Emma C. Patterson wrote "Your Town and My Town" for the Suburban & Wayne Times from 1949 to 1958. It was written during a time when Wayne's founders were still around to reminisce about the area's development. The articles are a wealth of information, with many names and places referenced.

The same way historic photographs of Radnor can tell us a great deal about their subjects, Ms. Patterson's writing draws a vivid picture of Radnor's history as seen from the lens of the mid-20th Century. At that point venerable institutions that no longer function were still alive in full swing, longtime residents who could remember back to Wayne's agrarian past could still share their memories, and there was enough community interest that the Suburban was willing to print such extensive and descriptive columns week after week for nearly a decade.

Locked in fading newsprint, tucked away inside crumbling scrapbooks for fifty years, each article by Emma C. Patterson is reproduced here in full, in an easy to navigate searchable blog format.

Browse an index of all articles

The Bellevue Hotel, part 6 – bicycles, new houses on Bloomingdale & Audubon

/ Emma C. Patterson

Another interesting sight along the Lancaster Pike in the 1880’s, but one quite different from the A. J. Cassatt tallyho described in last week’s column, was the “high wheel” bicycle. A later development of the first crude bicycle made in Scotland in 1839, the “high wheel”, or “ordinary”, as it was more commonly called, reached a high state of development both in this country and abroad about 1872, when bicycling became a popular sport.

By this time the heavy wooden wheels of the earlier bicycles had given place to lighter ones of metal, with their wire spokes set at a tangent to the center. Solid rubber tires were cemented to the rims, and the front wheel was made larger than before in order that a greater distance might be travelled with each revolution of the cranks. This tendency continued until the front wheels grew from 30 inches in diameter to 60 inches or more, while the rear wheel shrank to 12 inches or less. Racing models of this type could attain a speed of twenty miles an hour.

On these bicycles the rider sat almost directly over the high wheel, which was certainly not conductive to his safety. A fall from that high perch was a serious matter, but not an infrequent one, since roads were rough, and the going uncertain.

In 1876 the “Safety”, the forerunner of our modern day bicycle was invented. And from the time it was first marketed in a practicable form in 1885 the “Ordinary” was doomed, although it lingered until the early nineties, by which time it had been brought to a really high state of precision and lightness.

One of the quaint old pictures in Dr. Arms’ collection shows the “Century Club” of bicyclists as they stopped at the Bellevue Hotel en route to Lancaster from Philadelphia, or perhaps from Lancaster to Philadelphia. At any rate, it was a round trip which they were to make in one day, according tot he Century Club stipulations for the jaunt. Standing beside their high wheeled bicycles these riders present a quaint sight to present day travellers to whom such a trip would seem infinitely more hazardous than any by automobile could possibly be. Their costumes bespeak the era–tight knee length knickers with long stockings, equally snug shirts or jackets and small caps with almost invisible visors!

Henry Graham Ashmead’s “History of Delaware County” contains an excellent description of the neighborhood around the Bellevue as described by a reporter for the “Germantown Telegraph” in an article written for his paper under date of July 2, 1884. According to him, “a new town, or rather an aggregation of delightful suburban residences, is rapidly springing up within easy travelling distance of the city of Philadelphia, either by rail or Pike”. At that time not less than 50 “elegant residences” had been completed and occupied with about $600,000 invested in them. Still others were in process of building by the owners, Drexel and Childs.

The “Bellevue Mansion” he describes as “a charming summer resort . . . beautifully situated and approached by a fine macadamized road”. Plans had been drawn for seven “cottages” to be built just across the Pike from the hotel with indeed some of them already under construction. These “cottages” which today are considered homes of rather more than moderate size are still standing and in constant occupancy on the south side of Lancaster Highway between Bloomingdale and Audubon avenues. In addition to these seven new houses, Mr. Abbott of the Pennsylvania Railroad had already built “a fine cottage” in this same development, where according to our evidently news-conscious reporter, Mr. Abbott planned to spend his honeymoon!

Adjoining the Bellevue Hotel grounds on the East was the William D. Hughes homestead originally known as the old Cleaver Farm. Purchased by Mr. Hughes from J. Henry Askin in 1878 it remained in his possession until 1896 when it was bought by William Wood. Adjoining the Hotel on the west was “an elegant cottage” which in 1884 was just being built by Mr. Theodore Gugert, of the firm of Bergues and Engel. This house is still standing next to the automobile show rooms and offices on the corner of Bellevue avenue and the Pike. The big white stucco house just west of the Gugert house was originally built and occupied by Dr. Joseph Crawford Egbert, well known Wayne physician and for many years a member of the Radnor Township School Board.

Still further along the Pike to the west was the old Spread Eagle Inn, which had been purchased in the middle ’80’s by Mr. Childs in order “to sop the sale of liquor near his bailiwick”, according to report. The new owner had lent it to the Lincoln Institute for a country home for its young Indian wards who enjoyed “plenty of comforts and conveniences, and every opportunity for outdoor exercise, without being interfered with by outsiders”.

This then was the neighborhood that surrounded the Bellevue Hotel in its brief 20 years of existence before one of the most disastrous fires that Wayne has ever experienced razed it to the ground early on the morning of March 16, 1900. Large headlines in the Public Ledger of March 17 proclaimed the news:

“Bellevue at Wayne Wiped Out of Existence. Tramps Believed to be Responsible for the Blaze. Loss is $58,000; covered by Insurance–House Tops Protected by Snow against Flying Embers”.

Further simplifying the headlines is the statement that “It is believed that tramps, having made a fire in one of the large fireplaces on the first floor carelessly permitted the flames to spread. When the town watchman first saw the blaze the fire was progressing rapidly.

“Wayne is well supplied with fire apparatus, and has excellent water service. But when the firemen came to the scene it was evident the blaze was beyond control. However, heroic efforts were made to keep the flames in check and a stream of water was poured on the handsome stone stable belonging to William Wood which was but 20 to 30 feet from the hotel property. Persistent endeavor had its reward in the saving of this property and the Wood mansion nearby. The wind favored the firemen, but burning bits of wood found lodgment on the roofs a quarter of a mile away. That there was not further destruction was due to the encrusted snow that covered every house-top.”

This year was the first one in which the hotel had been closed for the winter. Mrs. A. R. Sank, the proprietor, had planned to reopen on April 1, after some alteration and improvements had been made. Her furnishings alone at the time of the fire were valued at about $8,000.

Not only was the Bellevue a popular summer hotel but for the four years preceding the fire it had been the temporary home of football teams coming to Philadelphia to meet the University of Pennsylvania players. Only the fall before the fire the Cornell and Michigan teams were housed at the Bellevue while three years before the University of Pennsylvania players had made the resort their headquarters.

–

This series on the Bellevue Hotel will conclude with personal reminiscences and anecdotes of the fire as given to your columnist by some of Wayne’s citizens who still remember it. Those who do remember it, and have not contacted Mrs. Patterson, are urged to do so by calling Wayne 4569. (The date for the fire has been definitely set as March 16, 1900, by a visit to the Newspaper Department of the Philadelphia Library where bound copies of Philadelphia newspapers are on file).

