Posts Tagged hartman

For those that complain that the football field and track are too far away from the school, there was a time the field was right beside the school. I have been asking for awhile for any pictures anybody might have that show the old field at the school and am grateful for the ones I have received. If you have a picture you would like to share please email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com. So far I have three pictures that I received permission to use and would appreciate any input you may have about them.
    In the first picture you can barely see the field at the bottom of the picture but it gives us a real good idea of the location. Some of the more interesting things about this picture are not so much the field but the layout of Lincoln High School at the time. At the time of this picture, there was a whole additional three story wing of the school where the current cafeteria, maintenance garages, and the “bridge” to the large gym are today. I have to ask those that remember, what was the layout of this wing? Was it all classrooms? I know the school did not have a cafeteria but did this wing have anything comparable to the size of the current cafeteria? Was the ground floor a locker-room for Lincoln Field for both home and away teams? Finally, was there a “band” room and a room dedicated for the choir before the addition?
    Okay, back to the picture, it’s nice to see the old Hartman Elementary School building and you may notice that Holy Redeemer is not there. Where the church parking lot is today, is the former BVM Church and previous to that it was the Methodist Church.
    Now back to Lincoln Field and the second picture. This is an action shot of the 1925 Ellwood City - New Castle game. In the background of the picture you can see the steel work for Lincoln High School that was under construction. You can also see how tight the stands were as an estimated 10,000 people watched the game from the bleachers, on top of parts of the school, and on top of neighboring houses. You can also clearly see how muddy the field was for the game and why New Castle cried for many years that the Ellwood City Fire Department flooded the field to slow down New Castle. The ball carrier in the picture is New Castle’s great Scooter Day, who despite a valiant effort, was not was not able to get into the end zone against the incredible Ellwood City defense.
    In the third picture here, you get a better layout of the field. As you can see, not only did the fans of Ellwood pack the bleachers but it looks to be two to three deep along the fence. Notice the people on top of the First Christian Church watching the game too.  This was not only a football field, but it was the school’s baseball field at the time. Home plate was beyond the field goal posts in the corner of what today would be Oak Avenue and Fourth Street. You can get a little bit of a better idea of the layout of the baseball field in the first picture. In addition to baseball and football Ellwood City also added four public tennis courts to Lincoln Field in 1930.
If you remember the field and would like to share your memories, please leave a comment below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

Originally Published Sept 25, 2009

The West End School at the corner of Tenth Street and Crescent Avenue is no longer part of the Ellwood City School District but is still used as a school today. The brick building standing today was not the original school house. The original school opened in 1893 the year after Ellwood City became official. At the first West End School dedication, R. Gregor McGregor was the keynote speaker. Additional elementary schools were built throughout town as the population continued to grow until 1902 when the Central Public School was built just a couple of blocks away from the West End School at the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Sixth Street.

Tom Daransky shared with us that the original school was torn down in the early 50′s and the current building was built in the same location. He recalled attending the school until its destruction at which time all the students were sent to Hartman Elementary school until the new building was completed. Mr. Daransky also shared him memories of the school principal, Miss Cooper, for whom he spoke very highly of. Other memories involved the playground directly behind the building. We would like to hear your memories of the old school, please share your memories below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

