4 Jan 2007 The Rest is History
When the late Debbie Szumowski was editor of the Fishtown Star, I wrote a column for one of the Fishtown anniversary celebrations that she use to organize. At that time my research seemed to show that the name of Fishtown had been around for at least 175 years, which pushed the name back into the early to mid 1820’s, thus knocking down the folktale that the English writer Charles Dickens had somehow named the area Fishtown. Dickens did not visit America for the first time until the year 1842 and Fishtown appeared to have already been known by its name for a number of years previous to his visit.
My research was dependent on a local newspaper I came across called One Man News, published in 1939. An article in that paper related the story of Jacob Faber, 78, who when a lad of 17 (1878) a fellow named “Old Uncle Ben” related to him the original boundaries of Fishtown, that being the small area created by the streets Susquehanna, Moyer, Montgomery, Richmond, and Palmer, with the Delaware River being the eastern border.
“Old Uncle Ben” stated these boundaries where such when he was a young lad. From that I deducted Old Uncle Ben’s youth to have been at least back into the 1820’s, assuming that someone with the moniker of “Old Uncle Ben” would have been at least seventy years old, or perhaps at the youngest in his sixties, which would then still predate Charles Dickens first visit to Philadelphia in the 1840’s, and thus still disprove the folktale of Dickens naming the area. I wasn’t totally happy with my conclusions, but it did seem to fit.
Well, I can happily state today that the name of Fishtown actually dates from perhaps two decades previous to my original deductions, probably earlier!
I recently found a rather bizarre newspaper called, The Tickler, a Philadelphia paper, rather satirical in nature, and published by one George Helmbold. In an issue dated November 16th, 1808, I found the below article. I might add that the italics were the publisher, not mine:
“Scratch’em’s Law Reports.
Vol. I. Case V.
In the Court of Common Pleas, a cause was tried on Tuesday the 8th, which excited considerable mirth. -The action was brought in due form of law, scan.mag. by plantiff against defendant, for certain libelous expressions, of obscure though envious import. The plaintiff alleged and proved, that the defendant had, in the course of some gentle altercation, called her, horney Poll, and bristley Poll.
Both plaintiff and defendant are females, and inhabitants of that eloquent part of the Northern suburbs, yelped Fish-town, and keep huckster shops in Market street. The court and jury were at a loss to perceive how horney Poll, and bristley Poll, could be considered as a libel on the plaintiff; but an explanation was given, which made the ‘men of law’ shake their heads, and look wond’rous wise. Some years since, envy, malice, or some other foul passion, raised a repor, that the plaintiff’s husband had stolen a bullock, which he killed, and the plaintiff sold, reserving the horns for her own private use - defendant and others, in consequence, nicknamed her horney Poll. Motives equally base, had been exercised, in endeavoring to cast an odium on the plaintiff, by giving currency to a tale that she once went into a shop to purchase a bunch of bristles - that she paid for one and stole another bunch - hence the nickname of bristley Poll.
The case was ably supported by counsel for plaintiff, who in very moving terms explained to the jury, the injurious tendency a libel has to destroy the happiness and reputation of the aggrieved individual. The counsel for defendant admitted the use of the opprobrious terms, and only plead in extenuation.
The jury gave the plaintiff a verdict of 50 dollars, and costs, to silver over her horns and bristles.”
Of course Helmbold seems to be having fun at the expense of Fishtowners, particularly due to the nature of the court case. His stating that the place is “yelped Fish-town” rather then “called Fishtown” pokes fun at the female fishmongers of the area, who along with other family members would have “yelped” their product at the fish market on Market Street, while their husbands or elder sons were out on the river plying their trade. Helmbold’s mentioning of “the northern suburbs of Fish-town” is for now the earliest indication that I have found for the mentioning of Fishtown’s name.
By next year, Fishtown can be said to be at least 200 years old, probably more, so start planning the Anniversary celebrations!
11 Jan 2007 The Rest is History
The riverward neighborhoods of the Northern Liberties and Kensington can boast of having some of the oldest labor temples in the city. A Philadelphia Inquirer article dated 15 October 1899 sheds light onto the early history of these labor temples, founded by German immigrants.
The German organized workingmen of Philadelphia had three branches of their Labor Lyceum Association. The headquarters at Sixth and Brown streets; the Kensington Labor Lyceum, at Second and Cambria streets, and a rented quarters at Wharton street and Passyunk avenue for the Southwark Labor Lyceum.
F. W. Fritzsche, an exiled member of the German Reichstadt (House of Representatives) played a prominent part in the organization of the Labor Lyceum at Sixth and Brown streets. Fritzsche was born in 1825, in Germany, and when he died in 1905, there were thousands of trade unionists that marched through the streets of Philadelphia on a rainy day for his funeral.
Fritz had been exiled by the German government for his socialist thinking and had come to America and quickly became active in trade union activities in his adopted home of Philadelphia. “The United German Trades, the central organization of the Teutonic craftsmen, had been in existence about five years when the urgent need of a common hall for meeting purposes was felt.” A meeting of various representatives of the involved unions was held at Fritzsche’s house at 325 Callowhill Street in 1887 in order to determine a suitable building for their newly founded Labor Lyceum Association.
The Labor Lyceum was a laborer’s club, a place were labor gathered and organized against the manufacturers, and in Kensington in particular, it was the various textile unions of Kensington’s mill district, which appeared to have been a special group within the city as a whole, probably due to the fact that there were so many of them. Some of the meetings at their Labor Lyceum attracted thousands!
After a couple of years of renting quarters, the Labor Lyceum Association found a new home in the old home of the congregation of the Reform Temple Keneseth Israel, at 809-817 North Sixth Street. The building was purchased in 1893 and the house adjoining, at 819 North Sixth street, was also rented as an “administration building, and to provide quarters for the janitor.” Besides a meeting hall, the building housed the Lyceum’s “valuable library of 1700 volumes,” mostly in German, and in addition several of the individual unions had libraries of their own. Evening courses were offered in English and carried on during the winter months, as was a series of lectures and instructions in drawing.
