Recently in 1920s Category

Another election has just passed, this one with little fanfare. No federal offices were at stake and only judicial ones at the state level. Many county and local officies were not up for election and some of those who were had only one candidate.

The flier above for the 1924 Republican Party candidates caught my eye when I was looking through a file on elections at the York County Heritage Trust Library/Archives. The gentlemen certainly look "SAFE--SANE--STEADY."

Even though 1924 was a presidential election year, it wasn't an exciting election. The American Presidency Project shows that Coolidge won with 54% of the popular vote. Democrat John W. Davis carried only the "solid south" and Progressive candidate Robert M. LaFollette only took his native Wisconsin.

Who were these 1924 Republicans and where is the York County connection?

Lucky canning house, probably 1930s
My 96-year-old mother-in-law remembers picking string beans at farms in Chanceford Township when she was 10 or so in the 1920s. She says she picked beans during the day and then helped snip them at the Lucky canning house in the evening.

I purchased a Lucky canning house ledger covering September through November, 1943 at a yard sale a few years ago and donated it to the York County Heritage Trust Library/Archives. The ledger shows that they were canning corn and tomatoes then.
Wholesale customers for canned corn included Daugherty & Ward, Crisfield, Del.; Fulton, Mehring & Hauser, York; Oriental Paper & Bag Co.; District Wholesale Grocery Co. and Sprague, Warner, Kenny Co., all of Washington, D.C.; Maryland Gro. Co. Baltimore, Md. and Audment Bros., Lancaster, Pa. The U.S. Government purchased both 1,500 cases of corn and 3,750 cases of tomatoes, perhaps to feed World War II troops.

See below for my recent York Sunday News column on York County canners and vegetable pickers and also a photo of the Lucky cannery workers.

Utz new Carlisle Street plant in 1950

Here I was, all ready to resume my "potato chip series," working my way up to the biggies, including my favorite Utz chips, and what do I see when I pick this morning's paper of my porch? Utz is being sold! I breathed a little easier when I saw that Snyder's of Hanover is the tentative buyer. The maker of honey mustard pretzels can surely do no wrong. The article sounds like they don't plan to change the chips, just the owners. That's fine--just don't touch my chips!

Previous chip posts:
Bon-Ton /Bickel's.
Senft's.
El-Ge/Eagle Snacks/Frito-Lay.
Charles Chips.

The York Daily Record article has a nice little chronological history of each company gleaned from their websites: Utz and Snyder's The Utz info basically agrees with the information I found in the York County Heritage Trust file, recapped below:

1929 York Fair Horse Racing

York Fair time is rolling around again. Previous posts looked at horse racing at the fair in the 1860s and in the 1950s.

In 1929, horses and jockeys were part of a fair racing circuit from mid-August through mid-October. The Central Fair Circuit included Kutztown, Lancaster, Bloomsburg, Pottsville, Reading, Allentown, York and Frederick, in that order.

The York Fair touted itself as "One of America's Outstanding Half Mile Tracks." The York racing officials were E. C. Knebelkamp, Presiding Judge; Jack H. Yerian, Starter and Herbert D. Smyser, Racing Secretary.

The first page of an eight-page program and brochure promoting York Fair racing continues:

Reno and Craley children at St. Luke picnic, c.1920.

When I was a child, just about every country church had a picnic grove in which they held the annual Sunday School Picnic. Many churches carry on the tradition. In fact, the church picnic often provides needed funds to help keep many small congregations solvent.

Every first Thursday in August, my church, St. Luke Lutheran Church at New Bridgeville (Chanceford Township), still dishes chicken-corn and ham-bean soups out of the big kettles to accompany various hot sandwiches and home-baked pies and cakes. Besides feeding hundreds of people in the air-conditioned social hall, we do a very brisk business in soup carry-out, selling soup by the quart. (That's usually my job.)

After they eat, people can pull their lawn chairs out of their cars, sit down and listen to live music. Community bands still provide the tunes at some picnics, but St. Luke has lately opted for smaller bands. This year Just Plain Country will be followed by the Harold Tipton Band. Ice cream, soda, and sandwiches are sold at outdoor stands in case hunger strikes again. Many attendees, who come from all over the county, stroll around the well-kept cemetery. Since St. Luke was organized in 1772, there is a good chance that they can find some relatives there.

You know how when it is really windy we sometimes exaggerate and say we were almost blown over. According to the York Dispatch of April 26, 1928, Rev. Dr. Milton K. Foster didn't have to exaggerate:

Probably White Rose Amusement Park in the 1920s

Another view of the park.

Pool at White Rose Park.

Closer view of the pool.

Reading Jim McClure's recent post on the White Rose Amusement Park and its huge swimming pool near Farquhar Park reminded me that I had these original photos of the pool and park in an album that belonged to my mother and grandmother. They were probably taken in the late 1920s. Click here for Jim's recent post.

None of the photos in the album are identified (sound familiar?), but I can figure out most of them. In this case the pool matches other photos and images in newspaper clippings in the files at York County Heritage Trust. It was a huge, easily recognizable pool. It was later known as the Boys Club Pool and also was the York City Pool. The YMCA aquatic center is there now.

Since they were all on the same page, I assumed the two park photos went with the pool photos. (See whole page below.) After reading another post of Jim's, in which he included Jim Hubley's 2005 column remembering airplane swings at the park, I think they do show the park. You can see a little of the roller coaster too. Click here for the post with the Hubley column.

York Imperial from USDA Bulletin

The York Imperial apple won't win any beauty contests. I have several in my fruit bowl right now and they all look different. They come in various shadings of red and green with brown freckles. Shape isn't uniform either--one is round, one is lopsided and one is...well, a kind of lopsided oval that's higher on one side than the other.

Beauty isn't what has kept Jonathan Jessop's York Imperial apples popular for over 150 years. It's their firmness and long keeping qualities that made them a favorite for storage and still keeps them in the high esteem of fruit processors.

See below for my recent York Sunday News column on clockmaker, engineer and fruit farmer Jonathan Jessop and his apple.

Princess Street Chapel from Atlas of the City of York by Frederick Roe, 1903

A recent post told how the Ladies' Aid Society of the Princess Street Evangelical Chapel successfully carpeted their church by raising the funds with an autograph quilt in 1909.

Click here to read that post.

I was curious as to what happened to that congregation and to their building. I found a trail that illustrates how many religious groups and sites change. New congregations are formed; some disappear or merge with others. One church body outgrows a building and another moves in.

The Princess Street Chapel story fits in with all of the above.

Dallastown to Red Lion, 1876 and 1928

A recent post related the troubles motorists had traveling from Dallastown to Red Lion in the fall of 1928 because of road construction and deep mud on the detour. I was asked exactly where those roads were.

Click here to read that post.

The state road that was being reconstructed was probably the short stretch of Route 74 that runs between Red Lion and Dallastown today. I don't think the path of that road changed much over the years, so it still pretty much follows the red line on the map.

As for the detour and the alternate route mentioned in the newspaper--I tried to reconstruct them using the 1876 Pomeroy, Whitman and Co. Atlas of York County, a present-day ADC atlas and the advice of a friend who knows the area.