Today I got to see photographs that I never knew existed. We had read letters my late father in law had sent home during World War II, but we never saw the photos, because like most veterans, he never really spoke about it. He came home in one piece, he put this away and went to college on the GI Bill and started his life.
My father was too young to have been a World War II vet. He was just a little boy when World War II was being fought. I had friends whose fathers were World War II veterans, but looking through these photos was like looking through a History Channel program on World War II.
When you look at the photos, and I never knew really before this, that my late father in law liked to take photos as much as I do.
So this was his world, then. I found it very moving. And it really makes you think about what these boys (because they were boys and they were often teenagers) did and how many never came home.
This prompted me to think about the world we live in today and the things you see people protesting about and how they even behave on social media, and they don’t even realize that these were some of the young men who fought for them to maintain those rights to do so.
This was a part of time that my late father-in-law put away, so I couldn’t ask him how many of these friends of his came home from his unit or battalion, or whatever you want to call it, because I saw these photos for the first time posthumously. This is something my late friend Anna would have found fascinating, because her late father was also a World War II vet.
This gives us all a sober reminder of what people fought for around the world then, so so many others including politicians could act like idiots today.
I guess this is what we call perspective. This is yet another reason to me why this upcoming election is so important. We also can’t let down the memories of these people who fought and bled through the entirety of the history of our country so we could be free and live free.
We can’t really tell the stories of all of these unknown young men staring out at the harsh reality of a world war as teenagers in the 1940s, but we can damn well respect their memory by making sure we vote. And if that means some of you have to secretly scurry into a voting booth and vote for a Democrat for president because you know as a Republican, your choice is repugnant, just get to it. Vote in memory of these young men captured in a moment in time, vote for your sons and daughters today.
After all, this is why we vote, and why it’s so important. We vote to ensure that the horrible atrocities of the past don’t come forward again into the present and future.
I told my readers a while back that I recently lost a friend I have had since I was 11 years old. At that time I hadn’t really been sure how to talk about it and I still don’t know quite how to talk about it but I know I need to. I need to process this loss and write it out.
It has been about a month and I miss my friend Anna.
Although as middle-aged adult women, we were thousands of miles apart, we were only ever a phone call or text message away.
We’re all getting to that age where occasionally we get the calls that someone is gone and when that someone is someone who’s been in your life since you were 11 years old, where do you go in your head?
The memories are still flying at a fast and furious pace. She and I met at the Tennis Farm at Shipley in Bryn Mawr. We were Mrs. P’s worst tennis players ever but she loved us just the same.
She was the reason I went to Shipley.
And throughout the years we were still connected to each other. That’s a gift until you realize that they’re not ever going to call you again.
I realize that it was just her time on this planet was finished, and now I have another angel watching me. But still…So many memories.
I remember JDA and SDA. The Junior and Senior Dancing Assemblies, respectively. They were held at the Merion Tribute House in Merion, and for all the years that we had to go down there our parents got lost either coming or going, every single time. These were the young people special events that they sent us to in those days to learn manners, and how to interact with the opposite sex and dance, and be polite and politely social. And it was managed onsite by this harridan in a gold lamé dress with a bullet bra named Mrs. Farber. And we can’t forget her 10 pounds of Aquanet that kept her hair in place.
We used to love the breaks the bands took when we would sit in the seating areas in this gorgeous old house with our friends, David and Kurt, and put stale pretzels down the heating vents, giggling the whole time. We lost our friend David a couple of years ago to a freak hit and run accident in Florida. Oh, and did I mention these events were black tie? I think we were what in 8th grade when we started attending? Because of these dances, for a few years I felt like I had a lifetime supply of crinkly taffeta skirts.
Other memories I have are like taking the Paoli Local to Philadelphia, and going to the Rusty Scupper in Society Hill for lunch on weekends once in a while. Or Pizzeria Uno.
Or walking up Morris Avenue, (when you could still do that safely) into Bryn Mawr, and going to KatyDid and the bookstore next-door to look for Christmas presents.
