Aug 6, 2005 By Glenn Tunney For The 9 min read

There was no June edition of the Reader Roundtable due to our two consecutive series on the Bridgeport High School fire and the future of Brownsville’s Neck, so today we will turn to some reader questions and comments that have been simmering on the back burner. Caught in the wringer

Ralph Rosendale lives in Grindstone, where the late Dr. Alexander Spears once served the medical needs of the community. In our April series on the former custom of childbirth in the home, Dr. Spears’ daughter, Eva Lu Spears Damianos, shared her recollections about some of her father’s many “home deliveries.” That prompted Ralph to write to me with a “Doc Spears” story of his own.

“If you have contact with Eva Lu Spears Damianos,” Ralph wrote, “please tell her that I remember her father. It is easy to do, every time I look at a big scar on my left arm at the elbow.

“I was two or three years old in the mid-1940s when our family bought our first electric washing machine with a modern electric-operated wringer on top. While my grandmother and mother were in the yard, happily hanging the first load of wash from this marvel, I was in the cellar admiring the washing machine. Climbing up on a bench to look at it, I put my fingers on the rollers of the wringer. It instantly took my arm in up to the elbow, and with the rollers still going around, it burnt off the skin and flesh to the bone.

“My screaming woke up my grandfather, who rushed down to the cellar and pulled the plug to stop the washer. He then picked me up in his arms and carried me down over the hill to the Colonial No. 4 mine building, where Doc Spears had his office on the second floor.

“Doc Spears was up in the patch delivering a baby, just as you described in your article. However, to make a long story short, he saved my arm, when most thought it would have to be taken off. He came to our patch house every day for a long time to treat it.”

I forwarded Ralph’s note to Eva Lu Spears Damianos in Pittsburgh, who replied that even though the incident happened more than half a century ago, she still recalls her father mentioning the episode of the little boy whose arm was caught in the wringer. I wonder how many of our readers have their own unpleasant memory of a painful run-in with an old washing machine wringer?

National Bottling Works

Former Brownsville police officer Rick Gordon of Brownsville called us in April seeking reader input about several old soda pop bottles that he owns. The three bottles were found on property along Thornton Avenue (near Green Street) where Rick believes there was once a bottling plant. The bottles are labeled “National Bottling Company of New Salem,” “Brownsville Bottling Company, Brownsville, Pa.,” and “Crown Bottling Works, Brownsville, Pa.”

Our readers have responded with information about one of the bottles and possibly a second. Michael John of Lemont Furnace wrote with details about the National Bottling Company of New Salem.

“Sometime in early 1947 when I was a teenager,” Michael explained, “my father, Michael James (Mickey) John and my uncle, Fouad S. (Foo) John, purchased the National Bottling Works of New Salem and moved it to 57 E. Penn Street in Uniontown. If my memory serves me well, I can picture the original plant while it was in New Salem. It was housed in a yellow brick building located near the Catholic Church, probably St. Procopius.

“They bought the plant from Andy Shirley of Fairchance, who also owned and operated a beer distributorship in Fairchance. As I remember it, the plant was a small operation that produced flavored beverages in seven-ounce bottles with the name of National imprinted in the glass.

“I believe the original plant began making soft drinks around 1918, as some of the main bottling equipment bore manufacturing dates from around that period. During World War II, closed soft drink plants were very common in the area, and this included the National plant. Sugar is a main ingredient for making flavored soda, and since most of the sugar went to the war effort, a lot of the plants were not in use because of a sugar shortage.

“My father and uncle set up the plant again at 57 E. Penn St. in Uniontown and changed its name to F.S. John Bottling. Later it became Hires Bottling Company when they added the franchise for Hires Root Beer.

“After Hires Bottling Company, my dad and uncle purchased the Sanitary Bottling Works from a group who bought it from the owner, Mr. Jefferies. In 1958 the plant was turned over to me, and I made soft drinks under the labels of ‘Virginia Dare,’ ‘Chocolate Bunny’ and ‘Bunny Beverage.’ I kept the plant open until 1965.”

Michael’s note confirms that the bottle in Rick Gordon’s possession was produced by an early link in a succession of bottling works that were in operation until 1965.

