Molovinsky's Nostalgia Train

I suspect that this blog will be spending a lot of time in the near future in the distant past. Frankly, I don't see much news to report on. I'll leave the arena news and Pawlowski's proclamations to The Morning Call. In a few weeks he'll be cutting the ribbon on the 15th Street Bridge, and we'll hear about infrastructure, and what he could do for all of Pennsylvania as governor. In truth, that bridge was on the books since 1985. In truth, they accomplished more work in a week on the high priority arena, as South Allentown dangled for almost three years without the bridge. In the picture above we're back in 1946. Allentown would be serviced by trolleys for another six years. In center city, the main north and south lines were on 6th and 7th Street, as were the stores. Here, the trolley is on 6th, between Turner and Chew Streets. Graf Court, one of Allentown's first apartment houses, shown on the left side, is still there. Out of view, on the upper right side, was the Jewish Community Center, now Alliance Hall.

click on photo's to enlarge images

On The Bus With Pawlowski

Long time readers of this blog will be surprised to learn that I have been on the campaign bus with governor hopeful Ed Pawlowski. Of course I'm not allowed in the bus, but have been staying on the top luggage rack, as he goes from one town in Pennsylvania to another.  This will be the first in a series of reports on how the march to the governor's mansion is progressing. Last week, candidate Pawlowski released his education plan for the Keystone State. In it Pawlowski states,  He (Corbett) has sacrificed public school funding in order to fund more corporate tax giveaways that in some cases businesses didn’t ask for or even need. That’s not the way to put our economy back on track. I suppose that Ed forgot about the biggest tax giveaway in state history, Allentown's $Billion dollar NIZ hockey arena complex.

Lehigh Valley News and Commentary

The Lehigh Valley International Airport, which has just completed a $multi-million dollar remodeling of the terminal, will increase fees to the remaining airlines by 11%. Although the airport management has succeeded in reducing the number of carriers from eight to four, one of which drives it's passengers to Newark on a bus, it's feared that one or two of them may continue service. If all had gone as planned, within a year or so, the airport would have transitioned to the Lehigh Valley Bus Terminal. Elsewhere in the news, Pennsylvania will extend the meaningless comment period to Allentown's trash/sewage to energy project. Although the project has already been approved, and construction permits have been issued, the environmentalists were allowed to question the project after the fact, and may now continue to do so.

Supermarket Comes To Boomtown

The concrete monolith still stands five stories above Lehigh Street at the Parkway Shopping Center. Currently it sports a clock and a sign for St. Luke's medical offices. It was built in 1953 as the modernistic sign tower for Food Fair supermarket, which then was a stand alone store. Behind it, on South 12th Street was the Black and Decker Factory. The shopping center would not be built to decades later, connecting the former supermarket to the bowling alley built in the 60's. Food Fair was started in the 1920's by Russian immigrant Samuel Friedland in Harrisburg. By 1957 he had 275 stores. 1953 was a rough year for the butcher, baker and candle stick maker; the huge supermarkets were too much competition, even for the bigger independent markets, such as Lehigh Street Superette; it was further east on Lehigh, now the site of a Turkey Hill Market. The sign tower also remains at the 15th and Allen Shopping center, which was another stand alone Food Fair. That parcel remains an independent supermarket. Food Fair would eventually absorb Penn Fruit, which had a market on N. 7th Street, then turn into Pantry Pride. When the Food Fair was built, there was as yet no 15th Street Bridge. Allentown only connected to the south side by the 8th Street Bridge and the Lehigh/Union Street hill. (stone arch bridge, near Regency Tower, was route to West End) Allentown was booming and Mack Trucks were rolling off the line, a block east off Lehigh Street, as fast as they could build them. The factories on S. 12th st. are now flea markets. Mack Headquarters is being sold to a real estate developer. Perhaps those concrete monoliths are the monuments to better times, by those of us who remember.

reprinted from June 2009

Allentown's Grim Future

By the time you hear of a stock, the anticipation of that business's success has already been built into the value. Although the arena won't open for another year, that event will be anti-climatic. The election results said that Allentonians don't think that Pawlowski can walk on water. An underfunded opponent, campaigning for only eight weeks, took 40% of the votes. The Morning Call, favorable to the Arena Project, cannot help but report the violence in center city. Suburbanites, many of whom haven't been downtown in decades, will only come reluctantly, if at all, and then leave very quickly. Those expecting a recipe for pumpkin pie are at the wrong blog.

Comments In The Blogosphere

Yesterday I called an anonymous commenter at an associate's blog a monkey. I actually suggested that two commenters might as well be the same monkey, in that they have the same name, Anonymous. Now the topic was a little more touchy than usual, Israel and Obama. I was called a Zionist, accused on putting an ungrateful Netanyahu and Israel ahead of my own president's wisdom. I will leave the discussion of Israel and Iran, Netanyahu and Obama to another time, I'm here today to discuss monkeys. I find it interesting that people are so reluctant to use their names on a blog comment, but spill their guts on Facebook. More so, Google knows everything about you; That's why advertisements for your false teeth paste pop up on your computer.

Blogging, The Last WatchTower

Anybody who buys The Morning Call on Monday knows what slim pickings is. The paper is produced on Friday, with a one man weekend crew, to cover the police blotter. There's hardly enough paper to cover the bottom of a bird cage. That leaves the news junkies forced to read garbage like this. Even the blogosphere is slim pickings. Bernie O'Hare, arguably the dean of local blogging, says that I'm lazy and preoccupied with choo choo trains. I actually haven't done a choo choo post in over six minutes, that's how long it took me to read the paper this morning. Truth to be told, I am fascinated with how much Allentown has changed within the last 50 years, and the railroads are a good metaphor. In my youth, the city was serviced by rail branch lines with dozens of sidings, supplying many industries with raw materials, to produce products distributed all over the country. Those industries fostered a large middle class, and a high standard of living. We were the truck capital of the world, we were home to the first transistors, and a retail legend. The tower shown above in 1963, and the gas tank in the background, were on Union Street. Although they are both now gone, this lazy blogger will continue to combine history, news and commentary for those of us who still remember a different era.