The Bellevue Hotel, part 7 (the fire) – description

/ Emma C. Patterson

The night of March 15, 1900, was one of intense excitement in Wayne, as many old timers now recall it. An unseasonably late snowstorm blanketed the countryside. The ice-coated branches of the trees creaked under their own weight as they bend and tossed in the high wind. Icicles hung from the eaves of all the buildings. A more terrifying setting for a fire can scarcely be imagined. Small wonder that on such a night as this, a fire, once under way, should totally destroy the Bellevue Hotel, as it stood on its high eminence on West Lancaster avenue.

A large group of Wayne’s young people had been to the opera that night in Philadelphia, and had returned home with some difficulty, on one of the late trains from the city. Among these were several members of the Wood household, who were shortly roused from their first deep sleep by a pounding on the front door, so loud that it resounded even above the noises of the storm. A Pennsylvania Railroad watchman, patrolling the tracks, was unable to find the doorbell in his confusion over discovering that a fire was well under way in the summer hotel adjoining the Wood property on the west. The entire household responded to his call and an alarm was immediately turned in to the face of almost overwhelming odds, the fire-horse dragging the heavy apparatus with difficulty through the deep ice-encrusted snow.

Mrs. Charles H. Stewart and Mrs. F. Allen McCurdy still recall the scene clearly as they watched it from their windows throughout the dark hours of the early morning of March 16.

In the midst of the intense excitement their mother, Mrs. Wood, quietly put on her warm winter coat and braved the elements in order to supervise the removal of the horses from the stable standing near the boundary line between the two properties. Not only were they all blanketed, but in order to avoid panic, each horse was carefully blindfolded as he was led from the stable.

Being constructed entirely of stone, the building was not destroyed in spite of its close proximity to the fire. Mrs. McCurdy says that when she moved from the old homestead only a few years ago, there was still one reminder of the fire in the form of a window in the hayloft that had been cracked by the intense heat of the flames but had never been replaced.

Had it not been for the deep snow, the high wind might have caused a holocaust in Wayne. As it was, burning embers were blown in all directions, some of them still smouldering when daylight came.

A resident of North Wayne still recalls his father’s fear that their Walnut avenue home might catch fire from the embers that were being blown that far in the high wind. Albert Ware, who lived with his family on West Wayne avenue, remembers watching the family coachman attach a long garden hose to an inside faucet, then pull it upstairs, under Mr. Ware’s direction, to a third floor window that gave access tot he roof. From this vantage point he stood ready to direct water on any fling embers that might land on the roof. Albert Ware remembers, too, how clearly the fire was visible from his window, and he watched the hotel burn to the ground.

Among others who lived on West Wayne avenue at the time of the fire, and still reside there, are Miss Mary Allen and her sister, Mrs. Henry Conkle, both recalling vividly the night of March 15, 1900.

According to all spectators, the entire sky was lighted up by the blaze. Mrs. W. Stanford Hilton, then Frances Wood, watched the scene as she stood in one of the front windows of the family home where she still lives, on the southeast corner of Windermere and Audubon avenues. With the present tall trees then in their early stage of growth, there was little to obstruct her view. When the cupola on top of the hotel caught fire, she could see it clearly as it broke loose from the main structure and rolled over and over down the snow-encrusted hill to the Pike.

Among those who really had front seats for the fire was the J. M. Fronefield family who then lived at 116 West Lancaster avenue. Joe Fronefield still recalls the thrill of the very small boy who watched his first big fire, cozily wrapped up in a blanket at one of the front windows of his home! Miss Helen Lienhardt also recalls watching the blaze from her house, as the firemen made their difficult and perilous way through the deep snow. The next day she joined other children in collecting in paper bags choice and long-cherished souvenirs of the fire.

The William Henry Roberts family were just then moving to the home on Windermere avenue still occupied by several of their members. With all their household goods in a freight car on a siding at Wayne Station, they were spending the night of the fire at the home of the J. Donaldson Paxtons who lived then on East Lancaster avenue.

Suddenly roused from her sleep by the shrill blowing of whistles, Miss Grace Roberts recalls that the sky was so light that she thought it must be morning, and she wondered vaguely if, in their new home town, they would always be wakened in this manner! As they roused more fully, the family began to realize that with the Bellevue so close to the railroad station, their furniture was in danger of being destroyed. However, Henry Roberts recalls that he found some consolation in the the thought that if the furniture burned up where it was, it would not have to be unloaded and unpacked! Miss Roberts also remembers that the snow was so deep that they went on bobsleds to Windermere avenue!

And so, through the eyes of some of our fellow townsmen who were living in Wayne in 1900, we can reconstruct the scene of perhaps the largest and most spectacular fire Wayne has ever experienced.

The Bellevue Hotel, so famous in its picturesque luxury throughout the brief nineteen years of its existence, is but a legend now. But it too has momentarily been brought vividly to life for us by a brother and sister who spent ten years of their childhood there when the Bellevue was in its heydey. To Dr. George w. Arms, of Lansdowne, and to his sister, Mrs. Horace J. Davis, of Wallingford, this columnist wishes to express her gratitude for the information which has made this story of the Bellevue possible. And to her fellow townsmen who have recalled such vivid incidents of the night of the big fire, Mrs. Patterson is also grateful.

(The End)

The Book “Our Pennsylvania”, part 1 by Amy Oakley, illustrated by Thornton Oakley, Bryn Mawr College

/ Emma C. Patterson

Although a number of contemporary reference books have been used from time to time in writing this column, so many of the others have been ancient tomes that this columnist thinks mostly of yellowed pages and frail bindings as she reviews in her mind the columns of the past two or three years. And supplementing old books have been time worn records, many written in faded ink.

By way of contrast we turn today to a book published only about a year ago by two of our Delaware County neighbors. “Our Pennsylvania”, by Amy Oakley, with illustrations by her well known artist husband, Thornton Oakley.

The Oakleys live at “Woodstock”, their lovely home on Spring Mill road where it is intersected by Sproul road. This book on their native state is dedicated to the memory of their parents, James Hunter Ewing, of Philadelphia, and John Milton Oakley, of Pittsburgh. In writing it they have traversed the length and the breadth of the Keystone State, so named, Mrs. Oakley explains in her preface, because this Commonwealth, holding seventh place geographically among the thirteen original states, was the “key of the federal arch.”

Large though the state may be, there is “no monotony to travel in Pennsylvania” in the opinion of the Oakleys. Not only are there famous historical shrines and “time mellowed architectural survivors of the years 1790-1800, when Philadelphia was the capital of the United States, “but forests cover approximately half of Pennsylvania’s area since the reforestation of the State. As the reader of any volume such as this might easily anticipate in advance of perusing it, one of the greatest problems of the author has been that of omission. “Exigencies of time and space” have not permitted a complete picture of the State either in the way of story or illustration. But as the reader closes the blue and gold volume on the delightful experience of traversing Pennsylvania with the Oakleys, he may well wonder not at what has been omitted, but rather that it has been possible to include so much that is vital in so limited a space.

Certainly that particular section of Pennsylvania which in a broad sense we may term “our own” has been described in pleasing detail. The first five chapters include those of “Historic Philadelphia”, “Modern Philadelphia”, “The Main Line and Valley Forge”, “Vignettes of Chester County” and “The Glorious Delaware”.