I decided to repost one of my favorite articles on the web site. The post features a priceless snapshot in time of Ellwood City taken from 196 feet above the town sometime between 1909 and 1915. It is amazing how much has changed from then to today. There is so much in the picture it is easy to miss some of the more interesting things. I have added yellow numbers to some of the points I would like to draw your attention to in this picture, of course there is more than the twelve things I mention here and would love to hear about something I missed.
    The first point of interest I see when I look at this picture is the grand Hotel Lawrence surrounded by the majestic Oliver Park. Though it is difficult to get your bearings with this picture, we are actually looking at the side of the Hotel. The front of the Hotel formally called Hotel Oliver is the side with the large white peaks and faces down Fifth Street.
Secondly, in almost the center of the page we see the Central School building built in 1902 on the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Sixth Street. Today the Ellwood City Municipal Building is located on that lot of land with a number of memorials displayed in the front lawn. The large World War II memorial in front of the Municipal building was purchased through multiple fundraisers including donations and with the extra money that was raised for Ellwood City’s anniversary.
Number three in the picture is the Park Hotel, built 1895 and located on the North side of the Ellwood City Short Line. Today, most people don’t remember the Park Hotel and I have had a difficult time uncovering the fate of the old Hotel. Did it catch on fire from the sparks of a passing train, or was it simply torn down due to dilapidation? The fact remains that the building is no longer there but if you look the next time you drive past, one of the walls from its foundation is still standing today.
Four and Five go together, almost. Point number four is the old train station that is no longer there today and number five points to something that is actually missing from the picture, the Fifth Street Subway. The railroad you see in the picture beside the train station was the Pennsylvania Railroad, who owned Rock Point Park. The railroad through Ellwood City was known more as the Ellwood Short Line and replaced the B&O railroad that was built along the Northern bank of the Connoquenessing Creek in 1876. After the Ellwood Tunnel was completed in 1892 the railroad connecting North Sewickley & Rock Point ran through the natural plain which Ellwood City was built upon and the hilly B&O railroad was abandoned.
Ellwood City owes its birth more to the Ellwood City railroad tunnel and Beaver Falls then the more common misconception of New Castle. Ellwood’s founder H.W. Hartman was dissatisfied with the conditions in Beaver Falls where he was the head of the Beaver Falls Water Company and Hartman Steel Company.  He heard the railroad was planning to build the tunnel to bypass the slower line through Hazel Dell and put his plan for an industrial resort town into action.
The passenger station in the picture, known as the Union Station, served Ellwood City until the mid 1950’s. One text says the station was torn down as late as 1957, while another says it was torn down as early as 1955. Today, a parking lot is all that remains beside what is now the Buffalo & Pittsburgh Rail line.
Just west of the Union Station is number Six, the freight yards of Ellwood City. The large structure on the Northern side of the tracks is the B.O. Freight Station. The station was located just West of Sixth Street which was a main road at the time of the picture as the bridge connecting Ellwood City to Hazel Dell was the Sixth Street Bridge, not the Fifth as it is today. The “Hazel Dell Bridge” as it was known then connected Sixth Street and College Street. The original Fifth Street Bridge was not erected until 1915.
The B.O. Freight Station was demolished in 1982 and the property was sold to the Ellwood City Forge Group.
Our number seven point of interest is one of the few things in the picture still standing today. Point seven is the Stiefel Building on the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Fifth Street. I have yet to discover if the building was named after one of Ellwood City’s most prominent citizens, Mr. R.C. Stiefel, if he actually had the building built, or maybe he even had his offices there.
Number eight is the old tube mill more commonly known to the folks of Ellwood as “Mill B”. Originally the mill was the home of the Ellwood Shafting & Tubing Company, the first manufacturing institution to establish itself in Ellwood City as early as 1891. “Mill B” was dismantled in 1923 and the property was sold to Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad for a freight station and yard. It is hard to see it today but from Sixth Street to Blanks Concrete and Supply was nothing but P&LE spurs. Five or six lines of empty railroad lines loading and unloading freight coming into and out of Ellwood City all day long. August 25th 1981 marked the last day P&LE took a loaded boxcar, cargo from Airway Industries out of Ellwood City.
Nine is less of a specific point as it is a general area. As you can see from the picture, the West End of town was the direction of the growth in the early days of the town. The mills and businesses were more congregated at that end and most Ellwoodians thought that the town would continue to grow in that direction. In fact the first school built in Ellwood City after its founding was the West End School and the first hospitals were all located in that direction of town. It wasn’t until Ralph C. Stiefel and J.H. Nicholson left the Shelby Seamless Tube Company in 1899 and erected the Standard Seamless Tube Company (later called “Mill A”) that the town began spreading east also.
Ten is the beautiful picnic grounds of Oliver Park and the site of Ellwood City’s first murder. According to “A History of Ellwood City, Pennsylvania” James Bell was found in the park next to a tree, murdered. The victim, who had carried the mail from Ellwood City to the Belton Post Office, was also robbed as his pockets were all turned inside out. The park was a popular picnic destination (if you got permission from the Hotel) and how Park Avenue got its name.
Eleven simply points out the large farms and spread out residences that still existed in Hazel Dell. Hazel Dell originally was on both sides of the Connoquenessing until Merrit Green and Henry Hartman purchased all the farms on the South side of the creek to build Ellwood City. The roads through Hazel Dell were the old Indian trading paths from when the Shawnee & Delaware Indian tribes occupied the area. It was these tribes that actually named the Connoquenessing, which means “can’t canoe”. Hazel Dell was cut in half by the Connoquenessing and connected by the covered bridge known as the Jones Mill Bridge or White Bridge (built 1858 and razed 1898) located at the present site of the Fifth Street Bridge.
Hazel Dell did not become a borough until 1901, almost ten years after Ellwood City. The borough of Hazel Dell officially consolidated with the borough of Ellwood City in 1914.
Finally, point number twelve reminds you of the time period that the picture was taken. The buildings with no windows behind the houses are not garages, but barns. Henry Ford introduced the Model T in 1908 but didn’t begin the moving assembly lines in his factory until 1913, so there were not very many cars in the town when this picture was taken. Some of the buildings are barns, other smaller buildings are outhouses. My grandmother’s house inside Pittsburgh Circle was originally built as a boarding house for tube mill workers before indoor plumbing was the big craze on HGTV. Four bedrooms, BIG bedrooms, and no bathroom.

