Monday, December 9, 2019

Playing Grandpa. July 25, 2019

July 25, 2019

Playing Grandpa

My talents as a grandfather were severely tested last month when my seventeen-year old grandson Ian McCance visited me for two weeks. I had a wonderful time and hope that it was equally rewarding for him.

The primary reason for his visit was a week spent at Jazz Camp at Duquesne. Unlike me, Ian is a very competent musician, playing trumpet in both his high school band and their jazz band. He had a good experience at camp at Duquesne last year and was happy to have the opportunity to return this year.

This is a lot of fun for me, both vicariously and as a spectator. Although I love all types of music, I was never able to perform myself. My darkest day in junior high was the one in which Alma Weise ridiculed me for my inability to sing. Consequently I am impressed with anyone who can play an instrument. Ian no only plays well, but he appears to understand musical theory as well.

The collateral advantage of Jazz Camp is the fact that I was able to attend an hour-long jazz concert every day. The camp faculty performed at the end of the day for the first three days, demonstrating different concepts each day. For example, on Monday they concentrated on improvisation, with each of them playing improvised solos on well-known songs.

The seven faculty members together make up a jazz band that is easily the equivalent of any I have heard in my long career as a jazz fan. The camp director Mike Tomaro plays saxophone as well as he manages the camp. Jeff Bush on trombone and Joe Badaczewski complete the front line and are aptly supported by a rhythm section made up of Max Leake on piano, Eric Susoeff on guitar, Paul Thompson on bass, and Thomas Wendt on percussion.

Each of these men is a consummate professional; they are all performing regularly in local jazz venues, often as leaders of their own small groups. We were fortunate to have Jeff Bush put together a quartet to entertain at our retirement banquet last April.

Thursday afternoon the campers performed a concert in small groups, with each student coming up with his/her improvised solo. Friday they played as a large (twenty four piece) orchestra. I was quite impressed at their performance, an impression that has been reinforced by watching the video version that I recorded on my cell phone. I continue to be amazed at the accomplishments of young people today, especially as compared to what I recall from my youth days.

Ian will be a senior at Rocky Mountain High School in Fort Collins, Colorado, this year, and is beginning to get serious about college next year. We described our campus visit to Penn State in an earlier column; it was followed by one at Pitt a week later. Unlike the very general one at Penn State, the Pitt tour focused on the School of Arts and Sciences.

At this point Ian is contemplating majoring in history, a decision that I certainly would support. In an effort to gain a little bit of experience in that area, he spent his other week here as a pro-bono intern for the Bridgeville Area Historical Society. We want to transform the mass of information developed in our series of workshops on George Washington in western Pennsylvania into something accessible to the general public.

A possible candidate is a collection of short narrated video presentations, one for each of Washington’s seven visits here. Ian’s project is to produce this series of five or six minute videos; his progress to date has been impressive. The prototype is a video dedicated to the Fort Necessity campaign. In support of it we visited Jumonville Glen, Fort Necessity, and Braddock’s Grave.

I am pleased with the tangible product of Ian’s efforts, something that is of value to the Society. I am much more pleased with the knowledge that he does indeed understand the subject matter and its significance to the history and heritage of this area. History may indeed be the appropriate niche for him. He attended the Historical Society’s program on the Bethel Brink’s Robbery and my brother’s talk on the local war dead and appeared to enjoy both of them.

Theater arts is another subject that Ian enjoys and at which he excels. Here too he is succeeding in an area in which I was a dismal failure. Despite my eloquent rendition of “Casey at the Bat” for my audition for the Dramatic Club in high school, my application was turned down. Even worse, based on my performance as Ogden McCloskey in our Junior Class play, Jane Patton was unable to find a role for me in our Senior play. In contrast, Ian has already performed in four or five community and school theatrical productions and is currently involved in a presentation of the play “Matilda”, based on the well-known novel by Roald Dahl.

This provided me with an excuse to watch a few movies with him while he was here. We started out with “The Benny Goodman Story”, an appropriate supplement to Jazz Camp. Then three classic Westerns – “High Noon”, “Lonely Are the Brave”, and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”, justified as examples of superb film-making.