The first fourteen of Mr. Oakley’s illustrations have been made in Philadelphia. Others that follow are of Washington’s headquarters at Valley Forge, Old ST. Davids at Radnor, The Augustinian Chapel at Villanova, Radnor Meeting House at Ithan, Plymouth Meeting Electric Station and May Day at Bryn Mawr College. Still others that follow have been made in Delaware and Chester Counties. They show a wide diversity of subject and interest. Just as the text covers the past and the present in order to give a full and comprehensive word picture of Pennsylvania as it is today, so do the illustrations present both the historic and the contemporary.

For her chapter on “The Main Line and Valley Forge”, Mrs. Oakley writes, “Continuity is no less in evidence on the Main Line than in the City of Brotherly Love itself. Our common memories go back, through hearsay, not necessarily of our own but of neighboring families, to the days when the Old Lancaster road (now appropriately called the Conestoga road) was an Indian trail”.

A paragraph or two further along she adds, “The Main Line is no Styx; but it is a region where the inhabitants each feel in possession, like Saint Peter, of a key to Heaven. ‘All this and Heaven, too’ is the attitude of the confirmed Main Liners–among whom I am fortunate to be able to include myself, my Scotch forebears having settled, in 1757, on the farm where their descendant still dwells.”

Since the Oakleys are residents of Villanova it is natural that in enumerating Main Line colleges, some slight special emphasis should be placed on Villanova, founded in 1842 by the Augustinian Fathers who had been established in Philadelphia more than fifty years before their purchase of the farm then known as Belle Aire, in Radnor Township, Delaware County.

It has the distinction of being the oldest Catholic college in Pennsylvania, having been named “in honor of the Spanish Augustinian Archbishop of Valencia, canonized as St. Thomas of Villa Nova, who had, in 1533, sent missionaries to Mexico”. The school which began with 13 students now has a registration of approximately 5000. Its campus which now covers 166 acres has 28 buildings on it, the most conspicuous being the chapel itself, “recognizable from afar”, because “with twin steeples, like cathedral spires” it stands on such high ground. An exquisite sketch of this building features the chapter.

“May Day, Bryn Mawr College” has been chosen for the subject of a scene typifying the activities of that Main Line institution of learning where the “flag of scholarship flies as high as ever” and where “its wealth of events, intellectual, musical, artistic, held in Goodhart Hall, have won for it a leavening place in the life of the community”. And “the same may be said for Haverford and, eleven miles away, the college of Swarthmore”, Mrs. Oakley’s narration continues.

All three of these institutions, which were originally founded by Quakers, have the exchange of professors, and even of students, an innovation instituted during the War which has since proven so successful that its continuation is assured.

Preparatory schools, Mrs. Oakley mentions as a special feature of the Overbrook, Wynnewood, Haverford and Bryn Mawr area. Baldwin School shares with the College its Mrs. Otis Skinner Memorial Theater “erected to one well beloved on the Main Line”. To our own local high school Mrs. Oakley pays especial tribute when she writes “Lower Merion and also Radnor High School are second to none”.

In connection with Bryn Mawr College, the author of “Our Pennsylvania” reminisces of the days when Woodrow Wilson lived with his young family in a house on the grounds of the Lower Merion Baptist Church across Gulph road from the college. The man who was laterto become president of the United States during one of its most crucial periods was then a professor at Bryn Mawr. The churchyard which surrounds the Baptist Church is a non-sectarian one where many of William Penn’s descendants are buried. “In the churchyard also”, Mrs. Oakley writes, “are early Presbyterians who preferred to worship with the Baptists (where they were welcomed as members of the Board) than with the West Angicans at Old St. David’s”. And then in delightfully personal vein, the author adds, “My widowed grandmother was so faithful and so punctual at St. David’s, with her little brood, that the rector was known to delay beginning the service, in snowy weather, realizing her lateness must have been unavoidable”.

(To be continued)

The Book “Our Pennsylvania”, part 2 – Old St. David’s Church, Wayne Family, old inns, Longwood and its gardens

/ Emma C. Patterson

A charming sketch of “Old St. David’s at Radnor”, where Amy Oakley’s grandmother came so faithfully with “her little brood” each Sunday, illustrates the chapter on “The Main Line and Valley Forge” in the Oakley’s book of “Our Pennsylvania”.

Few, if any, among the readers of this column have failed to visit this historic spot. To many it is a pilgrimage frequently made. Most famous of the many graves in the churchyard that surrounds the little stone edifice on three sides, is that of Mad Anthony Wayne, for whom our community is named. His “madness”, comments Mrs. Oakley, “consisted of fearlessness”. Standing but a few miles from St. David’s Church is “Waynesborough”, where Anthony Wayne was born in 1745. Begun by his grandfather in 1724, and added to in 1765, the original house is still occupied by a descendant of the Wayne famly.

Another old church in our immediate vicinity of which Mrs. Oakley writes and of which her husband has made a delightful sketch, is Radnor Friends’ Meeting House, “dominant above Ithan Creek” on Conestoga road at Ithan. Dating form 1718, this house of worship was used as quarters for officers during the Revolutionary War as well as for a soldiers’ hospital with food and fuel supplied by Radnor Friends. Since 1939 the structure has housed the Radnor United Monthly Meeting.

As the Oakleys traverse this general vicinity they recall the old grist mills once so abundant in the neighborhood. One still in operation is the Great Valley Mill established in 1710 on North Valley road in Paoli. On the estate connected with it are the famous rock gardens known to many of us as the property of Mr. and Mrs. Robert H. Colley. Other rapidly vanishing landmarks of the Main Line are the taverns which “once punctuated every mile of the coach road to Lancaster.” The Old Buch at Haverford, while still in good repair, is no longer an inn, nor is the General Warren at Malvern. The “hoary Sorrel Horse”, at Ithan, built in 1768, Mrs. Oakley recalls to our memories as an historic hostelry which often sheltered Washington and Lafayette. It is now a private house. The General Wayne Inn, which adjoins Merion Friends’ Meeting, still fulfills its original purpose.

Several pages of “Our Pennsylvania” are devoted to Valley Forge Park, site of the winter encampment of General George Washington and the Continental Army in 1777-1778. Even more familiar to most of our readers than the winter scene at Valley Forge is that of the blooming of dogwood there, which, according to tradition should begin on the tenth of May. It was from Valley Forge stock that the first pink dogwood was developed, according to Mrs. Oakley, “the white being a wide-spread native of the hills of Pennsylvania”. As all of us who have ever attempted a pilgrimage by automobile to Valley Forge in May recall, it is then that “cars from every state converge to see the glory of the hills bathed in clouds of pink and white”.

From the chapter on “The Main Line and Valley Forge”, the Oakleys pass on to one entitled “Vignettes of Chester County”. An exquisite full length sketch of the Mill at Chadds Ford with Howard Pyle in the foreground prefaces this chapter which is headed by a smaller sketch of the oldest house in Downingtown. This is a log cabin, said to date from about 1710, though many believe, Mrs. Oakley tells us, that “from its expert construction . . . it may have been erected still earlier by the Swedes, who introduced the log house with mortised corners into this continent”. Downingtown takes its name from an old grist mill, dating from 1739, owned by one Thomas Downing, a Quaker.