The first floor contained seven meeting rooms for the unions. The assembly hall was on the second floor and with the galleries, could seat 1500 people. The hall was rented out during the winter months for balls, entertainments and other purposes, which provided a nice sum to the treasury of the Labor Lyceum. Membership in the Labor Lyceum was confined to “the trades unionists occupying it,” all of whom used “it for a meeting place, except Textile Union, No. 8, which convenes at its own headquarters, in the Kensington Labor Lyceum, at Second and Cambria streets. Each union was assessed a tax for the support of the lyceum.
Connected with the Lyceum was a German singing society, the “Arbeiter Maennerchor,” which was made up of the “wives and daughters of the members” who maintained a “Ladies’ Labor Lyceum Association,” which was “a ladies’ aid society, whose principal duty is to get up and conduct various forms of entertainment to provide funds for lyceum purposes.”
Kensington’s Labor Lyceum was housed at 2916 N. 2nd Street and was erected about 1896. Five lots were purchased in May of 1895 and bids for construction were put out in March of 1896 and we can assume the lyceum was constructed soon after.
In 1898 it was reported that the Kensington Labor Lyceum Association was preparing for its annual pork lunch and peasant ball: “Their hog killing will be held at Second and Cambria streets, to be followed with all the business of sausage making after the manner of the peasants in the Fatherland. The costumes and scenes are to be represented at the ball.”
Mother Jones spoke at the Kensington Labor Lyceum on the 15th & 16th of June, in 1903 during a heated textile strike, which annoyed some textile unions, which denounced the socialists, including Mother Jones, for turning the strike rally into a socialists agenda.
Kensington has a long labor history, filled with riotous labor strikes. In another column I will write about those early textile strikers.
18 Jan 2007 The Rest is History
In 1891,, a fellow named Stephen Baxindine published a book called, Kensington: City Within a City. An Historical and Industrial Review. The title is a little misleading, as it is really a small business directory for Kensington. There is a brief 12-page history of Kensington, but then the rest of the 588-page book is filled with short half page or full-page biographies of local businesses. Baxindine wrote over 650 business biographies that are extremely informative of the small businesses in Kensington, particularly along places like Frankford Avenue.
Frankford below Girard Avenue did not have many small businesses being taken up by larger manufacturers. The 900 block had a saddlery & harness place, a dealer in feed, grain, hay, straw, and salt, boarding stables and a grocer. The 1000 block had three carriage or wagon builders and another saddlery & harness business, with the 1100 block having a window shade manufacturer.
Above Girard Avenue, at the 1200 block, you started to see a change in the businesses. That first block above Girard had a couple of furniture manufacturers and a Presbyterian Church, and then on the 1300 block you had an upholstery and chair business. A grocer, bakery, and blacksmith were also available to folks and if you smoked, you could get your cigars from Henry Fluer’s “Singing Birds, and Cigars.”
The 1400 block appeared somewhat industrial, with a color grinder, paint, and wood filler manufacturer, but there was also a wholesale and retail cigar shop, a laundry, a blacksmith, and a hardware shop.
The 1500 and 1600 blocks were not represented, perhaps being residential.
At the 1700 block, the business district started to kick in with various businesses: a tonsorial parlor, dry goods and notions, cigars & tobacco, wall paper & decorations, watchmaker & jeweler, men’s furnishings, milk depot, and grocer & provisioner. There was even a second hand furniture store.
The 1800 block had the homes of three local ministers from neighborhood churches, as well as a fourth on the previous block. The 1800 block also had the Kensington Beef Market, and Joseph Nicholls, “Oyster Bay.”
There was no 1900 block.
The heart of the lower Frankford Avenue business district was between the 2000 block and the 2600 block, where there were upwards of 75 businesses listed (minus the 2100 block which also did not exist).
The 2000 block had house furnishings, heaters and ranges, picture frames and art, second hand goods, a tonsorial artist, a boot and shoemaker, a photographer, pianos, organs, musical instruments, and sheet music.
The 2200 block had furniture, bedding, house furnishings, two shoe stores, and another wholesale and retail cigar, tobacco, and pipe shop.
The 2300 block offered ice cream and confectionary, fancy goods and notions, two more shoe and boot stores, and another candy shop specializing in fine caramels, a china, glass and “Queensware” shop, a men’s furnishing store, a bakery, and yet another tobacco shop.
The 2400 block had a “fine watch” and jewelry shop, a tailor, a saddle, harness, collar, and whip manufacturer, a millinery, pinking and stamping business, an interior decorator and upholsterer, and another house furnishing goods store. There was also on this block
“The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea, Co., Importers of Coffee Roasters and Retail Dealers in Teas and Coffee,” another tonsorial artist, a fine stationary store, a hatter and a “Gent’s” furnishing store, more china, glassware, and home furnishings, as well as a second tea dealer, the “Assam China and Japan Tea Company, Wholesale and Retail Dealers in Teas, Coffees and Fancy Groceries.” There was also a local “Book, Card and Job Printer,” another millinery, and a hatter.
The 2500 block started with the “Globe Meat Market,” “Harrison’s, Cigars and Tobacco, Stationery and Music” store, an English clog manufacturer, a hardware store, another
”Dry Goods and Notions” shop, a butcher, another millinery, more boots and shoes, fancy and staple groceries, and a wholesale liquor dealer and rectifier.
The 2600 block had an interior decorations store, a cigar and tobacco shop, an ice cream and confectionery place, more tobacco, boots and shoes, a gentlemen’s furnishing store, notions and trimmings, and carpets & oil clothes “on installments.”
There were only about eight or so businesses that were listed above the 2600 block of Frankford Avenue, showing that Kensington at that time really was considered that area below Lehigh Avenue.
As you can see there was an incredible amount of goods and services available on Frankford Avenue at one point. With hopes of bringing back the Ave, we can only hope that the new artisans in the area keep these storefronts open to the public and not turn them into private homes.
25 Jan 2007 The Rest is History
In 1850, when Kensington was self-governing, the district was divided into eight wards. One particular ward stood out as the heart of the textile industry, that being the old Sixth Ward. Prof. Philip Scranton, in his book, Proprietary Capitalism (Cambridge University Press, 1983), takes a look at the history of this famous textile area.