Or going to the movies. We went to lots of movies. I saw every Star Wars movie with her until we became adults and every James Bond movie. And it is because of her that I experienced the Rocky Horror Picture Show at midnight at the Bryn Mawr Movie Theatre for the first time as a teenager.
The Devon Horse Show… when it was still old school Devon. We bought our first antique prints from the print lady who was there once upon a time. We hunted for treasures at the Bryn Mawr Hospital Thrift Shop booth and had Devon fudge when the carefully guarded recipe was still made properly and had lemon sticks and greasy Devon burgers.
Flash forward to mini term in Italy senior year of Shipley. The hotel they put us in when we got to Venice at the end of the trip was called the Hotel Canal. It was all hard surfaces and there was this little German kid with his parents there who is about five and the kid was the devil and his name was Damian. We got a total giggle out of that. This is of course the hotel that Anna famously sprained her ankle in because she bought really high heels at one of the bazaars I think in Florence. She wanted to wear them to dinner and stumbled. Miraculously, she did not really do anything other than a sprain. It was just a slight sprain, and nothing was broken, but you know bruised egos a teenage girl. Amusingly the hotel is still in existence and sounds like it hasn’t changed since we were there.
On this trip, the students got shoved in the lesser hotels and hostel type situations and the alumnae traveling with us got the good hotels. To this day I think our parents probably paid for the alumnae to sit in good hotels.
The best place on that trip was the Pensione Adria in Florence. And that was the place were another classmate who passed away around COVID19, who flooded the room she was staying in with people by not paying attention to where the shower was running that was in the room.
In Rome, we were in a convent, and I think it was called the Sisters of Atonement. It was right near Vatican City. And we went to a private mass which was about 100 people on Ash Wednesday that year, because my father’s Saint Joe’s Prep friend, the late Cardinal John Foley, arranged it. It was our Pope encounter, Pope John Paul II and it was pretty memorable. He was right there blessing us all with holy water. And we were pretty close to the Pope. I still remember how serene his face was. In today’s world, I don’t think we would have been allowed to get that close.
But I don’t want everything I’m writing to be sad, but I’m honestly just sad right now because I just wasn’t expecting this. Death is not kind and death is not a gentle thing and sometimes we have advanced warning that somebody’s leaving, but a lot of times we just don’t.
I had a memory again last night about one time when we were in high school, and she wanted us to go to this kid’s toga party in Bryn Mawr. She even made herself a toga out of a bedsheet, but I refused to wear a toga. It was winter and so freaking cold and I think even snowy. We went to the house we knocked on the door. The door opened and 100° heat came pouring out because it was the middle of winter along with a female underclasswoman, chasing her (we guessed) at that point ex boyfriend screaming crying (this couple was all drama all of the time) ….both attired in bed sheet togas. I looked at my friend Anna and I asked if she really wanted to go to this party and she looked at me, shook her head, and we got back in the car and left.
Then there was the Super Bowl party for the Eagles. We went to a party on Fishers Road in Bryn Mawr. A nice guy who was a neighbor of sorts to me, and we knew absolutely no one there because he and his friends went to like Archbishop Carroll, Saint Joe’s Prep, and all the Catholic schools that we didn’t know anyone at. The Eagles lost. Our first Super Bowl party was a bust. And ironically, I have gone to very few since.
And then there was the Phillies when they won the world championship in the fall of 1981. All of our friends were cutting school to go to the parade and we weren’t allowed.
Then there all the adult memories. Calling to tell me her father had died. Eulogizing her mother at their church the day of the funeral. Texting each other at Christmas when we would watch Hallmark Christmas movies and text each other about which ones we liked.
Essentially, I have almost 50 years worth of memories with this woman. I hadn’t seen her in several years at this point, but we were still connected. She was one of the first people we told after my mother and sister when my husband and I got engaged.