West Chester, linked with East Downington “by a road through rural pasture where contented Holsteins chew their cud in meadows beside the Brandywine”, is next on the Oakley itinerary. Originally a little village known as Turks Head, its well known tavern, West Chester “has been the seat of Chester County since 1786. It was two years later that it changed its original name to its later one, adopting the name of West Chester, since it was “west of Chester”. Among its present points of interest, Mrs. Oakley enumerates State Teachers College, Westtown School and Cheyney State Teachers College, founded by Quakers as an institution for colored youth.

On the east bank of the Brandywine is the Village of Chadds Ford, named for John Chad (original spelling), who established a ferry there in 1737. The original Chad homestead is the subject of a well known painting by a Chadds Ford native, Andrew Wyeth, son of N. C. Wyeth, the late distinguished illustrator and mural painter.

Among the illustrations for this chapter on Chester County is one of the quaint old octagonal school house at Birmingham Meeting, near Chadds Ford. This school building dates back to 1753. Like Kennett Meeting House, Birmingham Meeting was in the historic battle area. Nearby Kennett Square is a flourishing present day community known as the largest mushroom-growing area in the United States.

A description of Longwood concludes this Chester County chapter. According to Mrs. Oakley “it rivals Verailles as to gardens and fountains, while the conservatory in its vast extent and the glory of its floral contents seems unbelievable–the ultimate creation of a conjurer’s wand”. An interesting historical note in connection with Longwood is that the original land was conveyed by William Penn to George Pierce whose son built the house occupied by the present owner, though now doubled in size by the addition of a twin mansion. According to our historian, the “long wood”, from which the early Quakers took the name, has largely disappeared, but many of the rare trees date back to plantings made in 1800 by the Pierces.

Our own historic Delaware County comes next on the Oakley itinerary before they leave this general vicinity for more distant parts of “Our Pennsylvania”.

(To be Continued)

The Book “Our Pennsylvania”, part 3 – Tinicumn, Fort New Gothenburg, Pritnz

/ Emma C. Patterson

Scanning in retrospect in her mind’s eye a number of books on the history of Pennsylvania which this writer has perused more or less thoroughly in assembling the material for this column, few, if any, have for her the warmth of appeal that is contained in “Our Pennsylvania”. Written by our Main Line neighbor, Amy Oakley, and illustrated by her artist husband, Thornton Oakley, often referred to as “T.O.”, it somehow inspires in its readers the desier to traverse the roads the Oakleys have traversed, and to see the sights which they have seen. Certainly this will be done with a deeper understanding of the historic past, and a keen appreciation of the present, if these readers remember what Mrs. Oakley has written.

Nowhere, perhaps, is her deep-seated affection for her native state more manifest than in the chapter on “The Glorious Delaware”. Her pride in the history of “a waterway that, for the early settlers, was a thoroughfare comparable tot eh Saint Lawrence to the colonists of Quebec” is something that she communicates to those among her readers who call this general section of Southeastern Pennsylvania “home”. And from a purely practical point of view this chapter is a concise guide book to point of nearby historic interest accessible to the automobilist.

To most of us the City of Chester is a thriving industrial center famous for its shipyards. So modern is it that perhaps few among us realize as we drive hurriedly along its busy streets that it is the second oldest settlement in Pennsylvania, with still a few reminders in it of those early days in the middle 1600’s when it was called Upland. It was in 1644 that it was founded by the Swedes, just a year after Fort New Gothenburg was erected on neighboring Tinicum Island. “Here at Tinicum”, according to Mrs. Oakley, “were established the first court, church and schoolhouse in present Pennsylvania. The wedding of Armegat, the governor’s daughter, to Lieutenant John Papegoya, commander of Fort Christina, was the first marriage of Europeans within the borders of our State”.

In what is now known as Governor Printz Park the foundations of the fabulous Printzhof, the capitol-residence established by John Printz has been excavated, though nothing has been done in the way of reconstructing that historic building. This foundation with the original steps leading down to the river may be viewed by sightseers interested in the historic past of our great state.

One of the few surviving log cabins of those early New Sweden colonists stands in the borough of Prospect Park, not far from Tinicum. it is known as the John Morton Homestead and belongs to the Commonwealth, as does Governor Printz Park, Morten Mortenson, who arrived in America from Sweden in 1654, was the builder of part of this log cabin, to which was later joined a second log house constructed by his son, grandfather of John Morton, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

“As the birthplace of this distinguished Swedish descendant, whose vote, in June 1776 ‘with those of Benjamin Franklin and James Wilson swung Pennsylvania tot eh side of independence by a majority of one’, the building has become a national shrine.” A charming sketch of John Morton’s homestead, as made by Mr. Oakley, illustrtes this part of the chapter on the “Glorious Delaware.”

Other Historic point of interest in Chester are the Penn Memorial Stone, at the northeast corner of Front and Penn Streets. THis marks the first landing place of William Penn in October, 1682. The site of the residence of Robert Wade, where Penn spent his first night ashore, also has its marks. Wade was the first Quaker to settle in Pennsylvania.

Mrs. Oakley’s description of “Pennsburg”, Penn’s manor house built in 1683 and recreated in 1938 by Brognard Okie, should inspire many an automobilist to take Route 13 “which skirts the river from Philadelphia to the Trenton bridge, and has been known since 1677 as the ‘King’s Highway’.” After going through what was once known as “Penn’s Sylvania”, where centuries-old buttonwoods spoke to the Oakleys of a time long past, they came on this “crisp day of early December”, on an inlet of the Delaware where “thousands of ducks, southward bound, floated, rose on the wing, swerved, or settled amid a restless honking host . . . ”

Here in Falls Township, Bucks County, is Pennsburg, William Penn’s country home, built in 1683-1700, now administered by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. On the left, as the Oakleys approached the manor house itself, are “orchard, vineyard, kitchen and herb garden, ice house, office, smoke house, brew house . . . adjoining are ample kitchen and bakery with ovens so vast that it took two days to heat them. Food, as at Mount Vernon, was carried across an outdoor path to the lordly dining room.”

The description of the lovely interior of Pennsburg is fascination enough to lure any sightseer to this beautifully reconstructed mansion with its authenticated furnishings of the period in which William Penn lived there. “Wrought iron nails are visible in the wide-boarded floors, for which primeval oaks were sought”, according to Mrs. Oakley’s description, which continues: “Elegance marks the mansion furniture and the crimson brocade of window hangings . . . across the hall the wainscoted dining room, with refectory table and massive Dutch chairs . . . above the dining room is a guest room, impressive with canopied four-post bedstead and especially noted for its highboy, one of the original Penn pieces for which millionaires have offered fabulous sums.”

Pursuing their way upriver to Washington’s Crossing, the Oakleys came to the marker that commemorates the spot where Washington crossed the Delaware on Christmas night, 1776, the eve of the Battle of Trenton. on their way to Bowman’s Hill Tower, with its view of the New Jersey shore, they stopped to admire the recently restored Thompson-Neely mansion where General Washington discussed plans for an offensive with some of his officers.