Kensington first became self-governing in March of 1820. Fourteen years later, in April of 1834, the population had grown such, that it was found necessary, for governing purposes, to divide the district up into five separate wards. In February of 1846 the ward boundaries of Kensington were again redrawn, this time adding a Sixth and Seventh Ward.
The population had increased so much during the past decade (1836-1846) that the Sixth Ward was created out of the old Third Ward. The new Sixth Ward was located between Frankford Avenue and Third Street and from Girard Avenue north to Oxford Street, and the old Third Ward shifted to the west of 3rd Street.
The Sixth Ward was the area that saw some of the heaviest rioting during the Anti-Irish Catholic Riots of May of 1844, a time when Protestants from Fishtown, the Northern Liberties, and Southwark attacked the newly arrived immigrants. The increase in population that had taken place was mainly Irish Catholics who became associated with St. Michael’s Church. Many of them were hand weavers, attracted to Kensington for work in the textile industry.
Scranton states “three-quarters of the [textile] firms and workers were counted in the central and adjacent Third and Sixth wards. With 1,600 workers and forty-nine firms, the Sixth Ward was the most heavily packed textile neighborhood in Kensington….”
He linked the manufacturing census of 1850 with the population census of the same year, coming up some interesting insights. Of the 49 firms he identified in the Sixth Ward, he linked 45 of them in Population Census. He found that 44 of the owners of these firms either lived close to, or at the worksite in Kensington’s Sixth Ward. Of the 45 manufacturers that Scranton linked, 33 of them were Irish born. The Irish master weavers tended to run their handlooms “on cottons, mixed goods, and carpets.”
Other information he gathered showed an “aging cotton handloom group with younger shop masters taking up carpet manufacture, a hand trade that showed a long-term rise” from the 1840’s to 1870’s.
By reviewing the 1850 Population Census, Scranton found that the “bulk of the Irish textile employers in 1850 Kensington were present to welcome the famine-era immigrants to their workshops, rather than being new arrivals themselves.” And welcome them they did as famine-era immigrants filled many Kensington blocks.
Scranton also found that handloom proprietors only had to rent a workshop or build a shed for their looms, a fraction of the cost of the larger powered loom factories. The average investment was only $90 per worker, as compared to $555 per worker at the large power loom works in Manayunk or Old City.
The hand weavers generally owned their own loom and being a skilled job, they could on average earn about $216 per year (woman about $72 per year). In today’s money that would amount to approximately $41,000 for a man, $14,000 for a woman.
Since the handloom proprietors found it difficult to leap to the power loom factory level (their profits at handloom production were not great enough for the investment needed), many of the masters instead invested in real estate, often housing their workers, or even boarding them.
A old small frame house in Kensington could be purchased for $150 ($28,500 today), an old brick house was about $300 ($57,200 today), and a brand new six-room house was about $1000 ($190,000 today). With a hand weaver earning about $216 a year, they were not in a position to purchase a new home, so they would have to either rent a home, or buy an old wood frame, which would have been affordable, and not much different in cost for a house in Fishtown just five or ten years ago. A decent house could be rented for $50 to $60 per year, so even if a hand weaver made the equivalent of $41,000 today, his rent would be almost $800 a month rent.
These little tidbits give some insight into a long gone way of life. The old Sixth Ward remained a leader in Kensington’s textile business sector for a little while longer, until the Norris estate began to be broken up in the late 1840’s, then a number of firms started to move north and the areas around Front & York, Front & Lehigh, and along Allegheny Avenue, became the new focus points for the textile industry in Kensington.
1 Feb 2007 The Rest is History
In my column of January 9th, I wrote on an old newspaper I came across called, The Tickler, published in Philadelphia, by George Helmbold. Dated November 16th, 1808, the paper ran a story that mentioned two women from “Fish-town” who were involved in a court case. This finding was the earliest known usage of the name of Fishtown for that old part of Kensington that sat east of Girard Avenue above Palmer Street (now of course much expanded and continuing to expand if your prone to reading the real estate adverts).
When I read that issue of The Tickler, there was a word in the article that wasn’t quite clear, and I assumed it to be corrupted. The printing was a bit faded and the word looked like it was spelt “yelped,” which would have been a corruption of the word “yeleped,” which besides meaning, “to boast,” also means, “to utter a sharp, quick cry.”
Since the article dealt with two women from Fishtown who were said to “keep huckster shops in Market Street,” it appeared to me that they were fishmonger women, selling the catch for their husbands or families, at the old market that ran down the middle of Market Street west of Front. I assumed the author was mocking the women and stated that the women were from “that eloquent part of the Northern suburbs, yelped Fish-town,” using the word yelped as a knock against the barking fishmonger women. However, it turns out was wrong.
Joe Walker, an old time Fishtowner on Almond Street, called me the evening that that issue of the Star came out. He told me there was a mistake in my column, a spelling error. He thought the author probably wrote “ycleped” and not “yeleped” as I thought, or “yelped” as I transcribed. It seems that from Joe’s background in the theater, he had come across this word on several occasions.
I reread the The Tickler article again and it was as clear as day, the word was indeed “ycleped,“ and it means, “called” or “named” and it is described as being “obsolete, except in archaic or humorous writings.”
In my column, I had based the fact that the author “Yelped” the name of Fishtown as a derogatory jab at the fishmonger women, but when reading the article now with the new definition of the word, it is simply stating that the place was “called” or “named” Fishtown. What is good about this is that the author did indeed state that “that eloquent northern suburb” was called Fishtown, and that this is indeed the oldest mention of the usage of this name for the neighborhood.
Native Fishtowners never cease to amaze me. An old archaic word, obsolete in its usage, and there Joe was on the phone within hours of the paper coming out!
If you don’t know Joe Walker, he’s a real Fishtown personality. You can usually find him over at Sulimay’s Restaurant (632 E. Girard Avenue) having breakfast on most days, or perhaps hanging out at his friend Greg Gillespie’s bookshop, Richmond Books (3037 Richmond Street).
Greg took over the old Richmond theater, turned hardware store, that use to be at that location, and after spending some time getting rid of the hardware store’s leftovers, the place now houses thousands of used books. His shop is particularly good for Irish studies and fiction.