We also watched the baseball fantasy movie, “The Natural”, as a complement to going to a Pirate game. The game we saw was close to being a fantasy; the Pirates beat San Diego 11 to 10 in eleven innings, incorporating three different comeback rallies en route to the victory. It certainly is difficult to beat the drama of a baseball game between two evenly matched teams.

Another highlight of his visit was our attending a live performance of “Oklahoma” at the Bendum Theater, accompanied by my daughter Elizabeth and grand-daughter Rachael. After seeing it I concluded that “Oklahoma” must be the greatest musical of all time. Ian and I also watched the movie version, with Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones; that did nothing to reduce my opinion of the show.

I am still not certain how a grandfather is expected to behave; both of my grandfathers had died before I was born. I suspect I attempt to overcompensate for this by being overly permissive. At any rate I enjoyed his visit immensely and hope it was equally enjoyable for him.

Almost Forgotten July 18, 2019

July 18, 2019

Almost Forgotten

It was my privilege recently to attend a presentation in South Fayette’s “local authors” series which featured my brother, Joe, and his book, “Almost Forgotten”, a record of the men from the Bridgeville and South Fayette area who lost their lives while serving in the military.

He began his talk with an explanation of how the project that led to the book began. In 2004 he attended a Memorial Day weekend service at Bethany Church in which the pastor focused on honoring our ancestors. Joe commented that it would be appropriate to mention the men from the church who had lost their lives while in the service and volunteered to come up with a list of their names. The next year and every year since then these men have been remembered at Bethany on Memorial Day on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend.

While researching this group of casualties Joe quickly turned up information on numerous other local men who deserved to be honored, and he decided to extend his project to include everyone from the general Bridgeville/South Fayette area and to record their stories in a book. The book was completed in 2011 and self-published through “Author House”.

The original book includes the stories of 107 men ranging from the Civil War through the Vietnamese conflict. Since then he has learned of nine more men; they are discussed in two addenda. The book is still available for purchase at the Bridgeville Area Historical Society.

The main body of “Almost Forgotten” is divided into six sections – Civil War, World War I, World War II, Korea, the Cold War, and Vietnam. In each section the author records all the information available about the specific individual and his death, supplemented by his personal experiences interviewing family members and friends.

Nine of the eleven fatalities in the Civil War were members of Company D, 149^th Pennsylvania Volunteers. This company was organized in the Robinson Run area in August, 1862, and performed in distinguished fashion throughout the war. Similarly Company K of the First Pennsylvania Cavalry was organized a year earlier in Bridgeville and had an equally distinguished war record. Two of the local area fatalities, Richard Lesnett and Thomas Boyce, were members of Company K; Lesnett losing his life in the Cold Harbor Campaign and Boyce losing his life during the Siege at Petersburg.

The story of Company D is recorded in an excellent book compiled by one of its veterans, John W. Nesbit, published in 1906. Company K’s story also deserves to be told – it would be a constructive project ; there is considerable information available.

Twenty two area men lost their lives in World War I. For me the most poignant tale is that of Roy Purnell, a young African-American man who left his wife Viola and baby Amy and went off to France. He died there, probably from the flu epidemic, and is buried in the Oise-Asne Cemetery. After the War, the Gold Star Mothers pressured the U. S. Government to send survivors to France to visit the graves of their loved ones. In 1929 the program was approved and nearly 6,700 widows and mothers made the pilgrimage.

Unfortunately African-Americans were not included in the initial program. Enraged, Viola’s employer, Dr. Fife, responded by volunteering to pay for her passage. The photograph of her at her husband’s gravesite in France is extremely touching. Their baby grew up to become Amy Perkins, a well-known Bridgeville resident who became a Centarian before dying last year.

World War II produced sixty-two more deaths. Among the ones Joe highlighted in his talk was the very first one, Alexander Asti. He was a seaman on the USS Juneau and perished along with the five Sullivan brothers, when it was torpedoed and sunk at Guadalcanal in November, 1942. His photograph on the cover of “Almost Forgotten” is an excellent prototype for all the young men immortalized in the book – what a tragedy that they were deprived of the opportunity for a long, happy life.

Nine men died during the Korean War. Hardest for us to accept was our childhood friend and neighbor Amos Jones. He was an airman on a Navy Neptune patrol bomber that crashed in Iceland on December 17, 1953, while searching for Russian submarines. The bodies were recovered twenty-eight years later and interred at the Arlington National Cemetery.