Beyond Washington Crossing lies New Hope with its many old homesteads amid the beauty of the surrounding scenery. The settlement is now one of painters, writers and musicians, Here, too, is the quaint old Delaware Canal, construction of which was begun in 1827. Two sketches by Mr. Oakley, one of the “Delaware Canal” and the other of “Mules on the towpath” add further interest to this part of the chapter . . . “New Hope is among the chosen places to which an artist never says good-bye, but always au revoir,” Mrs. Oakley says of this lovely artist colony spot as she passes on to description of more distant spots.

So much of “our” part of Pennsylvania. Before the close of their book, the Oakleys have covered the length and breadth of the State by way of description and illustration. This brief resume of some of the early chapters has been given with the hope that some of the readers of this column may be inspired to see for themselves more of the lovely surrounding countryside and of the many historical sites and edifices in our immediate vicinity.

The Saturday Club – original history and Christmas 1951

/ Emma C. Patterson

In the month of the Christ Child’s birth, our hearts turn with reverence tot he simple beauty of that far away scene, when in the lowly manger, “The little Lord Jesus laid down His sweet head.” Now, almost 2000 years later, in times of such fears and forebodings as the world has never before known, the hearts of mankind turn to that scene in humble supplication, that there may yet be a time of “peace on earth, good will to men.”

Except in our churches, there are, perhaps, no times when groups of people can feel this unanimity of Christian hope so strongly as they do when they come together for a presentation of Christmas music. Many in the audience assembled in the Saturday Club on Tuesday evening of last week for the Musical Coterie Christmas Concert must have felt this, when at the close oft he program, all were asked to join in the singing of Christmas carols. As voices rose in the lovely strains of such old favorites as “Oh, Come, All Ye Faithful” and “O, Littls Town of Bethlehem”, all could feel the upsurging of hope for real peace on earth that to all Christians is symbolized by Christ’s Birth.

This Christmas concert is now an annual event to which the community is always welcomed. Started some years ago by the Musical Coterie, Wayne’s oldest extant musical organization, it is now a joint affair of the Coterie and the Saturday Club. This year’s program opened, as it usually does, with a group of Christmas songs, sung by the chorus. After several piano solos, a string ensemble number and one of vocal solos, the chorus again made its appearance to close the foremost program before the general singing of Christmas carols. The Concert is, in truth, a real contribution to the community.

On February 10 of the coming year, the Coterie will celebrate 41 years of continuous activity, having been organized in 1911 at the home of Mrs. Humbert Borton Powell, The Powells then lived in the large yellow house on the north side of the 200 block of Windermere avenue, which was their home for many years before they moved to Devon.

Mrs. Powell was the newly-formed organization’s first president, serving for the first eight years of its existence from 1911 to 1919. Other charter members were Mrs. Robert LeBoutillier, Mrs. Charles Walton, Mrs. Chlarles C. Shoemaker, Mrs. David Hoopes, Mrs. Frederick P. Ristine, Mrs. Sheldon Catlin, Miss H. Velma Turner, Mrs. W. H. Sayen, Miss Marguerite Elder, Mrs. Rufus Waples, Miss Grace C. Roberts and Mrs. Thomas E. Walton. Others among the community’s musically talented residents soon joined these original 13, until shortly thereafter some 50 women were in active membership.

In 1911, as in 1951, there were many women in Wayne and its general vicinity who had had extensive musical training. Many of them were married women with young children, who, without some direct incentive and objective, found it more than difficult to continue their musical activities. Among older women in the group Mrs. Walton and Mrs. LeBoutiller were, perhaps, especially inspirational in their leadership, and in planning ways and means by which all the members of the newly-formed Coterie should find expression for their talents. Or Mrs. LeBoutillier, one of the club’s charter members recently said to your columnist: “Her idea was to present a worthwhile musical number, no matter what the seeming difficulties were. If two hands were not enough, then get four hands, or even six . . . if one piano did not suffice, then get two.”

There was never any thought of exploiting the individual with talent. Rather, it was to benefit the group by presenting opportunity for all to take part in the presentation of programs and to participate in the study groups. At first, only women who were willing to take part in programs, either by performing or by writing papers, were asked to join.

Later, those who were to be listeners only were admitted, thus greatly enlarging the membership as well as altering the original character and purpose of this musical organization. As time passed, membership became more geographically extended. Largely local to Wayne in the beginning, it now embraces the entire Main Line, as well as a number of its neighboring suburbs. It is still essentially of Wayne, however, always retaining its original name of Wayne Musical Coterie.

Although primarily a woman’s organization, it has at times had men soloists on its programs and at other times has joined with men’s choruses. In 1926 the Junior Section of the Coterie was formed to further the mutual interest of talented children of the community.

Among notable achievements of the musical group was the publication in 1925 of a book of programs compiled from those presented during the first 15 years of the Coterie existence. In 1929 a Memorial Library was established, with each volume in it given in memory of a deceased member of the organization. Neither wars nor depressions have called a halt to its existence, which ahs now been one of more than 40 years’ continuity.

(To be Continued)

A Merry Christmas from Mrs. Patterson to all the readers of this column, whose interest is a great inspiration in preparing her material for presenting Wayne and its environs, both of the past and of the present. To these readers, an especial thanks for the almost daily expressions of their interest. Again, Merry Christmas. E. C. P.

The Saturday Club – the Musical Coterie of Wayne

/ Emma C. Patterson

The Book of Programs compiled by the Musical Coterie from its files covering a period of 15 years was a noteworthy achievement. Published in 1925 and copyrighted by Miss H. Velma Turner, the book received favorable comment from many sources, selling throughout the entire United States. Among those who enthusiastically endorsed it were George C. Gow, head of the department of music at Vassar College and Helen Pulaski Innes, conductor of the Matinee Musical Club Chorus of Philadelphia.

The book was most convenient in size and makeup. Measuring six by eight inches with table of contents and complete index, the 116 programs contained in it were arranged according to periods, nationalities and individual composers. There were more than 300 of these composers, and made up of all nationalities, its scope ranged from early Italian music to that of the ultra-modern French and Russian.

Of the general work of the Coterie at the time this book was published, Stanley Neuschamp, in a special feature article written for the Philadelphia Inquirer in June, 1925, says: “All of the good work in the case of music is not the result alone of the playing of the large orchestras, nor the singing of the great opera companies. It is well within the domains of the smaller organizations and the music clubs to foster a love for music and to cultivate it.

“The Musical Coterie of Wayne, our suburban neighbor, has been studying the master-musicians and their works for 15 years, during which time they have covered enormous areas of musical ground. The recording officer, Miss H. Velma Turner, has kept a record of their meetings. These records, consisting of programmes presented during the 15 years now ending, cover the subject of the nationalistic and racialistic in music; the classic, romantic and modern periods, and conclude with a series of programmes each devoted exclusively to the works of one composer.”