With all the nooks and crannies, the shop reminds me of my days when I worked at William H. Allen, Booksellers, which I might add the new owner of Allen’s is also suppose to house his books at Greg’s place. Allen’s was the Dickensian shop that use to be at 2031 Walnut Street. The customers were the top scholars in America and Europe, and had a long history of serving scholars going back to Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead, who were customers during “the war” years.
The high walls of bookshelves and the ladders used to access them, the mezzanine balcony, and the “back room” where treasures were found, were the first reaches of the shop, before entering into the annex, or the basement, where if you didn’t duck you were sure to bang your head. A trip to Allen’s would not be complete without a visit to the “rare book room,” where I once had the pleasure of a private conversation with Umberto Eco, the Italian author and linguist. What did we talk about? The origins of my Sicilian surname.
The place was a booklover’s paradise! Hopefully Greg will help to keep a piece of bibliophile history going in Philadelphia, and he is doing it right here in Port Richmond. Pay him a visit!
8 Feb 2007 The Rest is History
Considered by many the greatest swimmer of the first half of the twentieth century, Joseph T. Verdeur (1926-1991) was a local neighborhood boy who lived for some time at 2551 Cedar Street, right between Sergeant and Hazzard. His mother Sophia died in 1982, still living in the neighborhood.
Joe went to Northeast Catholic High School, where his swimming career first took off. Later, at LaSalle University his swimming career excelled even further. He eventually came to be called the “King of the Medly” a difficult race requiring three different strokes. He acquired this monicker by being the AAU National Individual Medley champion for eight consecutive years (1943-1950).
During his career, Verdeur held 19 world records, 21 American records, and 12 NCAA records. In 1948 he added a Olympic Gold Medal. In all he won 20 AAU National Individual championships, 4 NCAA National Individual championships, and was part of the AAU national championship team in 1944.
One of his best events was the butterly, where he broke the world record twelve times between 1945 and 1950. Starting in 1943, he won nine National AAU gold medals in the butterfly and ten AAU golds in the 200 breaststroke, to go with his already mentioned 8 consecutive AAU National Individual Medley championships.
During his swimming days at LaSalle, before the era of the Pan-American Games, or the Spring Championships, Verdeur took the NCAA Division I wins in the 200 yard Butterfly in 1947 and 1948 with record times of 2:16.8 and 2:14.7 respectively. In 1949 and 1950 again for LaSalle, Verdeur took the win in the 150 yard individual medley clocking in at 1:30.8 and 1:31.2 respectively both records for this then relatively new event.
Verdeur’s final triumph came when he took the gold medal in the 200 breaststroke at the 1948 Summer Olympics, held in London, England. The Olympic had been suspended during World War Two and these 1948 games were suppose to have been held in London back in 1944. If not for the cancellation, he would have competed and probably won back in 1944 as well.Verdeur’s gold medal in the 200 meter breaststroke came with an Olympic record breaking time of 2:39.3.
One event in Verdeur’s life can sum up the man. After he won the 200 meter breaststroke at the 1948 Olympics, he was set to race in the 4 x 200 freestyle where he was certain to win another gold medal. Instead of racing, he allowed Wally Wolf to take his place, since Wolf did not race yet. Wolf raced for the team event and won a gold medal It’s hard to imagine the atheletes of today doing such an unselfish act.
Due to his amazing swimming career, Verdeur was an easy shewin in 1966 for the then recently opened International Swimming Hall of Fame and was one of its first honoree inductees.
Before graduating from LaSalle in 1950, Verdeur swam for Northeast Catholic High School, up at Erie & Torresdale. The Falcons team won several titles during his years at North. He graduated from North in 1944 and was already a national breaststroke champion swimmer.
After his competitive swimming career, Verdeur married a woman from Philadelphia and had five children. He became a school teacher in the Philadelphia school district and taught from 1954-1991. He is said to have taught gym at the old Edison High School at 8th & Lehigh. He also coached Temple University’s swim team from (1960-1969) as well as Thomas Jeffereson University’s swim team (1969-1981), to go with a pool supply company that he owned.
Verdeur moved to Bala Cynwyd, PA, where he died of cancer in 1991. He was 65 years old.
Besides being a swimming coach, Verdeur demanded excellence in academics as well. It was said that he said “C's weren't good enough….Whether it's in the classroom-or in the swimming pool-you don't settle for anything less than your best.” Besides being one of the greatest swimmers, “Verdeur's role as a teacher greatly influenced the lives of young people.”
In the months leading up to the 1948 Olympics, Hollywood scouted Verdeur as a possible new “Tarzan.” It is said he wanted to play Tarzan and “had the looks to do it.”
In May of 1999, Verdeur was honored by La Salle University with a bust of his likeness on the campus at Kirk Pool in Hayman Center.
North Catholic, LaSalle, Temple, Thomas Jefferson, and Tarzan, how much more Philadelphian can a fellow get? As the then LaSalle University President Nicholas Giordano said about Joe Verdeur, “the combination of superior athletic ability with selflessnes,” that was who Joe Verdeur was, Kensingtonians should be proud.
15 Feb 2007 The Rest is History
In Philadelphia, before the Social Registers began to be published, there was the Boyd’s Philadelphia Blue Book. Starting around 1880, this annual listed Philadelphia’s elites and social climbers. The volume for March 1893, states that it includes “25,000 prominent householders.”
In many cases back then, pedigree counted more then money and along with things like the Social Register and Boyd’s Blue Books, there was also much activity at that time in the formation of lineage societies, which allowed elites to identify one another and discuss their illustrious families. Organizations like the Daughters of the Revolution and the Mayflower Society helped to tell who was who in the ever changing social scene of America, as “new money” immigrant families entered the upper class of society.
What I like about these books is that you can find certain blocks in Kensington where the “elites” congregated back in the 19th Century. For example, when I was a kid there use to be large three story homes on Cumberland Street from Jasper to Emerald Street. Today most of those homes have been torn down, but back in 1893 this was an elite block in Kensington, with 5 homes on the south side of the Cumberland Street being listed. One home was George Weisbrod (1924 E. Cumberland), a partner in Weisbrod & Hess Brewery, a local brewery where Yard’s Brewery is today.