Six men lost their lives in the period between the Korean and Vietnamese Wars, a period Joe designated as “the Cold War”. Included are two more personal friends – Dick Johnson and Sam Patton – both of whom died in accidents. In some respects illness and accidental deaths are even more tragic than those occurring in combat. Every time I see the pictures of Dick and Sam, I lament the waste of two fine young lives.

Another six young men lost their lives in Vietnam. Joe showed a Cy Hungerford cartoon that could have applied to any of the 116 men in Joe’s project. A somber Uncle Sam, hat in hand, is looking at a cross on which is inscribed “Killed in Action, Cpl. George Verdinek of Bridgeville, Pa., Age 19”. That never fails to make my eyes mist over. Uncle Sam’s comment “No teenage delinquency here!” could well be the theme of Joe’s entire project.

The entire project is extremely emotional. I am impressed that Joe is able to get through a presentation like this without breaking up. I suspect that the saving grace for him is the positive reactions he has experienced from survivors who are grateful to him for his efforts keeping the memory of their loved ones alive.

Evidence of the effectiveness of his project is the fact that this recent presentation was attended by three Lesnett descendants. It is heartwarming to realize that Richard Lesnett, who died on a hospital ship en route to Washington, D. C., from wounds received on May 28, 1864, in a large cavalry battle at Haws Shop, Virginia, is still being remembered by his kinfolk.

Joe has made a major contribution to local history by his scholarship in researching this extremely relevant subject and recording it in a book that is peppered with interesting anecdotes about the folks he met along the way.

The Coverdale Brinks Armored Car Robbery July 11, 2019

July 11, 2019

The Coverdale Brinks Armored Car Robbery

The final presentation in the Bridgeville Historical Society’s 2018/2019 program series dealt with the very first robbery of a Brink’s armored truck in history. It occurred on March 11, 1927 in Bethel Park on what is now Brightwood Road, close to its intersection with Route 88.

The speaker was Courtney Williams, a multi-talented Bethel Park High School teacher. One of her responsibilities is directing the school’s dramatic production each Fall. In 2017 she decided to write her own play, based on an actual event that had taken place in her community. The result was “The Heist”, a fictionalized version of a very significant historical event.

The actual robbery was perpetrated by a notorious Detroit gang, the Flatheads. They took their name from the physical appearance of their leader, Paul Jaworski. Newspaper photographs do indeed resemble the old Dick Tracy comic strip gangster, Flattop. According to Wikipedia Gould based the character on “Pretty Boy” Floyd; based on my perusal of the photographs, I would bet on Jaworski.

Although the Flatheads were based in Detroit and committed a number of highly publicized robberies there, they regularly came here and specialized in robing coal company payroll shipments. Apparently one or more of the gang members was a local resident who had intimate knowledge of the procedures followed by the different coal companies. In 1927 they decided to take on the challenge of robbing the payroll of the Pittsburgh Terminal Coal Company’s Coverdale mine.

The surface facilities for Coverdale mine were in the general area of what is today Industrial Boulevard in Bethel Park. Adjacent to it was one of the largest “mine patch” communities in the area, over 250 company houses. Payroll day (twice a month) was an important event in the lives on the miners.

One day earlier, on March 10, someone had broken into the powder supply house at the company’s nearby Number 3 mine at Mollenauer and stolen five hundred pounds of black powder, a battery, and a long length of electrical wire. An annoying event, whose relevance was not apparent at the time. This was an era when payroll robberies were common. The Brink’s Express Company responded by developing the ultimate delivery vehicle, the steel-sided “armored car”, an obvious descendant of the tanks used successfully in World War I.

On this day a Brink’s armored car picked up a payroll of over $100,000 at the coal company office in the Wabash Building in downtown Pittsburgh and, accompanied by a second vehicle full of guards, proceeded south to deliver its cargo to the Coverdale mine. Before it reached its destination two massive explosions threw the armored car “75 feet in the air” and deposited it upside down, with its occupants stunned. The support car was in a large cavern left by a second explosion; the guards in it were also incapable of resistance.

The robbers had buried the black powder in the roadbed and set off the explosions with a remote plunger, precisely when the two vehicles were directly over the charges. They efficiently scooped up all of the payroll envelopes, got into two getaway cars and disappeared. None of the Brink’s guards was seriously injured: one of them was able to identify the license number on one of the cars, a blue Stearns-Knight touring car.