If you noticed something I missed or if you feel that I got something wrong, please leave a comment below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

Originally Posted February 5, 2010

    As I have already mentioned, Ellwood City owes its birth to the Ellwood City railroad tunnel, Beaver Falls, the vision and dedication of Ellwood’s founder H.W. Hartman, and hard work of men like Merritt Green. Hartman was dissatisfied with the conditions in Beaver Falls where he was the head of the Beaver Falls Water Company and Hartman Steel Company when he heard the railroad was planning to carve out the tunnel to bypass the slower line through Hazel Dell. That is when the visionary put his plan for an industrial resort town into action by building that town around the new “shortcut” line.

In the years I have had this website I have compiled little tid-bits of the big shootout in 1941 at the end of the Fifth Street Bridge between the Elwood City Police Chief Ernest Hartman and three bank robbers. I never posted them here as I didn’t have the full story. Then someone handed me a very old newspaper that contained the entire story. I was going to put it into my own words, but the reporter did all the work, he should get all the credit…

As reported by Kenneth Nevins in the Pittsburgh Press…

   A county cop and a bill collector were town heroes here (Ellwood City, PA) after they shot it out with three bank robbers, killing two and wounding the other. The cop – Police Chief Ernest Hartman, 36 – wounded the three single-handed in a gunfight at a busy street intersection, and the bill collector, Jimmy Pasta, shot one of the bandits dead on a lonely country road a short time later, as they tried to force him to aid their getaway.

    The shootings followed the robbery an hour earlier of the First National Bank at Harrisville, Butler County, when $1,072 in currency was taken along with about $2,000 in money orders and checks. Virtually all of the loot was recovered, much of it stained with blood.   Killed by Mr. Pasta was Earl Everets, 27, of Smithfield, Fayette County near Uniontown. Albert Feelo, 26, of Republic, Fayette County, wounded in the gun battle with Chief Hartman, died (the following morning) in the Ellwood City Hospital. The third bandit, Kenneth Palmer, 33, of Detroit, formerly of Volant, Lawrence County PA., where he joined in the holdup of a Volant Bank in 1930, was wounded badly and (was) near death.

    Chief Hartman was alone in his office when word was flashed that the bank bandits were headed towards Pittsburgh in a black club coupe with white wall tires, bearing Ohio plates. “I grabbed the .45 Thompson (sub-machine gun), hopped into the squad car and headed for Wampum Avenue and the Fifth Street Bridge” Chief Hartman said. “I knew that they’d come in that way if they came.”

          He hadn’t long to wait. the black coupe roared into view and screamed to a stop as the bandits sighted Chief Hartman, standing in the street, his car blocking the roadway. “I hollered for them to get out” chief Hartman said. “But I wasn’t sure of them. There were three and the car didn’t have white wall tires. So I waited.”

     The driver climbed out, and “hollered something about a fine thing stopping a car on a highway,” and the other two followed, the Chief said. “They fanned out, and that made me suspicious,” Mr. Hartman continued. “When they got within 70 feet, guns seemed to jump into their hands, and they were firing at me. “I thought, ‘If I go out I want to take some of them with me,’ so I let ‘em have it with the Tommy.” Palmer fell to the street as Chief Hartman, crouching, backed away shooting. As he stopped to reload his clip, the bandits threw Palmer into the car and sped away.