Another noteworthy achievement of the Musical Coterie was the establishment of a Memorial Library in 1929 to honor the deceased members of the organization. The books, chosen with much thought, included those of biography, of history of music, or symphonies; indeed all manner of musical literature. There were also bound volumes of vocal music and piano music. All these have been housed for some time in the Memorial Library of Radnor Township, where they are available not only to Coterie members, but to Library members as well. The Library also devotes several shelves to vocal scores.

Book plates for the books given in memory of deceased Coterie members were designed by Miss Lecian von Bernuth, of Strafford. The latter has made “an exquisite adaptation of the Melozza da Forte angel of the vatican collection,” an adaptation which “has conveyed in feeling manner the spirit of reverence so in keeping with a memorial of his kind.”

Each book plate bears the name of the Coterie member whose memory it has been given. Among these names are those of Mrs. Robert LeBoutillier, Mrs. Charles Walton, Mrs. Parke Schoch, Mrs. John Dunlap, Mrs. Joseph Clegy, Mrs. Spiers and Mrs. R. E. Hinkel. Miss Turner had much to do with the original selection of books, and served as Coterie Librarian for some time. Among others who have served in this capacity are Miss Alvira Echert and more recently, Mrs. G. Rishton Howell.

The chorus of the Coterie has always been one of the main features of programs given for the public. On several occasions the organization has also sponsored mixed choruses, one of the long remembered of these occasions being an evening party at the LeBoutillier home when the Euterpean joined forces with the Coterie. The Euterpean was for many years an outstanding men’s musical group in Wayne. The name of William Bentz is one always remembered by early Coterie chorus members. “Community Sings” at the High School were one of the means of offsetting the effects of “the depression” on the community.

The Junior Musical Coterie was established in 1926 as a means of developing and giving expression to the talents of youngsters of the community. Programs were given by the members ranging in age from six to sixteen years. On some of them from time to time great artists explained various musical instruments to their youthful listeners and then presented numbers in explanation. Mrs. Robert P. Elmer and Miss Turner had much to do with the early development of the Junior Musical Coterie, which today is a flourishing branch of the parent organization, giving concerts of its own at regular intervals.

Early in its career the Coterie joined the Pennsylvania Federation of Music Clibs, one of those presidents was said in writing to Miss Lillian Walter during her Coterie presidency, “Your club has been one of the outstanding clubs in the Federation, and its splendid achievements have been noted all over the state and nation . . . It is through contact with such club as yours that we grow in national work, generating new ideas.”

It was during the presidency of Mrs. Thomas Blackadder, which extended from 1935-1937 that the Coterie celebrated the 25th anniversary of its founding with a dinner held at the Aronimink Golf Glub, when guests included Coterie husbands.

Mrs. Humbert B. Powell was the Coterie’s first president, with an eight year term of office lasting from 1911 to 1919. She was followed by many noteworthy successors, including Mrs. Jessie Fulweller Spiers, Miss H. Velma Turner, Mrs. Charles H. Howson, Mrs. Winfield W. Crawford, Mrs. E. Bisbee Warner, Mrs. Thomas E. Walton, Miss Lillian A. Walter, Mrs. George P. Orr, Mrs. Thomas Blackadder, Miss Gladys Lawton, mrs. F. Ashby Wallace, Mrs. L. Wayne Arny, Mrs. G. Rushton Howell, Mrs. Spencer V. Smith, Mrs. Wesley P. Dunnington and Mrs. Esmond R. Long the incumbent.

Other officers in addition to Mrs. Long include Mrs. Alfred N. Watson, vice-president; Mrs. E. D. Ziegler, recording secretary; Mrs. George V. Woodrow, corresponding secretary, and Miss Margaret Howson, treasurer. Directors include Mrs. Richard H. Clare, Miss Gladys Lawton, Mrs. Roy Fuller and Mrs. A. B. Wheeler. Committee chairmen are Mrs. Dunnington, program; Mrs. Hugh H. Spencer, Junior Coterie; Mrs. Spencer V. Smith, Librarian; Mrs. Orrin C. Knudsen, String Ensemble; Mrs. Wheeler, Chorus; Mrs. Watson, membership; Mrs. Blackadder, publicity and Mrs. Wallace, Camp and Hospital.

Meetings are held on the third Monday afternoon of each month at the homes of various members. The Christmas Concert is always an evening affair, held in conjunction with the Saturday Club. The Spring Concert is another large affair while the annual meeting, followed by a musical program, closes the season.

A quotation from Elbert Hubbard heads the season’s printed program for the year:

“Art is not a thing separate and apart–art is only the beautiful way of doing things.”

(Conclusion)

A Happy New year to all the readers of this column from Mrs. Patterson!

Radnor Fire Company acquires new Mack 1000 gallon pump truck, fire fighting history, plane crashes

/ Emma C. Patterson

It was an eventful day for the community when the big shiny new Mack 1000-gallon pumper, equipped with the latest in fire-fighting apparatus, arrived in Wayne last August. As it stood outside the Fire House in all the glory of the American LaFrance “fire engine red” paint, the eyes of all passers-by were on it. Many of the grownups joined the admiring group of youngsters as the latter clustered around it.

Its trial spin around the streets of Wayne attracted still wider attention. All of Radnor township felt a justifiable pride in this latest addition to one of the best equipped fire companies in the State of Pennsylvania.

This was, indeed, a far cry from the days when a three-foot fire horn, such as was owned by each Wayne householder in the 1880’s, sounded to call out the neighbors to fight any fire that might occur in the community. One of these horns is now among the most interesting exhibits at the headquarters of the Radnor Historical Society on Beechtree lane.

Old records show that even in the early days of Wayne, fire protection was considered very essential. Householders took nightly turns in patrolling their neighborhoods. So serious was the matter of the blowing of these three-foot horns that any unwarranted use of one called for a fine of five dollars.

A bucket of water stood behind the front door of each home in the township. The use of this was a first aid measure while the young men of the community rushed out to “man the pumper.” This was a 500-gallon hogshead of water on two wheels with a hand pump attached. While some of the volunteers pulled the ropes tied to the tongue of the pumper, others pushed from the rear. Down-hill, or even on the level, the method of locomotion was not too difficult. For uphill runs it was well-nigh impossible. Usually, there was little salvage after a fire had really gotten some headway.

The present fire company, formed in 1906 by a group of 21 residents of the community, has seen such steady growth in the intervening years that the handsome new Mack pumper so recently acquired is but one of the fleet of five pieces of fire-fighting apparatus, each piece capable of handling a fire by itself. Any one of the five may be sent to a fire to combat or to control it. In addition tot his array of fire trucks there is the handsome and well-equipped ambulance, which alone answered 329 calls in the period between April 1, 1950 and April 1, 1951. During this same time there were 279 fire calls, making a total of 608 calls, which the Radnor Fire Company had answered in the course of one year’s time.

The new Mack truck features the high pressure fog system, the most recently developed technique for putting out fires with the least amount of damage possible. It carries 300 gallons of water and approximately 1000 feet of 2 1/2-inch hose. Before the acquisition of this truck the newest piece of apparatus was the 750-gallon Mack pumper acquired in 1948. It carries 1400 feet of hose, a fact very reassuring to the property owner whose home is located at a distance from the nearest fire hydrant.