The massive manhunt that ensued found paydirt at the farm house of Joseph Wenchoski at Ginger Hill, near Monongahela City. Following a tip from a neighbor who described Wenchoski as a strange farmer who could afford fancy cars and expensive farm machinery, but only sold three cans of milk a day, a large posse descended on his house. They apprehended Jaworski there, along with numerous items of incriminating evidence, including uncirculated currency that was identified as part of the payroll.

The Stearns-Knight getaway car was found nearby, hidden in a ravine. Eventually two buried milk cans containing about $30,000 in currency were discovered at the farm. Except for Stanley Malaskey, who was captured with Jaworski, none of the other nine gang members involved in the robbery were caught.

Included in one of the newspaper photographs of the posse at the farmhouse was Allegheny County Detective Robert L. McMillen, a well-known Bridgeville resident. I was not surprised to see him involved in this incident; McMullen figured prominently in all the law enforcement incidents in this area in the early part of the twentieth century. County detectives were quite important law officers in those days.

Five months later, while Jaworski was being held in the Allegheny County Jail, his brother Sam masterminded a daring jail break. He smuggled in five “automatic revolvers”, tossed three of them through the bars to Paul, and turned the other two on the startled guards. Retrieving the cell key from a guard he released his brother and John Vasbinder, a convicted murderer awaiting execution. In the ensuing dash to freedom two lawmen were seriously injured. The escapees drove off in a getaway car with a female driver.

Jaworski and the Flatheads’ next well publicized robbery was at the offices of the Detroit News on June 25, 1928. It netted them $14,000 and cost police Sergeant George Barstad his life. Jaworski fled to Cleveland. On September 13, 1928, he and an accomplice, Frank “Whitey” Kraft, were enjoying a meal in a restaurant when a nearby diner recognized him and notified the police.

It turns out that Jaworski had been spotted by the director of the church choir in which he had sung as a young boy. He fought his way out of the restaurant, only to be cornered in a nearby house and severely injured by a shotgun blast from a policeman. Medical personnel were able to save his life and permit him to be extradited to Pittsburgh where society finally got its justice when he was electrocuted on January 2, 1929.

Jaworski was born in Poland in 1900; his name then was Paul Poluszynski. His family came to Cleveland while he was still quite young. When his father complained that Paul’s behavior would bring dishonor to the family name, he changed his name to Jaworski.

Although Jaworski and the Flatheads are remembered for the Coverdale robbery, it was actually the third such escapade in this area. The first heist occurred on December 23, 1922, when the gang successfully intercepted the payroll for Pittsburgh Coal Company’s Harrison mine in Beadling. The paymaster had picked up the payroll at the First National Bank in Carnegie and was transporting it by automobile to Beadling. Chief Clerk John Ross Dennis was riding in front of the car on a motorcycle.

Shortly after the cavalcade reached left “the Carnegie road” and went onto Beadling Road, a single gunman shot Dennis, knocking him to the ground. He then killed him with a shotgun blast at close range. Five other bandits surrounded the car, forced its three occupants to lie face down in the road, and absconded in a getaway car with the $20,000 payroll. The case was never solved although the authorities tried to pin it on Daniel Rastelli. Initially convicted of the Dennis murder, he was eventually exonerated in a second trial. Years later Jaworski claimed responsibility for the robbery and murder.

I presume this robbery was committed on the portion of Beadling Road between its intersections with Cedar Boulevard and Gilkeson Road, close to the Mt. Lebanon Township maintenance facilities. “The Carnegie Road” was probably either a combination of Cochran Road and Cedar Boulevard or, perhaps, Swallow Hill Road, Segar Road, and Lindendale Drive. The fact that Dennis was taken to the home of Andrew Smith reinforces this presumption. “The Smith Castle”, on the hillside west of Cedar Boulevard is still a well-known landmark.

The other payroll robbery was at the Pittsburgh Terminal Coal Company’s Mollenauer mine, not far from Coverdale. It was perpetuated on December 23, 1925. Paymaster Leroy Hutton and two guards – Isaiah Gump and Francis Mahoney, picked up the payroll at the coal company’s offices in downtown Pittsburgh. Divided into two bags, it totaled $67,000. They boarded the Pittsburgh and West Virginia train at the Wabash Terminal, got off at Mollenauer, and proceeded toward the mine office.