    Three miles from town, down the dusty, twisty Belton Road, hardly wide enough for one car, sped the bandit’s machine, Everets at the wheel. Struck twice in the chest with Chief Hartman’s bullets, he lost control of the car and it toppled 15 feet down an embankment stopping against a clump of saplings. Mrs. Laura Kash of Ellwood City driving from Beaver Falls with a friend, Angelo DeCarbo, saw the crash.  “We stopped and I got out and hollered. ‘Anybody hurt?’” Mrs. Kash related. “The one fellow standing turned around and he had a gun. He pointed it at me and said ‘Get down here’.” The frightened woman obeyed only to have a 30.30 rifle poked in her side as she and Mr. DeCarbo were ordered to carry the two wounded men from the overturned car. Mrs. Kash told police: “He said ‘Hurry.’ and I said ‘How did he expect a woman to lift a man?’ and he said ‘Shut up and lift.’” “And,” said Mrs. Kash explosively, “did I lift!”     Meanwhile, rookie Policeman Ed Shaffer, on the force regularly only a week, and in plain clothes, reached the scene of the original shooting. He asked Mr. Pasta to drive him after the bandit’s car. As Mrs. Kash and her friend helped the wounded men to the road, Officer Shaffer and Mr. Pasta arrived. They were “covered” at once by Everets, who ordered them to aid in putting the injured two into the DeCarbo car.

    “They said all seven of us couldn’t ride in that old car.” recalled Mr.Pasta. “I’ve read enough gangster stories to be plenty scared by that.” He watched as Palmer and Feelo were placed in the rear seat. Then Everets put the rifle on Palmers lap,” Mr. Pasta said, “and walked around to the driver’s side.”

    “The car was between us and I figured it was now or never,” Mr. Pasta said. “I grabbed the gun from Palmer and pointed it at Everets. He made a move like he was going for a gun and I fired through the window at him. He fell over the hill.” “Then Ed (Shaffer) jumped one of the other two and I jumped the other. Palmer clouted Ed in the eye with a wrench and hit me on the head with it, but we subdued ‘em.” “Then I climbed down the hill where Everets was moving, trying to get up. I hit him over the head with a gun and he passed out.” At a morgue, Everets was pronounced dead of a bullet wound through the neck and two slugs in his chest from Chief Hartman’s machine gun.

     Chief Hartman, after wounding the bandits, took another road to head them off and arrived at the Belton Rd. shooting scene after Everets had been killed and the other desperadoes subdued. Three pistols taken from the bandits showed a dozen shots had been fired, presumably at Chief Hartman who said he “never even heard ‘em come close.” In a golf bag in the luggage compartment of the car, three other pistols were found. Police are checking gun numbers to link the bandits possibly with the robbery of a New Castle hardware store a week earlier. The car the men used was stolen from Cleveland, Ohio and had been riddled in a dozen places with bullet holes from Chief Hartman’s fusillade.

     Both Palmer and Feelo admitted they took part in the Harrisville robbery. Feelo died of his wounds in his back and in his abdomen. Palmer’s legs were almost literally “cut to pieces” by bullets. It was the third robbery of the Harrisville bank in five years, police said, and the second shooting affray in two years for Officer Hartman who was elevated to the Chief’s job a year earlier after serving 11 years on the force. Two years earlier, a burglar exploded a tear gas gun hidden up his sleeve, when surprised by Chief Hartman, and was shot to death, although Mr. Hartman was blinded by the gas.

    According to State Motor Police, the bandit trio first joined forces as inmates of the Rockview Penitentiary near Bellefonte, PA. Everets and Feelo were serving terms for robbery. Palmer was serving a seven-year sentence for participation in the Volant National Bank robbery. Because the Harrisville bank was a Federal Depository, agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation were sent here as soon as word of the stick-up and capture was flashed.     Thousands of motorists jammed the dusty Belton Road to inspect the scene of the killing.

It was later reported in a December 1941 edition of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette that the sole surviving bank robber was convicted in US District Court. Kenneth George Palmer was found guilty on three counts of armed bank robbery and transporting stolen firearms across state lines. He was charged of robbing the Harrisville First National Bank and a bank patron of $1,042.

Palmer, who still showed the effects of having his knees riddled with bullets, denied participating in the robbery.

Shortly after the case came to closeure, Chief Ernie Hartman retired.