Further east on Cumberland, between Frankford and Tulip there are 8 households listed. At 2209 E. Cumberland lived the famed toy manufacturer Albert Schoenhut, and on the same block was the Rev. John A. Goodfellow, long time pastor of the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd (Collins & Cumberland), where he served for a record 61 years (1872-1933).
The 2300 block of east Cumberland had 11 homes listed, including the Harbison dairy family (2345 E. Cumberland) and Christian Hess (2357 E. Cumberland), of Weisbrod & Hess Brewery.
In all, Cumberland between Jasper & Gaul had 29 homes listed in the book, the most of any street in the Kensington area. The next runner up was 6th Street, which had 24 households, many of them “new money” German & German-Jewish immigrants.
The big homes that lined the streets of Norris Square were highly represented (Hancock 19 houses, Howard 18 houses, Susquehanna 16 houses, Diamond 6 houses), as was the business district of Frankford Avenue (18 families).
The addresses that are bringing big money in the gentrification of Fishtown today were also good blocks in 1893: 900-1200 Shackamaxon (12 homes), 2300 block Dauphin (7 homes), 1000-1400 Columbia (13 homes), 1000-1400 Marlborough (15 homes). However, Montgomery Avenue, a very fine street today, only had six houses listed, 4 on the 1300 block and 2 on the 1500 block. Palmer Street had Alexander Adaire at 1414, and baseball man Ben Shibe’s relicts at 1311. Richmond Street, a place that along with Beach Street, use to house Kensington’s elites during the first three quarters of the 19th Century, now only had ten homes represented between them
Lehigh Avenue, a rather newer street for Kensington, but a fancy street when it was laid out, had 18 homes listed between 5th and 9th Streets. My own York Street was represented with 9 homes, most of them on the 2200 and 2300 blocks, with my own home being occupied by Samuel Creighton, the vice-president/treasurer of Dungan, Hood & Co., a large morocco leather manufactory at American & Dauphin Streets.
Other streets not mentioned above, but represented in Boyd’s Blue Book of 1893 were the 2000 block Amber, 1200-2100 Germantown, 2400-2500 Kensington, 300 block Norris, 100 block Oxford, 1000-2400 N. Front, 900-2500 N. 2nd, 2000-2400 N. 3rd, 1300-1500 N. 4th, and 1200-1600 N. 5th.
At this time (1893) Kensington would have had in the neighborhood of 125,000 residents, but only 360 families are represented in Boyd’s Blue Book. They were our manufacturers, industrialists, bankers, clergy, and politicians, but not only that, they were our citizens, as no matter their worth, they lived here.
The movement of the upper class out of the neighborhood had started before 1893, as many of Kensington’s elites had begun to move to the “new money” neighborhood of North Broad Street (Broad to 20th, Girard to Diamond). By the end of World War One (1918), the movement of the elites out of the neighborhood was almost complete. Now, folks that lived outside of the neighborhood would control Kensington’s institutions and factories and as the next generation took over these institutions there was no longer the connection to the neighborhood that had once existed by the founders of those institutions, and thus a large part of what made Kensington great was lost.
22 Feb 2007 The Rest is History
Sometimes I’m asked why I only write about “old” history and nothing about modern history? I suppose I have been alive for almost the last fifty years (47 and counting), and thus I’m not as interested in modern things as I am of the past. I must admit though, for new folks moving in, or for the younger generation, the last forty to fifty years have seen many changes. My adventure of walking to school in the 1960’s is one example of one little street.
I went to elementary school at St. Anne’s and I remember distinctly taking the long walk to school every day. There was no lunch program at school, so we walked back and forth to home for lunch. We lived on the north side of York Street and back then (1960’s) it was the southern boundary for St. Anne’s Parish, thus for a youth, I walked a rather long way to school at Cedar & Tucker Streets, from Memphis & York.
Today most of what I remember as a youth on my walk up and down Memphis Street has changed. The buildings are mostly the same, but all the corner stores of my day are gone, sometimes replaced, but mostly not.
Starting at Memphis & York, there use to be a barbershop next to Key Pizza and Key Pizza use to be a hairdresser, and where Third Federal Bank is today there was a wholesale food supply place that sold to local restaurants. I remember they had a fire one night and the firemen were throwing boxes of food out of the building and we as kids scooped them up and took them home.
Heading north on Memphis Street there was a garage behind Key Pizza where youths gathered to pick up their bundles of newspapers for their delivery routes. At the southeast corner of Boston & Memphis was another barbershop; this is where I use to get my “little boy’s” haircuts. At the southwest corner of Hagert & Memphis was an old Chinese laundry, where local kids would tease him, but I liked him, as on Halloween the fellow would give out fortune cookies.
Cattycorner from the Chinese Laundry, on the northeast corner, where the corner store is today, was the “Six Cent Soda Store.” I think it had another name, something like “Whellers,” but as kids the only thing that mattered to us is that you could get a glass of fountain soda for six cents. Whenever I had some pennies gathered, I would stop on my way home from school, saddle up to the counter, and order a glass of cherry soda, savoring every sip. It seems odd today, but was quite delightful as a youth.
Further north on Memphis, at the southwest corner of Cumberland Street, was another corner grocery store and across the street, on the northwest corner of Cumberland and Memphis was a place that I think was owned by the Wallace’s, where I remember getting large Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream cones, another occasional stop on the way home from school if money was available.
At Hazzard & Memphis, on the northwest corner was another small corner grocer, the name escapes me now, it might have been a Jewish fellow, but it was a place where I had one of my first jobs, stocking shelves and rotating the stock. I was probably only about 11 or 12 years old at the time, I worked on Saturdays. It’s hard to imagine a store hiring a 12 year old today.
At Huntingdon Street you had the stores that you have today, different owners, but same locations, Conway’s Meat Market was on the northwest corner, where there’s a shop today, but Irene, the hairdresser, wasn’t there yet on the southwest corner, as she was in school with me. McCloskey’s corner store was on the northeast corner.
After Huntington Street you were practically at school, the crossing guards were posted there and you couldn’t goof off after this point, unless you wanted to feel the whip of Sister St. Kevin, who was the Sister in charge of the crossing guards at St. Anne’s.