Jean Huston Bright of Brownsville lived on Thornton Avenue for 45 years. She emailed that many years ago, James Thornton had a bottling works on Thornton Avenue, the street where Rick Gordon’s pop bottles were found. I was able to locate a display ad in J. Percy Hart’s 1904 “History and Directory of the Three Towns” which advertised “Jas. I Thornton & Sons, Manufacturers of Pure Bottled Soda Water, Brownsville, Pa. Jas. I Thornton, Jas. B. Thornton, C.A. Thornton.” It is possible that one of Rick’s other two bottles from the Thornton Avenue site is connected to the Thornton Avenue bottling firm mentioned in this 1904 advertisement.

Finding Harlem

Ron Barry of Brownsville, a captain in the South Brownsville Volunteer Fire Department, wrote me with a comment and a question prompted by the series about the graduation night fire that destroyed Bridgeport High School.

“Did you know that the South Brownsville fire company was officially organized on May 18, 1908, just 12 days after the fire?” Ron wrote. “Our roots go much further back, as we have records of fire protection in Bridgeport as far back as 1842, but our official charter is dated May 18, 1908. You’ll find this inscription on all of our trucks as well as on our company patch.”

In the subsequent article describing the construction of the Prospect Street School to replace the burned Bridgeport School, it was mentioned that some taxpayers felt the new school should be smaller than its predecessor, because the growing population in distant parts of the borough might necessitate future construction of satellite schools. The article quoted a Clipper-Monitor editorial, which suggested that “if the town grows, some time a ward school will be required in Harlem and one towards the Woodward farm. That being true, it would be folly to build too large a school on the old site.”

That 1908 editorial prompted Ron Barry to ask, “Where was Harlem?” The context of the word’s use in the editorial indicates that it was located somewhere within the boundaries of South Brownsville Borough. I have never encountered the term Harlem as a name for any region within Bridgeport or South Brownsville borough. Can any reader shed light on this subject?

The same article caused Donna Edwards-Jordan of North Huntingdon to inquire about two memorable architectural features of the new Prospect Street School.

“In your article, I noted the editorial comments in the Clipper-Monitor concerning cost,” she wrote, “notably that extravagance should be avoided and costs contained. How, then, did Prospect Street School come to have that magnificent central staircase, which I believe was made of marble? It was a grandiose work of art, and it looked to me, although I was an impressionable kid, like something you’d see in a Hollywood extravaganza. Were no objections raised to the cost of this staircase, or to the cost of the huge, purely ornamental Greek columns gracing the front facade?”

I can answer one of your questions, Donna, by sharing the story of a local benefactor who helped pay for those four towering columns that flanked the entrance to the Prospect Street School. This information comes courtesy of the late McCready Huston, who wrote the weekly column “And That Was Brownsville” for the Brownsville Telegraph from 1961 until his death in 1973.

In one of his columns, Huston wrote, “Nora Shallenberger Murray writes the column a sidelight on Roland C. Rogers that deserves a place in the annals of Brownsville men who did something for the town. Nora, an admirer of the Prospect school facade, as she should be, had from her uncle Rinard Bulger the tale of the pillars, a vignette that illustrates the character of Mr. Rogers.

“It seems that Mr. Bulger and Mr. Rogers were on the board when the question of the pillars came up, a question of money. Like all school boards at any given time, it didn’t have enough, or thought it didn’t, for solid pillars. It was about to order sectionals when Mr. Rogers objected, saying the building warranted the best. He backed his preference with an offer to pay the difference from his own pocket.”

Roland Clay Rogers, a South Brownsville “gentleman of private means” and philanthropist, died in 1922 in the same Bank Street home where he was born in 1844. His family’s assets came from his and his father Talbert’s commercial enterprises in Philadelphia during the nineteenth century, and the family was a major source of capitalization for the Second National Bank in Brownsville (across Market Street from the Flatiron building).

As for the story behind Prospect Street School’s central staircase, I have yet to encounter any information on that score. Perhaps a reader will be able to enlighten us further.

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Glenn Tunney may be contacted at 724-785-3201 or 6068 National Pike East, Grindstone, PA 15442. Comments about these weekly articles may be sent to Editor Mark O’Keefe, 8-18 E. Church St., Uniontown, PA or e-mailed to mo’keefe@heraldstandard.com. All past articles are on the web at http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~glenntunneycolumn/