       The current Hartman Elementary School is located on the same property as the original school at the corner of Fourth Street and Crescent Avenue. The school sits upon property that was once Oliver Park that surrounded the Hotel Lawrence. The hotel and land were sold in 1915 to the Ellwood City school board and converted to a school building and apartments until it was torn down in 1925 to make room for the newly planned civic center that included Lincoln High School, Hartman Elementary School, a public library and more. Unfortunately half was through the massive project, the great depression hit and the civic center was cancelled due to the lack of money needed for a project so large.

When it came to naming the new elementary school and the high school, it was decided to put it to a vote. It was decided by the vote to name the high school Lawrence but was later changed to Lincoln High School and the elementary was named after the towns founder Henry W. Hartman. The original Hartman Elementary School was finished before the new high school and classes started in 1923.

For a number of years the school was alongside the baseball field and attached football field. These fields were moved to Ewing Park when the High School was expanded and a parking lot was added. Those that went to the original Hartman School remember that parking lot as their playground for recess and gym classes. The school had a unique playground to say the least. It had a very big metal swing set, metal slides, eight foot high metal monkey bars, a big metal jungle gym; all on blacktop.

I have only been in the new modern school once or twice but I remember Hartman with the old creaky floors, coat rooms, and eight foot wooden heavy doors. In a previous post, we were told by Cheryl Franus that when she started teaching there was a room in the basement of that school that was full of food supplies, gas masks, bedding, etc, all marked appropriately with the triangular design of the Civil defense and the fallout shelters.

When the Ellwood City School Board decided to tear down the original building and build a new school the current students were displaced to the other elementary schools in the district with the large majority attending the previously closed Ewing Park School. We would like to hear your memories of your time at Hartman. Whether it be the teachers, the intimidating hall ways, the art/music room, dungeon of a cafeteria anything; we would like to hear your memories. Please share below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

I forgot to mention the orange and gray gym. I went to that school two or three years and only remember going into that gym ten times at the most and half of those times were for class pictures and Santa’s workshop.

Originally Published 12-22-08

Standard Engineering began operations in Ellwood City in 1902 at the corner of Second Street and Park Avenue. A Subsidiary of the Standard Steel Car Company from Butler, PA the Ellwood works had previously been the Baker Forge-Hardware Company.
     Built 1894, the Baker Forge-Hardware Company was located east of Second Street and stretched from Franklin Avenue to the railroad tracks. The company that had been originally a partnership between J.H. Baker and H.W. Hartman manufactured wagon hardware until being replaced with the manufacturing of railroad steel car forgings. When Standard Steel Car Company took over, the name was changed to the Steel Car Forge Company until 1929 when the name was changed again to the Standard Steel Car Company, Steel Car Forge Division.

It was reported in a 1916 Pittsburgh Gazette that the Steel Car Forge Company was the largest plant of its kind on the North American continent. They manufactured rolling and tube mill machinery, pipe threading machines, sand rolls and high grade gray iron castings. The black and white picture was taken from the Peerless Lead Glass Company at the eastern end of Park Avenue while the color picture appears to have been taken from the former ground of the Ellwood Brick Company.

In the first fourteen years of business, the Steel Car Forge reportedly knew no bad times and continually employed six hundred men. This time even included a strike at the Butler facility of the Standard Steel Car Company where one man was fatally shot when police opened fire into the hostile protestors. On July 19, 1909, an estimated 500 Employees of Standard Wheel Company joined the Standard Steel Car Companies 2,500 Strikers in Butler and things got violent. As mentioned, police fired into the crowd killing one, wounding two and ten others were hurt. Even during all this, the Ellwood works continued to produce.

     Standard Engineering considered Ellwood City an ideal place for great manufacturing with an unlimited supply of working people and free from labor trouble. The town’s water and electricity were considered very cheap and it also had what they regarded as a first class fire protection. Ellwood also had the freight service of four great railroad systems with Pittsburgh rates and the additional advantages of no extra charges for transfer.

When times were difficult for other industries, it seemed to have no effect upon the Steel Car Forge Co. Its product, if nothing else had already made Ellwood City famous, would have attracted the eyes of the world to our community because of its being at the very top of the world’s industries. The Steel Car Forge was often referred to as a “mechanical blacksmith shop” operating on a tremendously larger scale. It performed blacksmith work but entirely by machinery. In the early part of the century, the Steel Car Forge Works produced forgings for freight cars and also a general line of forgings for all railroad and for special purposes. Standard typified, as perhaps no other industry could, the progress that had been made by the beginning of the twentieth century.
In May 1934 the Pullman Company ceased operations in Ellwood City and moved all the machinery worth keeping to the Butler facility of the Pullman-Standard Car Manufacturing Company and the property sat empty until 1939 when the property was purchased by a company you might have heard of, the National Tube Company.