Sister St. Kevin was an interesting sort. When I would do something to get “pulled up” by the crossing guards, she would give me the choice of what I wanted to get beat with. “What would you like Milano, the bullwhip or the shillelagh?” My normal response was, “Sister, I’ll take the shillelagh, the sting doesn’t stay with you as long,” and then across the desk my butt would go.
It’s a different walk down Memphis Street today, and while I sure miss the six-cent soda store, I can do without Sister St. Kevin.
1 March 2007 The Rest is History
During Kensington’s era of self-government, there were twelve men who were elected President of the Board of Commissioners for the district. They would have been equivalent to the Mayors of Kensington. John Robbins was one of these men.
Born in 1808, at Bustleton, now a part of Philadelphia, but then a small village in Lower Dublin Township, Philadelphia County, PA, Robbins was the son of a well-to-do farmer. He attended the public schools of Philadelphia and later was a student at the “Gunmere Academy in Burlington, N.J.” Robbins stayed with his parents until 1836 when he moved to Kensington and remained there for the rest of his life.
In Kensington, Robbins engaged in the manufacture of steel on a small scale on Frankford Avenue, above Richmond Street, and became active in local politics. He soon became a member of the Board of Commissioners for the District of Kensington and was elected the President (Mayor) for several years (1842-1845).
It was during his presidency that Robbins needed to deal with one of the greatest crisis’ in Kensington’s history, that of the Anti-Irish Catholic Riots. It is said that through his “strenuous efforts lives and valuable property” were saved.
In 1845, when he was still the Mayor of Kensington, Robbins became partners with John P. Verree. Verree, also from the Lower Dublin area, presumably knew Robbins already.
Verree and Robbins had several things in common. Besides being from the Lower Dublin area and being in the same business, Verree also served as the President (Mayor) of the District of Kensington, although several years (1852-54) after Robbins served.
The firm that the two men created went by the name of Robbins & Verree’s Rolling Mill and together they built a large mill on Delaware Avenue, just above Popular, but still within the then District of Kensington’s borders. Robbins owned a pier in that area as well, which he later used for a Ferry Company that he was active with.
Being a well known businessman and mayor of Kensington, Robbins took his popularity to the congressional level and tried his hand at Washington, where he was able to be elected as a Democrat to the 31st, 32nd, and 33rd Congresses (March 1849-March 1855). He declined to be a candidate for re-nomination in 1854.
The partnership of Robbins and Verree continued until 1856, when Robbins, after having acquired a good fortune, retired from business and politics, and sold out his interest. Verree remained in business in Kensington for a number of years, being found in 1880 as President of the Philadelphia Iron and Steel Company, at 939 N. Delaware Avenue.
Robbins was nominated for mayor of Philadelphia in 1858, but lost to the Republican incumbent by less then 900 votes. He didn’t cry for a recount.
In 1861 he was found to be raising money for the relief of the families of Philadelphia Volunteers, the families of those men serving in the Civil War.
After that failed attempt to become mayor of Philadelphia, Robbins resumed his activity in the steel manufacturing business and held several municipal offices. At the Democratic Convention for the 5th Congressional District, Robbins was nominated by the party to run for Congress again. He took the challenge and won the election serving Kensignton at the 44th Congress (March 1875-March 1877). At the end of his term, on account of advanced age, he declined to be a candidate for re-nomination in1876.
Besides being a successful businessman, a member of Congress for four terms, and the Mayor of Kensington for three years, he was also a member of the Board of Education in Philadelphia and served as its President for many years, the President and Director of the Kensington National Bank, the President of the Kensington Soup Society, where he served many years, a member of the Board of Managers for the House of Refuge, an Inspector of the County Prison, President of the Kensington and New Jersey Ferry Company, and one of the largest stockholders in the Germantown Passenger Railway Company. He was also closely identified with the James Page Library Association of Kensington and a number of other organizations; as well he was possessed of “considerable real estate in this city and of a number of country seats in Bucks and Montgomery Counties.”
John Robbins died in Philadelphia, Pa., on April 27, 1880, at the age of 72. He died at his home at 908 Shackamaxon. He had been ill about a little over a week, when he had caught a cold and it congested in his lungs. His body was interred in Laurel Hill Cemetery.
8 March 2007 The Rest is History
The search for economic prosperity is a desire, which compels many individuals to immigrate to America. The opportunities America offers often result in lifting a person to a higher social status than might otherwise have been possible in their native country. One of these success stories is Anthony Palmer, who started out as the son of a middling planter in Barbados. Being ambitious and desiring more than the possibilities available to him, he immigrated to Pennsylvania, where he became a leading merchant and used his wealth to found Kensington and as well open the channels of political institutions where over time he became acting governor of the colony.
17th-Century Barbados was a land of immense opportunity. Barbados had become the jewel of the sugar islands and a source of great wealth. Minor nobles, the second sons of nobles and the ever-adventurous merchants went there to seek their fortune. They became the elites and embodied a new mentality that had been growing in Stuart England, a mentality that was "individualistic, competitive, and highly materialistic." Leaving behind traditional notions of "good lordship and medieval Christian values," they were quite ready to allow material interest to serve as the "yardstick" of acceptable and unacceptable social behavior. Anthony Palmer’s father was one such person, a middling planter/merchant, who wanted more for his son.
Records show the senior Palmer first recorded in Barbados in 1677. He was elected a constable in the vestry of St. John's Parish and soon after is found to be an ensign in the island’s militia.
The baptism records for Barbados in this period are not complete, therefore it is not clear whether Kensington’s founder was born in Barbados, or not, but his father does show up in Barbados soon after the birth of his son in 1673.
The quest for a livelihood as a captain of a ship or a merchant most likely brought the elder Palmer to Barbados earlier than the 1674 to 1677 period. He may very well have traded in the island before settling. According to the Barbados Census of 1680, Palmer Sr. was an ensign in the militia and could have come to Barbados for military purposes; unfortunately not enough evidence exists to exclude any possibility. One thing is certain; Anthony Palmer, like most other Englishmen, came to Barbados with one purpose in mind, to better his station in society.
The Barbados Census of 1679-80 is probably the most informative census taken before the 1770's. The census lists all propertied inhabitants of the island along with such statistics as the number of acres, indentured servants, and slaves owned. There is also information on the militia. For our purpose the census helps to identify and place the father of Kensington’s founder Anthony Palmer.
