Posts Tagged Carroll

     This picture is part of a collection once owned by Harry W. Horton, Assistant Borough Engineer under Alex Main from 1920-1925. Most of the pictures show Ellwood City in an important stage of its development as it was getting more of the town out of the mud in the years following World War I.
    This picture is the North end of original Fifth Street Bridge looking West down Wampum Avenue. The house on the right as you are looking at the picture with the clothes hanging out back was once the home of Ellwood City Ledger’s Louise Carroll. Her mother rented the house in the 1940′s when it was owned by Madison Maine.
We have not had a lot of luck uncovering the business that was inside the building on the left at the very end of the bridge. Further down Wampum Avenue across from the house on the right, Morini’s built their neighborhood store. Some of the homes still remained from this picture into the 1940′s as Mrs. Carroll remembers that one of the small houses was still standing and a lonely older lady lived in one. She still has memories of her mother baking homemade bread and occasionally would take her a loaf.
    If you look closely at the picture, there a couple of odd things that kind of stand out, at least to us. The sidewalk on the bridge is paved and looks very fancy, especially since the main roads leading to and from the bridge are all still dirt roads. Another thing that stands out is the rooftop next to the business at the end of the bridge. The building looks to large to be an outhouse but we don’t know what else it could be. The dirt road just seems to drop off into the building also. Like we said, odd.
    If you see something else we missed, please leave a comment below or email us at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

    The house at 414 Division Avenue doesn’t look to peculiar from the street except that it has two front doors from being transformed into a duplex. However, once you see a glimpse from the side, you notice that the building stretches back forty yards to the alley. Some might recall seeing two large delivery trucks with big bold letters stating “Mrs. Smith’s Noodles” parking inside the garage doors at the rear of the building.
    Considered one of the strongest businesses in Ellwood City, the Mrs. C.H. Smith Noodle Factory at 414 Division Avenue was considered among  National Tube Co. and Mathews Conveyor as the business leaders of Ellwood City. Employing all women (except the truck drivers) Mrs. Smith mass produced one of the tastiest noodles of its time. Unfortunately, her secret ingredient – wheat from Russia, is what also forced the Noodle factory to close during World War II.
    The Noodle Factory was the first company to put their noodles in “kerosene bags” (clear plastic polyethylene bags) and sold their product to the many corner grocery stores in town and beyond to neighboring states. Mrs. C.H. Smith started the business in 1921 after developing the recipe herself. The business thrived for many years and was one of the few businesses that actually grew during the Great Depression. Mrs. Smith Noodles continued to grow and plans were made to enlarge the business and go national with their special noodle, until June of 1941. That summer, Hitler invaded Russia and Mrs. Smith was unable to get her special wheat. The business came to a standstill until finally closing sometime after 1942.
    If you recall these noodles or have any memories of Mrs. Smith or the house at 414 Division Avenue, please leave a comment below or email us at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com. We would like to thank Louise Carroll for all of this information that we got from the terrific article she wrote for the Ellwood City Ledger.

    Louise Carroll wrote an article in the Ellwood City Ledger in June of 2009 about an area sports team that was crowned State Champions and exactly the kind of story this sight was started for.
    In 1959, the Medusa Eagles finished third in the world at the World Slow Pitch Championship Tournament held in Cleveland, Ohio after the team won the Pennsylvania State Championship. When the team won the State Championship, they were known as the Chewton Slow Pitch team but became the Medusa Eagles from Wampum when Medusa Cement sponsored the team for the world championship games.
    The team consisted of Dick Allen, Ron Allen, Al Baker, Jim ‘Cat’ Cipro, Chuck Dombeck, Clarence Freer, Wendell Goatley, Gary Guy, Henry Hajec, Willie ‘Sonny’ King, Bob Kosior, Dave Kosior, Lou Kosior, Dom Suppa, and Kenny Tillia. Bob ‘Lefty’ Kosior, who had a heart problem and couldn’t play himself, served as the manager of the team.  Another Dick Allen was also a player and would help manage the team when needed.
    The team originally played their home games in a pasture field on Snake Run Road before moving to the field in the center of Chewton. The team members were responsible for maintaining the field themselves including keeping the grass cut and the up-keep on the back stop. As you may remember, the field is a large square and there was a time they had to turn the whole field around because foul balls kept hitting a nearby house. The team did not practice a lot as they played three or more games a week.
    Mrs. Carroll interviewed a couple of the players, in particular ‘Sonny’ King. “We were competitors. We went to win,” King told Carroll “We played three games a day to qualify and it was Memorial Day weekend and it was hot. A team from Gastonia, N.C., beat us, I’ll never forget that.” Chuck Dombeck recalled “Everyone had way better uniforms than we did, there were teams there sponsored by Proctor & Gamble, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and Hamilton Glass and big corporations like that.” Teams may have looked better than the boys from Chewton, but very, very few played better.
    1959 was the second time the Chewton Slow Pitch Team competed at the World Championships. In 1958, the team, including Ralph ‘Red’ Mohr, John Schotch and Jim Ferrante, finished fourth in the world at the tournament. When Louise Carroll asked, “the men said they believe sports were so popular in Wampum because there wasn’t anything else to do but play baseball and basketball”. “They also agreed that they played because they loved to compete and loved the game.”
    Our gratitude goes out to Louise Carroll for writing an excellent article and giving this great team the attention it deserves. If you would like to leave a personal memory about this team or any of its players, please leave a comment below or email us by CLICKING HERE.