      The single story stone and brick building on the corner of Ninth Street and Lawrence Avenue has one of the most storied histories in Ellwood City. Originally built as a two story stone building, it housed the Pittsburg Company Offices and was officially named the Bank Building of the Pittsburg Company. The second story housed the offices of the company Hartman used to build his town. The first floor was home to the First National Bank of Ellwood City which was organized in 1892. Many of the young town’s most influential men were at one time or another involved in the bank including J.H. Gelbach, president; H. S. Blatt, vice-president, and former board of directors’ members Frank Moore and Captain A.C. Grove.
      The Ellwood City Ledger would later operate out of the stone building, but expansion was necessary. A brick addition was added to the east side and rear (south) of the building. Additional office space was added out the East side and in 1963 the second story of the original building was removed.
      The giant safe of First National Bank is still located inside the Ledger building today but was sealed shut for many years as no one had the combination to open it. When the safe was finally cracked open, to everyone’s disappointment nothing of significant value was found inside.

North Side School has by far had more memories shared on this web site than any other elementary school in the area. On the post North Side Elementary School Class Pictures, we had a number of people that shared their rich memories. Instead of writing my own post, I am just going to quote some memories and share some new pictures.

      Quoting R. Scott Mackey: “North Side Elementary was…in a time and place where fundamental values were taught both by rote and by example, and we who were fortunate enough to live within this atmosphere became better adults because of the association.”
-R. Scott Mackey: I recall having attended North Side Elementary from approximately October 1954 when I transferred into second grade from Hartman Elementary until June 1959 upon ‘graduation’ from sixth grade. I believe students rotated classrooms while teachers were stationary and taught either general subjects through grade four and their specialty subjects for grades five and six. The teachers I can recall from that era were:
Mrs. (Lorraine) Battersby (2nd grade), Mrs. Wilson (3rd grade),  Miss (Julie ?)Kelly (4th grade / Health), Mrs. (Estelle) Franz (5th grade / Geography), Miss Calvert (Art), Miss (Blanche) Shively (6th grade / Homeroom / English), Mr. (Joseph) Lanzi (6th grade / History / Geography), Miss (Josephine) Hartzell (Principal)
Beyond academics, the massive wintertime snowball fights between 5th and 6th graders which turned the grounds into a veritable war zone at lunchtime were most memorable.
-Jim Hardie: This time of the year brings back memories of the Christmas plays held each year by the N. S. pupils. It was always a time of excitement for not only the actors but also the audience. I remember one year when “Joseph” fainted and tumbled down on the manger propelling the baby doll “Jesus” to fly out of his bed and into the air. …
-Dave Larson: I remember…
- Saying the “Pledge of Allegiance” every morning
- Exchanging valentines…I must have given Brenda Snare at least a 1,000
- Snowball fights…back outside when the streetlights went on…to fight again!
- Going home for lunch…that in itself may have made the values take hold
- President Eisenhower’s photograph displayed proudly in your home room
I remember Mrs. Wilson. To this day I will never be caught without a handkerchief.
I remember Mrs. Calvert. How could you forget someone who told you that you could draw?
       Jim Hardie: Miss Calvert … I think it was this time (December) in 1956 when she had us all come to school in the evening to have a Christmas party. We met and walked around caroling for a while until we crossed the 5th Street Bridge and walked to our principal’s (Miss Hartzell) apartment. We started singing and she came out on her balcony to greet us. The snow began in earnest on our walk to her house and on our return everything was covered with a new layer of snow and the storm kept on all evening. The lights of the bridge were beautiful in their turn -of- the- century style covered with snow. Like a postcard.
-Chris Pavkovich: What a school! Floors that creaked, no air conditioning, and a gym that echoed to high heaven and flooded during rain spells. I remember the kick ball tournaments toward the end of the year, spinning on the merry go around immediately after lunch until we were sick, and the old basketball courts (at one time this was the place to play).
-Quoting R. Scott Mackey again: I offer my thanks to those now departed who provided the examples which we learned and by which we still live in the present day. Hopefully, we have all had the opportunity and the sense of responsibility to pass along those same values to the generations who succeeded us.
We all would enjoy hearing any memories you may have of attending North Side Elementary School. Please share your memories below or email me at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com.