Anthony Palmer, Sr. is identified as a landowner in the parish of St. John. He is listed as owning 39 ½ acres of land and had the luxury of the labor of 4 indentured servants with their period of indenture lasting roughly 6 years. Palmer rounded out his holdings with the ownership of 40 slaves. These figures would have placed him the middle class of Barbados society, well above the lower classes, but still far from reaching the upper class.
Owning not quite 40 acres, Anthony Palmer, Sr. would have been in a position to have a modest sugar works or possibly a small tobacco plantation. Early records of his son Anthony have him trading tobacco and he had the labor to support such an operation.
It appears that Palmer married before coming to Barbados. He appears on the will of Thomas Bickle, Sr. who owned a small plantation in St. Joseph's Parish, Barbados. On this will, Palmer is listed as being Bickle's son-in-law, married to Bickle's daughter Jane. This is the earliest appearance of the junior Palmer and future founder of Kensington in the Barbados records. This will, dated June 28th 1678, tells us that Anthony Palmer Sr. & his wife Jane had three children, Anthony, Thomas and Francis.
This is about all that is known at this time of the parents and siblings of Kensington’s founder. No death record was found for the senior Palmer. While it is unclear what became of Anthony Palmer, Sr., we do know that his son Anthony came to Pennsylvania in the first decade of the 18th Century, acquired hundreds of acres of property, founded his town of Kensington in the 1730’s, and became acting governor of Pennsylvania colony in the late 1740’s, thus acquiring a much higher status in his life then his father was ever able and becoming another American success story.
15 March 2007 The Rest is History
It’s hard to image today that our neighborhood once was the homeland of the Lenni Lenape tribe of American Indians. No doubt there are still people in the area that can trace their ancestry back to the Lenape people, especially since I had a potential client call me recently from Florida needing help to trace her Native American heritage. She grew up in Kensington and in the process of tracing her family’s history, she found evidence that her ancestors were Lenni Lenape and apparently never moved out of the area! Boy oh boy… and I thought it was neat that you could still find early original 18th century English and German families living in Fishtown!
Over the years the Lenni Lenape people came to be known by the name of the Delaware Indians, having been given the name because they lived along the Delaware River. Englishmen Samuel Argall is credited with giving the name Delaware to the Delaware Bay, in honor of Sir Thomas West, Third Lord de la Warr, a one time Virginia Colony governor. Since the Delaware River fed the bay, it too was given the name of Delaware, and since the Lenapes inhabited the Delaware River Valley, they were also given the name.
The Lenapes homeland stretched from southeastern New York, to northern Delaware state, from the Atlantic Ocean to the eastern woodlands of Pennsylvania. They were actually made up of three different groups; the Munsee, the Unami, and the Nanticokes. The Munsee inhabited the northern areas, the Nanticokes the southern area, with the Unami in the middle.
Hale C. Sipe, who wrote on the Delaware Indians, states that the Unami, or “down river people” as it translates, dwelt on both sides of the Delaware River. From the mouth of the Lehigh in the north, to the Pennsylvania border with state of Delaware to the south.
Within the three groups of the Lenapes there were also three clans that interconnected the three groups. Those clans were the Turtle, Wolf, and Turkey. The Turtle Clan was the most important clan and always had the head sachem, or chief position, in any tribal council. Sipe tells us that the Unami’s Turtle Clan had as its most important village, Shackamaxon, the place were Fishtown, Kensington, and Port Richmond would later come to be founded. Sipe theorizes that Shackamaxon was likely the capital of the whole Lenni Lenape nation, seeing as if it was the principal village of the Unami tribe and their sachem was the leader of the united Lenape nation by history and traditon.
It should not be surprising then that William Penn would come to Shackamaxon to make his peace treaty, as it was the chief village of the Lenapes and the home of Tamanend, William Penn’s counterpart for the American Indian. Tamanend was of the Turtle Clan of the Unami, a position he held from a time before Penn’s arrival to at least 1697. He died about 1701 and is believed to be buried in the “Tammany Burial Ground,” near Chalfonte, Bucks County, PA.
By the time William Penn arrived on the scene in the late 17th Century, the Unami were at the low point in their history. The whole of the 17th Century was fairly devastating to them. There were a number of wars fought with other neighboring Indian tribes over who would control the trade with the Europeans, as well as fights between neighboring tribes encroaching on each other’s traditional hunting grounds, which previously was not a problem, but now, with the rise of commercial hunting so trade could be conducted with the Europeans, presented serious problems. By the time the Swedes founded their colony in the Delaware Valley in the 1630’s, the Lenni Lenape were already a subject people to the Susquehannock tribe and needed permission to sell land to the Swedes.
The fifteen years (1660-1675) leading up to Penn’s arrival in 1682 were the worst for the Lenapes. There were more wars, this time with the Iroquois, where the Lenapes had to fight for the Susquehannocks, as well as more small pox outbreaks. The final results were that the Lenape nation once 20,000 strong, fell to a low of 4,000.
After Penn’s colony got underway and the American Nation was eventually born, the Lenapes began a slow 130 year migration west, where the majority of them finally found a home on reservations in Oklahoma and Ontario, Canada.
So it was surprising to get that phone call from Florida from the woman looking for her Native American ancestors in Philadelphia, as most Lenapes left the area. Her ancestor never went to a reservation and over time intermarried with German immigrants, blending in and becoming part of the great American melting pot.
22 March 2007 The Rest is History
People often ask me what is the best way to start researching your family’s history and my standard answer is to talk to the old folks before they pass away. I alluded to this topic in a column I previously wrote about family picnics (13 July 2006), but I did not go that much into it.
The older folks in the family are the carriers of the history. They have stories in their memories not available anywhere else. Once they die whole chapters of the family’s history are gone forever.
It’s important when starting to research your family history to interview the oldest people first as they are the ones most likely to die if you wait. It might be a grandparent, or great grandparent, it might be an aunt that you never talk with, or a relative you never had a relationship with. The oldest member of the family might be one of your parents. No matter who it is, interview them and get as much as you can from them.
