district, her resignation was inevitable, but, being always the teacher, Joanne chose to make a lesson out of it. From my knowledge, the reasons that she gave for her resignation were indeed long term frustrations that she had with some fellow board members. My Facebook interaction is different than most. I limit my Friends to people I actually know, and have worked with on one project or another. I also happen to be friends with two fellow board members with whom she had issues, Scott Armstrong and David Zimmerman. Although I can understand the clash in style and tension Joanne felt with these two gentleman, I believe that Allentown was well served by all three of them. Joanne's resignation, for whatever reason, is indeed a loss to the school district.

WPA Effort Goes Facebook

Thanks to the kindness of others, our WPA efforts are on  Facebook. Although I will take credit for the photograph of the bridge, dam, and wall, the page was started by others, and is currently maintained by Steven Ramos. This coming Wednesday, August 28th at 6:00p.m., City Council will discuss the fate of the Robin Hood dam. If you would like the dam and ambience to remain as is, please consider attending the meeting. If you like to see the WPA structures in our park system maintained, please make your Facebook friends aware of the WPA Facebook page.

It's Like A Postcard

Last week when I prevailed on some players at City Hall to meet me in Lehigh Parkway, somebody remarked that it's like a postcard. With the creek banks now overgrown, it would difficult to recreate the nationally distributed postcards of Allentown parks from the 1950's. But the old postcards still exist, giving testimony to the beauty that was ours. There will be a formal discussion with the City Council Park and Recreation Committee next Wednesday at 5:00p.m. They will hear about stream velocity theory and habitat from the grant driven new age science crew. I will talk about beauty. I still believe that the parks were created for the pleasure of people.

King Of The Gypsies

According to my mother, a Gypsy king was buried in Allentown in around 1960, she knew about such things. She was born in Galgo, Hungary, an area of Transylvania, now part of Romania, near present day Gilgau. In Galgo, the Jews and Gypsies lived on the edge of town. In the early 20's, my grandparents, along with their Gypsy neighbors, came to Bethlehem to work at the Steel. On weekends, to make extra money, my grandparents would open their house and show Hungarian movies. None of their relatives, Jew or Gypsy, save one cousin, survived the nazi's; even the cemeteries were desecrated. As you can see from the document above, my grandfather earned his citizenship the hard way.

REPRINTED FROM DEC. 23, 2007

UPDATE: My post above is from 2007. In tomorrow's paper, The Morning Call has the story about the Gypsies coming to Allentown. Apparently, the Gypsy prince drowned, and a memorial service was held in Allentown. I suspect my mother had the details correct, and my memory was at fault.

Weekend In The Parkway

Lehigh Parkway provided a retreat for generations of Allentonians since it was built in the mid 1930's. In 1941, the current bridge over the Little Lehigh replaced the old cow bridge, and the picnic area called Robin Hood was completed. The area contained parking, picnic tables, rest rooms and a fountain overlooking the beautiful creek. Needless to say, the view and access to the creek was unimpeded.

Muddy Waters

It's been a tough five years for the Little Lehigh under Donny Cunningham. First, he has remained silent on the drilling of wells at the stream's headwater, to accommodate the bottling industry he shepherded to the valley. Now, The Morning Call has publicized the fact that the Lehigh County Authority (water and sewage) has an on going spillage of sewage into the waterway. Recently, when I criticized Cunningham's Plan to demolish the historic stone arch Reading Road Bridge,  Bernie O'Hare, defended the plan by quoting the "Bridge Doctor", Glenn Solt. Solt is Cunningham's public works director. Solt said that stone arch bridges look pretty, but they're filled with "crap." The Morning Call article quotes Richard Young, Pawlowski's Public Works Director. Young states that the Allentown Sewer Plant, which handles the sewage from the Lehigh County Authority, only intentionally dumps raw sewage downstream from the water plant. He fails to mention that the manhole covers, which overflow during storms, are upstream or just before our water plant. The above photo shows such overflow just west of Schreibers Bridge, which is only a few blocks before the water plant intake pipe. I hope Cunningham and Solt don't see this post. Schreibers Bridge is also a historic stone arch bridge. Built in 1828, it was rehabilitated in 1920 and 1998. Maybe Cunningham should concentrate on what's flowing under the bridges.

photo from The Morning Call
reprinted from July 2010

UPDATE:Some things have changed since I wrote this post in July of 2010, some things have not. Donny Cunningham resigned as County Executive and now heads Lehigh Valley Economic Development.  This blogger has managed to keep Solt from tearing down the Reading Road stone arch bridge.  Schreiber's Bridge, built in 1828, is carrying the load for the 15th Street Bridge, which is being replaced. Raw sewage still overflows from the LCA pipe in Lehigh Parkway,  and the Wildlands Conservancy picks and chooses science to suit their endless pursuit of grants.  According to Wildlands there is no sewage in the Little Lehigh, and the only pollution problem will be solved by removing the beautiful historic dam at  Robin Hood. They  were also silent about well drilling at the Little Lehigh headwaters, and anything else that might negatively impact their revenue stream, which is now partially funded by Nestle Bottling Company.