          I was talking to a young man that is in the fifth grade about what he thought about going to Hartman “Intermediate School” this year instead of North Side Elementary as he did last year. His biggest complaint was the different playgrounds. I agreed, there was a big difference, but I told him “Back in my day…”, you know, etc. etc.
I have never been on Perry’s Elementary school’s playground but have heard from former students that claim it was the largest recess area of all the schools. I will have to take their word for it as I said I have never seen it, but I have heard of the big field behind the former Wayne Elementary School that also had two playgrounds. Another school with an exceptionally large recess area was the former Walnut Ridge Elementary school as its yard was bigger than the school itself. As a kid, I remember having little league baseball practice there and we would not even come close to disturbing anyone who was playing on the playground at the time.

I was also fortunate enough to attend the old North Side Elementary school when the yard was located where the current school stands. The field behind the school was big enough to have a game of kickball going on at one end and a game of football at the other end. The flat field was big enough that when you were down at the other end, it felt like you were no longer even at school. All of a sudden you were just out playing with friends in a field.

The yard at Ewing Park Elementary School at one time had a slide and swing set, but little else except grass. Kickball and tag were the more common games played at recess. From what I have heard, another popular game at Ewing Park School was “chase the ball across the road”.

Then we get to Hartman Elementary School. Not the fancy state of the art one that stands today, but I am talking about the original one that had coat rooms, old wooden creaky floors and eight foot wooden heavy doors. That school had a unique playground to say the least. It had a very big metal swing set, metal slides, eight foot high metal monkey bars, a big metal jungle gym; all on blacktop. Ahh, just what every kid wants, to have recess in a parking lot. At least the modern school today has a grassy area, it’s only 8 foot by 8 foot, but there is grass. Today, Holy Redeemer is the only school where the children scrape knees and elbows and occasionally rip a pair of pants playing on blacktop. At least the playground equipment at Holy Redeemer is not bent and crooked from cars backing into them as was usually the case at Hartman.

We have heard from a couple of you about the playground at the former North Side School, but we would like to hear your memories. Please share your memories of recess in Ellwood below or email us at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

      The First United Methodist Church was organized one year after Henry W. Hartman founded Ellwood City. The land for the church on Fourth Street and Park Avenue was donated by Hartman’s organization, the Pittsburg Company. After only twenty-five years, the building became inadequate for the number of members that attended the church. On August 2, 1925 the church acquired prime real estate in the young town on Crescent Avenue between Fourth and Fifth Street. The original building along Park Avenue was sold to the Blessed Virgin Mary Roman Catholic Church.

    The United Methodist Church is under the direction of the Reverend James A. Cannistraci and continues to be a presence in the community.
The Cub Scouts of America have used the basement of the church as their den for years and I look forward to the Wednesday’s during the winter as the church offers some of the best homemade soup for lunch.
If you have a story you would like to share about the Methodist Church in Ellwood City, please share your memories below or email us at info@ellwoodcitymemories.com

    The enormous house at 301 Fountain Avenue was not quite as large as the Stiefel home less than a block away, but was still referred to as the “southern mansion” of Ellwood City. The nickname may have had more to do with the ornamental ironwork on the flat roof of the house and the railing on the front porch roof similar to the large estates in the southern states.
The house was the home of John Gelbach, who was considered the most powerful man in Ellwood City not involved in the tube mills. He was part of the group that controlled First National Bank of Ellwood City and part of the group that purchased the assets of the Pittsburg Company in 1905 after its head man and Ellwood’s founder, Henry Hartman moved to Denver. The assets of the Pittsburg Company at the time included the power company, water company, the short line railroad and the hotel company, all of which Mr. Gelbach guided until 1933. He was very active in the First Presbyterian Church and one of the organizers of the Ellwood City Country Club.
If you would like to share something either about the house, the current owners and renovations they are making, any of the other folks that have owned the house since the Gelbach’s, or about Mr. Gelbach himself, we would love to hear from you. Please leave a comment below or email us your memories by CLICKING HERE. Don’t forget to mention the “prize” lamp in the large picture window at Christmas time.
Information for this post was gathered from the book Ellwood City Houses and the People Who Lived in Them by Charles R. Moser available at the Ellwood City Historical Society.