You could tape record the interview, or use a video camera, or simply take notes. You might want to put together some particular questions beforehand so that in the event the conversation goes off on a tangent; you can bring it back into focus. It’s okay to let the conversation stray, as stories might be revealed that you would have never thought to ask, but if there is certain information you want, make sure to bring the conversation back to your topics.
If the family member is not one who your close to, you might first ask them if they would consider an interview about the family’s history and what method of interview they would feel most comfortable to do, as some people might object to tape recorders, or a video camera. Also, keep in mind people will act differently when they are recorded, then if you simply had a conversation with them. The family’s dirty laundry might not want to be aired on camera or tape.
My own interest in my family’s history came about after the death of my father. He died in 1985. A couple of years after his death I came to realize I did not know much about his family and where he grew up, nor did I know much about his parents.
He was born in South Philadelphia, but his father was born in Sicily and his mother was an Irish-American from St. Louis. His dad came over as a boy with my great grandparents and the other four kids in their family. My Irish grandmom grew up in St. Louis where she was the granddaughter of Irish immigrants who fled Ireland during the Potato Famine in the 1840’s and settled in Carondelet, an old neighborhood at the southern tip of St. Louis on the Mississippi River.
Since I never talked with my father about his family history, I never found out what it was like for him to live in South Philadelphia amongst his Sicilian relatives, nor was I ever able to find out about my father’s parents, as they died back in the early 1960’s when I was just a boy.
Much of my father’s family history I know only from paper records I have found, or interviews with distant cousins (while not an only child, my father’s siblings died young).
I never talked to my father about his life in St. Louis (nor of his mother’s life in St. Louis) the place where he lived after spending his early years as a youth in South Philadelphia. What I know of my father’s mother’s family also comes from paper records I have found in my research, as well as interviews with more distant cousins.
The one jewel of an interview I had was with my grandfather’s brother, Giuseppe Milano, who lived to be about 93 years old. He was born in Pietraperzia, Sicily, so he had stories from the “old country.” He was a treasure of family history, but then after that one and only time I met him, he promptly died and whole chapters of the family history died with him.
A good deal of my family’s history was lost simply because someone never sat down and asked my father about his family. Some folks are talkative people, others are not. My father was not, at least not about his family. Perhaps you already know about your family’s history, perhaps not. If your interested in your family’s history, the most important thing you could do to preserve it, is to take the time to sit down and talk with the old folks and write it down. Once they’re dead, that chapter of the family’s history dies with them.
29 March 2007 The Rest is History
John Fanning Watson (1779-1860) was a local historian and antiquarian who lived in Germantown, a walking institution of Philadelphia history, a primary source. He knew many of the early Philadelphians that other historians write about. He remembered as a boy seeing Washington when he lived in Philadelphia and he was also able to recall when the Penn Treaty Elm still stood. His recollections of Philadelphia before consolidation give an excellent look at the towns and villages that made up Philadelphia County and would eventually become her neighborhoods.
Watson was old school, short on the critical analysis, but plenty of narrative and first hand observation, which makes for more lively reading then the sterile academic speak we have today. His most famous and lasting work is a set of books titled, Watson’s Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania; A Collection of Memoirs, Anecdotes, and Incidents of the City and its Inhabitants and of the Earliest Settlements of the Inland Part of Pennsylvania from the Days of the Founders. Intended to Preserve the Recollections of Olden Time, and to Exhibit Society in its Changes of Manners and Customs, and the City and Country in their Local Changes and Improvements.
His history was first published in 1830 in a one-volume edition. In the 1840’s Watson expanded his work and published it as a two-volume work. In the 1870’s, Willis P. Hazzard added to Watson’s work and published it as a three-volume set. It was very popular and continued to be published throughout the rest of the 19th Century and into the 20th Century.
There is much in Watson’s Annals that pertain to the history of Kensington, Fishtown, and the Northern Liberties and I have put quite a bit of it on my website in the “Observers and Travelers” section of the Kensington Encyclopedia: www.kennethwmilano.com
I found the below mentioned piece rather amusing, as we often talk about the way kids act today, but reading Watson shows that some things have not changed since when I was a kid and when Watson was writing over 175 years ago. In chapter 26, which he titles, “Sports and Amusements,” Watson gives us this little story about street fights, which I suppose could be considered an amusement and a sport, or at least I recall plenty of folks in my youth (friends and not) that would have thought so:
“The Northern Liberties about Camptown and Pegg's run used to be in
agitation almost every Saturday night by the regular clans of "rough and
tumble" fighting, between the ship-carpenters from Kensington, and the
butchers from Spring Garden --- the public authority not even attempting to
hinder them, as it was deemed an affair out of town.
All of this spirit of rivalry and fighting was the product of the war of
Independence. Their eyes, as boys, were filled with the echoes of battles
lost or won. They felt their buoyant spirits inspired with martial ardor
too, and having no real enemies to encounter, they invented them for the
occasion. In this way the academy boys were accountred as young soldiers,
and they much piqued themselves as the rivals of another class of
school-boys. Each had their officers, and all of them some emblems "a la
militaire" --- all aspiring to the marks and influence of manhood; burning
to get through their minority, and to take their chances in the world before
them :
"Then passions wild and dark and strong,
And hopes and powers and feelings high,
Ere manhood's thoughts, a rushing throng,
Shall sink the cheek and dim the eye !"
Watson doesn’t mention it (it would have been known when he was writing), but when the Kensingtonians were fighting the Spring Gardeners at “Camptown” and “Pegg’s Run,” they would have been fighting on “neutral” grounds. “Camptown” and “Pegg’s Run” would have been located in the Northern Liberties District, which sat between Kensington and Spring Garden Districts. “Pegg’s Run” is an old creek that runs its course underneath the present day Willow Street, just south of Spring Garden, and “Camptown” was an area just north of “Pegg’s Run,” where a British military barracks was constructed in colonial times upon a plot of land that would today roughly equal the area from 2nd to 3rd Street, from Green south to Buttonwood Street and thus the name of Camptown, or Campingtown, was given to the area of and adjacent to the barracks.
So remember when you see the kids battling in the streets this summer, as they seem to always do, remember that they are simply “burning to get through their minority” and carrying out a tradition in the neighborhood that has been going on since the American Revolution.