Other trucks include the Chevrolet, purchased in 1940, with its 200 gallon pump, its 150 gallons of “booster” water and its 500 feet of 1 1/2 inch hose; the Ford, bought in 1939, with its 100-gallon pump and the Autocar “quad” (quadruple combination) which was acquired in 1937. The latter has a 600 gallon pump; 1100 feet of 2 1/2-inch hose; two 65-foot ladders and other different types, varying from eight-foot collapsible to 50-foot extension. The different types of ladder operated by the Radnor Fire Company are extension, wall and roof ladders.

In enumerating the engines and equipment of the Radnor Fire Company, Chief Edwin J. Clark tells your columnist that there is only one possible thing which a large city company might have that is lacking Wayne–this is an aerial ladder. Among the many interesting and up-to-the-minute pieces of equipment which they do possess is a portable cutting tool in the form of an acetylene torch that would be capable of cutting an automobile in half, should this be necessary. Other equipment, of which the community may well be proud, is the fire company’s emergency lighting system, to be used at night at the scene of a fire; the foam generator for gasoline fires and the newest equipment for both high and low pressure fog. And then there is the radio inter-communication equipment, by which all the trucks may keep in contact with each other, as well as with the fire house headquarters. Incidentally, Radnor was one of the first fire companies to be radio-equipped, having acquired its set even before Philadelphia.

Among other accessory possessions are several asbestos suits that enable firemen to go right into a blaze without too much danger; masks of various kinds; many types of forcible entry tools; salvage covers to protect furniture and roof covers that effectively keep out the weather until repairs can be made.

Much of the technique of the newest methods of fire-fighting is acquired at the Fire School held in Lewistown, Pa., each year. Radnor Fire Company attempts to send several representatives to each session of this school, which is run by the Pennsylvania Department of Public Instruction.

Chief Clark himself seldom misses a session. On one occasion the question was propouned as to what methods to —— out a fire in a gasoline or ——- on the road. Of the 72 fire chiefs present, Mr. Clark was the only one who had actual experience along this line, the occasion being the well-remembered fire of this kind on Spring Mill road several years ago.

“Eddie” stated that his men had put out the fire with low velocity fog. The others attending the School said this could not be done, whereupon the Session adjourned to the proving field, where the actual experiment was tried by putting gasoline in a tank and scattering more around it. The effectiveness of low-velocity fog was proved, just as Wayne’s Fire Chief had stated.

Following this question came another concerning the best methods of extinguishing fire in an airplane accident. And again “Eddie” was the only fire chief present with actual experience in this direction.

Although no other fire chief present had had experience with airplane fires, Mr. Clark had two on which to report. The first was the crash of an Army Air Force P-38, on the rear of a property on Waterloo road, Devon. The plane was on its way to Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Md., but went off its course in a heavy rainstorm. Radnor Fire Company extinguished the flames and immediately afterwards the State Police and Army representatives took over.

The second plane accident occurred in Radnor township itself on June 15, 1949, when a private plane took of after having made a forced landing on County line road, Villanova. Neighbors called the fire company, which reached the scene in seven minutes with four pumpers, ladder truck and ambulance. The fire was put out with the fog apparatus.

Pilot rescue was impossible from the beginning–all that the fire company could do was release the body form the safety belt after extinguishing the flames. The plane apparently came into contact with high power lines of the Pennsylvania Railroad immediately after take-off.

(To be Continued)

Radnor Fire Company history & members, Radnor High School, The Coffee House

/ Emma C. Patterson

“Be it known that the subscribers, having associated themselves together for the support of Fire Engine, Hook and Ladder and Hose Company for the control of fire and being desirous of becoming incorporated agreeably to the provision of the act of the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania . . . do hereby declare, set forth and certify that the following are the purposes, objects, articles and conditions of their said association for and upon which they desire to be incorporated.”

So reads, in part, the opening paragraph of the handsomely framed charter of the Radnor Fire Company which still hangs on the second floor of the fire house on South Wayne avenue. It is signed by 24 subscribers, and dated March 15, 1906. Isaac Johnson, President Judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Delaware County, attached his signature to the decree, as did R. J. Baldwin, Recorder of Deeds, and W. I. B. McClenachan, Deputy Recorder.

The first clause of the “articles and conditions of said association” sates that its name shall be “Radnor Fire Company of Wayne”. The second states that its purpose is “for the control of fire”, the third that its place of business is Wayne, Delaware County, Pa., and its fourth that the corporation is “to exist perpetually”.

The fifth clause gives the names of the subscribers while the sixth states that the corporation has no capital stock and is to be managed by a board consisting of seven members. According to the seventh clause, “the early income of the Corporation other than that derived from real estate will not exceed the sum of $25.”

The 24 names of subscribers in the order in which they appear on the charter are: Charles M. Wilkins, Charles E. Clark, L. B. Gault, Edward G. Fritz, Andrew L. Fritz, Nathan P. Pechin, Charles T. Worrall, George Deuber, John S. Detterline, Jr., Albert McAllister, Joseph M. Devereaux, W. H. Gault, John A. Duff, Howard F. Pennell, Richard Leary, A. A. Sellers, Patrick J. Duf, David P. Duff, W. Clarence Lucas, W. W. Gualt, George G. Lentz, J. Herbert Reynolds, Frederick H. Treat, and Charles H. Stewart. With the exception of Mr. Pechin, who lived in Radnor, and Mr. Stewart, who lived in St. Davids, all were residents of Wayne.

Directors for the first year as listed in the charter were the Messrs. Stewart, Worrall, Treat, Pechin, W. H. Gault and John H. Duff, with the president, who was still to be elected at that time, to serve in an ex-officio capacity. W. W. Hearne was later chosen for that office, serving from 1906 until 1917.

It is interesting to note that the first two subscribers to sign the charter have sons who now, some 46 years later, are actively connected with the Radnor Fire Company. “Eddie” Clark has been the popular Fire Chief for some 19 years past, while Leslie D. Wilkins, whose activities have extended over a long period, is the Chief Engineer and Secretary. Both Mr. Clark, Sr., and Mr. Wilkins, Sr., served at various times as chief of the Fire Department. The latter is now deceased, but Charles M. Clark is Fire Co-ordinator for the State Defense Council, he now spends most of his time in Harrisburg.

The first semblance of an organized fire company in Wayne was formed soon after the Civil War with headquarters in what is now the Legion House on Beechtree lane. It was called the North Wayne Hose Company. An organization formed slightly later was the Wayne Chemical Company. Subsequently these companies were sponsored by the North Wayne Protective Association and the Wayne Public Safety Association, which originally took over both police and fire protection for their respective districts.

The charter members of the present fire company, when it was formed in 1906, were drawn from the membership of both these groups. The nucleus of the buildings which are now the fire company’s headquarters on South Wayne avenue was built by the Wayne Public Safety Association sometime in the ’90’s. At that period the fire company’s chief piece of equipment was a chemical wagon pulled by horses hastily obtained from the R. H. Johnson Company, on Conestoga road, whenever the alarm for a fire was sounded. At that time there were both front and back exits through which a horse-drawn fire engine could be drawn. All of the ground back of the small building was an open field. The old Coffee House then stood on the site of the present high school building, while the high school itself was located in the present grammar school before the annex was added.

