Other Times
100 Years Ago – 1917: Samuel R. Bell, contractor and builder, says that the crossing at 11th Street and Edgmont Avenue is one of the most dangerous in Chester. Yesterday, he and his son, Samuel, Jr., had a narrow escape from being killed by a fast-moving trolley car striking their automobile. Since they installed the double track on Edgmont Avenue between Ninth and Twelfth streets, the dangers at Eleventh street have been increased.
75 Years Ago – 1942: A tiny woman, sitting in a heatless house last night, told how she tried to give the government $2,000 “because they need it to win the war.” Mrs. Mary Taylor, 38, of Aston Mills, who works hard every day in the Yorkshire Mills and lives in a three-room “company house,” lost her husband, Raymond W. Taylor, 41, in May when the oil tanker on which was a messman was torpedoed. The War Shipping Administration in November sent her a check for $5,100, representing War Risk Insurance, and a few weeks ago, received $2,000 of the money back from Mrs. Taylor. Flabbergasted, the War Shipping Administration replied that they could not accept the money, and, thanking Mrs. Taylor of her patriotism, suggested that she buy War Bonds with it.
50 Years Ago – 1967:
Tentative plans to extend the Media Bypass westward into Chester County and to relocate portions of Route 202 were disclosed Thursday night by the Delaware County Planning Commission.
25 Years Ago – 1992: One of the 19 tenants displaced from apartments on Sproul Street in Chester deemed “firetraps” by city officials during a crackdown on buildings lacking a certificate of occupancy learned firsthand the brightest and darkest sides of human nature yesterday. In the morning, she was told that a second benefactor had paid the bill for her family to stay the MiniMotel in Media for three more days.
In the afternoon, the news arrived that someone had broken into her condemned apartment and taken her gold chains, her children’s bicycles and her best clothes.
10 Years Ago – 2007: Bob Preston, a founder of the Delaware County Literacy Council and tutor trainer for more than 30 years, has been named one of the Philadelphia Eagles’ 10 outstanding volunteers for 2007. The Eagles feted Preston and his fellow honorees Dec. 18, at the team’s annual Community Quarterback Award ceremonies at the NovaCare Center.