Other Times
100 Years Ago – 1917: Bees have eaten their way into one the chime tower of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church at Broad and Madison streets. Quite an army of bees have infested the top piece of the ornate structure by boring through the concrete. The work of the bees is plainly visible from the street and will be given immediate attention in order to prevent further destruction.
75 Years Ago – 1942: Attention, First Warders! Your scrap will be collected tomorrow. Have it on the curb tonight ready for the trucks. If you wish, take it to your designated depot or school yard. If you have heavy scrap that you cannot handle, call 4258 and arrangements will be made. First Ward Boundaries – Upland Borough, Nether Providence Township, Ridley river and line running from Welsh Street and Upland Avenue east to Edgmont avenue, north to Sixteenth Street, then east to Ridley river near foot of Eighteenth Street.
50 Years Ago – 1967: The driver of a stolen truck escaped on foot early Sunday after the truck stalled and the engine burst into flames, ruining the vehicle. Swarthmore Borough police said the truck, which had been stolen earlier in Avondale, Chester County, stalled about 2:15 a.m. and was being driven eastbound on Baltimore Pike, near Cedar Lane. Springfield police spotted the flames but when they reached the vehicle the driver had fled on foot. Springfield Fire Co. extinguished the flames.
25 Years Ago – 1992: A Secane family was awakened rudely yesterday by a Cadillac Eldorado that plowed across their front lawn and through the front wall of their home. Geraldine Nau, 67, of the 1100 block of Providence Road, was spared any injury. Her son John, 26, sustained cuts from glass scatted throughout the first floor of the house. “I always wanted a Cadillac,’ she joked later as she assessed the damage. According to Upper Darby police, the driver’s brakes failed as he was traveling south on Bishop Avenue, hitting a traffic signal before crashing into the Nau house.
10 Years Ago – 2007: Middletown Council unanimously approved a final land development plan of PML Associates for Paul and Margaret Linvill’s Linvilla Orchards property on West Knowlton Road. The plan shows extensive enhancements and additions to the family-run farm property, including rebuilding the octagonal barn. The Linvills’ conditional-use application to expand a nonconforming use also was approved, but not unanimously. Voting disapproval was Councilman Douglas Roger Jr., who said it could not support it unless proposed rebuilt landmark octagonal barn is “a true replication” of the historic structure that was there.