At this point an automobile passed them, stopped, and discharged six bandits. Gump was immediately shot, the other two coal company employees thrown to the ground, and the bags of cash appropriated. The gang then jumped into their car and drove away safely. Gump died a few hours later. The case went unsolved until Jaworski claimed responsibility for the murder and robbery a few years later.

I am surprised that the overall career of Jaworski and the Flathead Gang is not better known. He claimed to have killed twenty-six men, including four policemen and his fellow jail-breaker Vasbinder. His record of evil doing matches those of “Baby Face” Nelson and “Pretty Boy” Floyd, highly publicized villains of the era. Perhaps he needed a better nickname.

The Historical Society will kick off its 2019/2020 program series on September 24, 2019 with a program by Steve Mihaly entitled “Marketing the Presidency”. This appears to be an appropriate time to compliment Program Chairperson Rosemary Kasper on another fine season of presentations.

Market Faire at Woodville Plantation July 4, 2019

July 4, 2019

Market Faire at Woodville Plantation

Most of the time when we report on current events, it is “after the fact”, and our readers frequently comment that they wish that had known about the event early enough to attend it. Consequently this week we are going to discuss a future event, one which we are eagerly anticipating.

Each summer Woodville Plantation sponsors a re-enactment of the signature event of the Whiskey Rebellion, the Battle of Bower Hill, in mid-July. This year that will take place at Woodville Plantation on July 20 and 21. We have seen this several times and can confirm that it warrants attendance.

This year however the celebration has been greatly expanded by the addition of an authentic Eighteenth Century Market Faire featuring entertainment, sutlers, craftsmen, and a menu of food appropriate for colonial times.

The sponsors of the Faire have promised that the nefarious Alexander Hamilton, portrayed by re-enactor Pete Fernbaugh, will make several appearances to encourage Federal Marshall David Lenox to ignore President Washington’s instructions and to “use whatever force is deemed necessary” to collect his hated Excise Tax. This time perhaps the rebels will do more than just hang Hamilton’s portrait upside down.

Also at the Faire will be Dr. Balthasar and his array of patent medicines designed to cure all ills. Portrayed by Ohio Historical Society interpreter Mike Follin, this “Snake Oil Salesman” hawks a magical medicine guaranteed to cure “consumption, baldness, the "summer complaint," dropsy, drunkenness and death of two weeks’ standing.”

A popular attraction at colonial market fairs were the curio (or raree) shows where travelling entertainers displayed rare and exotic artifacts (“the stones that David did not throw at Goliath) and entertainment (Punch and Judy shows). Jack and Maddie’s Turnip Wagon will re-enact this diversion at Market Faire. Children’s peepshows, marionettes, hobby horses, and occasional eighteenth-century songs are part of their repertoire.

No colonial fair would be complete without a wide variety of sutlers, vendors eager to sell their wares to the settlers attracted by the entertainment. The Midway at Market Faire will include an impressive collection of them.

Interested in a set of playing cards from the 1760s, or a Paul Revere lantern, or “fancy shoe buckles”? Be sure to visit the “Smoke and Fire” stand. The “Celtic Forge” booth will be perfect if you are interested in Celtic jewelry. The Small Canoe Trading company will offer eighteenth-century clothing and items. Products offered at other booths include pottery, bladed weapons, and leather jackets.

Don’t pass up the chance to see a legitimate period style craftsman in action. An excellent example is Master Horner “Wild Willy” Frankford, whose talents lie in scrimshaw and powder horns. Ralph Babcock will portray an eighteenth-century sutler making and selling wooden boxes and chests.

To get into the Whiskey Rebellion mood, we suggest you visit the Liberty Pole Spirits booth. Their distillery in Washington, Pa. produces seven different whiskeys including two that are authentic throwbacks to the Monongahela rye whiskeys of 1794. I wonder if they have paid Mr. Hamilton’s tax?

When you combine Market Faire with two days of re-enactment of the Battle of Bower Hill, the result is a must-see event for everyone even remotely interested in local history. Plenty of parking will be available in the ChemTech lot on the other side of the Washington Pike.