When the present Radnor Fire Company, as formed in 1906, had been in successful operation for ten years, the small building which it had been occupying since the Wayne Chemical Company had gone out of existence was formally deeded to them by the Wayne Protective Association. This was in 1916, and by then it had become apparent that the Radnor Fire Company needed larger quarters. The original building was placed on rollers and pushed farther back on the property in order to make room for the addition planned by the Radnor Fire Company.

Pictures of the original building show that its front door, which faced West, is identically the same door by which voters enter the polls after turning to the let when they first go into the fire house on the High School side. The present stairway, as well as the upstairs room and the room underneath, belonged to the original small building.

After this first addition was made in 1916, further enlargements came in 1936 and 1948. The ambulance, purchased in 1947, then found permanent quarters in the one-story annex tot he South of the older building.

For subsequent articles in this series much interesting material on the early days of the Radnor Fire Company, obtained from several of the Charter members of the organization, will be presented to our readers.

(To be continued)

Early days of Radnor Fire Company (as the North Wayne Hose Company) Andrew L. Fritz

/ Emma C. Patterson

In order to assist your columnist in assembling material for this series of articles on the Radnor Fire Company, Andrew L. Fritz paid a visit to Wayne recently to reminisce about the early days of fire companies in Wayne.

Mr. Fritz, whose name is among the 24 signers of the 1906 charter of the present Fire Company, now lives in Upper Darby, although he was for many years a resident of Wayne.

In telling of the North Wayne Hose Company, which antedates the Wayne Chemical Company by several years, Mr. Fritz recalls that it consisted of a hose reel and little ladder truck, all hand drawn.

George Baker, who lived almost directly across the street from the building which was headquarters for the Hose Company and now known as the Legion House, was always immediately on the scene as soon as an alarm came in, thereby earning his appelation of “chief”. Among his faithful assistants in pulling the truck was Miss Mary Biles, who was later to become Mrs. Andrew Fritz. Another helper was a colored girl named Anna Miller.

As the majority of North Wayne homes were built slightly before those in South Wayne, it was natural that that section should have the first organized fire department.

When the Wayne Chemical Company was formed in South Wayne, its equipment consisted of hose reel and combination chemical wagon, according to Mr. Fritz. Sometimes the hose cart was hitched bak of the chemical wagon. At first hoses for this two-wheeled vehicle were obtained from Lienhardt’s Bakery, in which connection Mr. Fritz recalls that Dr. Lienhardt had great interest in the Fire Company at that time. Later, the horses came from R. H. Johnson’s “not very often the same two horses”, according to Mr. Fritz. Eber Siter, at that time the foreman for Johnson’s often brought the horses down to the fire house from the company’s stables.

Several very disastrous fires occurring in quick succession had much to do with the formation of the present fire company. The Andes home on the Lincoln Highway near Strafford avenue as well as a twin house nearby, was a total loss, as was the building on East Lancaster avenue, then occupied by “The Suburban”, when it caught fire a short time afterwards. The latter was on the site of the present Allan C. Hale Company building. All of these structures could have been saved had there been proper fire protection in the township.

According to Mr. Fritz, there was much casual talk along these lines in the pool room, which was then on the first floor of the Masonic Hall, where the Wayne Red Cross Headquarters is now located.

Charles H. Stewart, who was then secretary of the Board of Commissioners, became very much interested in the project of a well-organized, motorized fire department. Frederick H. Treat, another member of the Board of Commissioners, was equally enthusiastic and he undertook to interest other members of the Board. And so, in 1907 Radnor township acquired its first piece of automobile equipment, to be followed only a year later by a second piece.

This 1907 model was unique in that it was, according to local claims, the first gasoline-pumped and propelled fire engine in the world. Since no factory had blue prints on file for such a piece of fire apparatus, the Radnor Fire Company ordered the different parts to be specially designed before actual construction began. Of this motorized fire engine “The Fireman’s Herald”, under date of August 4, 1908, says:

“The Radnor Fire Company has for some time possessed a Knox combined automobile chemical and hose wagon, which is capable of a speed of 20-miles-an-hour, and carries two 35-gallon chemical tanks, two 3-gallon portable chemical extinguishers, 1,000 feet of 2 1/2 inch hose and minor equipment. It has answered 18 alarms without the loss of a minute by accident or hold-up of any sort.” A picture of this quaint old vehicle, along with that of Radnor’s latest piece of apparatus, illustrated last week’s column.

According to Mr. Fritz, this original Radnor fire engine at first received its full share of ridicule from the townspeople. And even before it was finally accepted by the Fire Company it had to undergo various tests. Mr. Fritz recalls that Mr. Treat designated the old road on the Wright place leading from Brook road to Old St. David’s Church as the final stretch along which the fire truck was to make a successful run. Much of the purchase price of this Knox chemical and hose wagon was raised by door-to-door solicitation of funds, although the Commissioners made a contribution from their treasury, also.

The second piece of fire-fighting apparatus was acquired in the spring of 1908, a year after the purchase of the first one. A full description of this engine appears in “The Fireman’s Herald” of April 4, 1908, in an article illustrated by a very clear picture of this now quaint vehicle. According to the Herald, “Radnor Fire Co. No. 1, of Wayne, Pa., has just received a fire engine of a new pattern. It is an automobile gasoline machine, and consists of a truck chassis made by the Knox Automobile Co., of Springfield, Mass., with an independent gasoline drive pump manufactured by the Waterous Engine Works Co., at St. Paul, Minn. The automobile engine is of the two-cylinder air-cooled type. The pump is driven by a separate engine constructed by the Waterous Company, and is of the four-six-inch rotary cylinder type. The cooling is accomplished by a pipe from the pump, and the amount of cooling is adjustable so as to be readily adapted to the requirements of service. There are two separate and distinct systems of ignition provided. The pump is connected by clutch directly with the engine shaft, and has a capacity of about 400 gallons a minute”.

The testing of this new engine was an occasion of much interest not only to local firemen, but to many outside the district as “The Fireman’s Herald” indicates in the same article:

“The test was made in the presence of many firemen from that section, and was personally superintended by F. J. Waterous, of the Waterous Company, in charge of Charles M. Wilkins. Draughting from a cistern and playing through 950 feet of hose, and a 1 1/2 inch nozzle, the engine forced a stream 101 feet; with a one-inch nozzle, 125 feet; with 500 feet of hose and a one-ince nozzle, 141 feed, and with a 1-1/8 inch nozzle, 130 feet. With 400 feet of hose a perpendicular stream was tried against a stack 155 feet high. A strong wind was blowing and it was impossible to keep the stream steadily against the stack, but the stream came within 15 feet of the top. With 3/4 and 7/8 inch nozzles two effective perpendicular streams were thrown a distance of 125 feet.

“From a hydrant through 50 feet of hose, and a 1-1/8 inch nozzle, water was thrown 141 feet, amply sufficient for any building in the Township; with an inch nozzle, 160 feet. Measurements were taken of solid drops of water only.”

The “housing” of this Knox-Waterous automobile was an occasion for a parade, a banquet and a ball, all of which will be described in next week’s column.