We have these people in our lives, and there is that saying it’s something like people are in your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. She was a lifetime person, and it just wasn’t enough time. A lot of you reading this, are classmates and other friends of mine who didn’t know Anna. And I am sorry that you didn’t. To those of us, who did, she will forever be our Anna banana. And we loved her.
If I hadn’t met her, there are so many of I never would have met, including my husband.
So here’s to Anna. Thanks for all of the years of friendship.
Anna Klauder Nupson, 61 of Ribera, NM died June 24, 2024 after a brief illness at home.
Anna grew up in Bryn Mawr, PA and graduated from the Shipley School in 1981. She went onto Amherst College in Amherst, MA where she graduated in 1985 with a Bachelor of Arts in American/United States Studies and Civilization.
Among the happiest years of her life were spent between Shipley and Amherst. She had a deep appreciation and reverence of American history and the theater arts. While in high school she was active in theater productions and after college she was a member of the Footlighters Theater in Berwyn, PA as well as being part of the Windsor Court Players, which was based in Narberth, PA out of Narberth Presbyterian Church and founded by a close friend and classmate from Shipley.
Anna eventually decided she wished to move to an area of the United States, for which she had a special affinity. This was the beautiful and majestic American Southwest. Anna’s mother was a native New Mexican who was born in Clovis. Anna purchased a modest ranch and settled in Ribera.
Anna embraced New Mexico with her whole heart and soul and loved the wild beauty of her adopted state. She settled into ranch life, and also loved creating a life which was also full of rescuing dogs and horses.
Anna is survived by her family and friends, who mourn the loss of a gentle soul who has gone home to God far too soon. Anna will be forever loved and missed.
Now a lot of people know Barry from various things, including great balloon rides and West Vincent Township. But what people don’t realize is that for many years he was on the radio. So he and WCHE have gotten together and he’s got this new show.
He has had many interesting guests so far, and one of the things I am most amused about are the elected officials of both political persuasions and candidates who ghost him or hide because he has offered them time to come on the air, and not have gotcha moments, but talk about what they’re about and what they’ve done.
Today they also had Neil Young the latest history teacher in Chester County running for office. He is running against Chrissy Houlahan for the 6th District Congressional seat. I was laughing because he came on after my segment, and he remarked that I think I was like the first thing his family saw when he announced he was running. I may have been giggling and posted a comparison to Pee Wee Herman’s haircut, and his because his old haircut did look like he borrowed it from Pee Wee Herman. And he has an Alex P. Keaton working on his campaign, but I’m guessing that the party machine has probably lessened the role of that high school kid who was his campaign manager. And I’m not saying Alex P Keaton because the kid was annoying or anything it’s because that’s what I immediately thought of was the television character Alex P. Keaton from “Family Ties” which was an awesome sitcom- and those who know me know that I don’t really watch sitcoms.
Now I’m still going to say I don’t think he’s my guy, but I applaud him for going on the air and talking about what he thinks and helping people get to know him. He was also very well spoken, which is a thing with me because Barry had a guest on earlier in the week who kept dropping her G’s and it makes you want to hit them between the shoulder blades.
Neil also spoke about the situation in Great Valley Middle School, where he is a history teacher. As he said in a recent media interview:
“There is nothing more dangerous than not holding children accountable,” said Neil Young, a middle school teacher who was the victim of a fake TikTok account created by his students….
“This is not funny,” was Young’s first thought when he found out about the post. He could not understand why students would do this to him or to the other teachers who were targeted. “These are great teachers.”
According to Young, the district’s administrative office (not the administration at the school) initially said that they would take care of the problem, but he was unsatisfied with their response….
A teacher and coach for twenty-two years, Young understands that middle school students are impulsive and make mistakes; yet he has witnessed a change in their demeanor over the years. “We have empowered children which is a good thing, but the pendulum has swung too far.”
Students are “careless in the way they use technology and have no understanding of the reach they have via social media. When they make mistakes, they are not apologetic and they employ a mantra of ‘I have rights.’”
He pointed out the difference between what I had said, and what those students did, which I think is important. Because every day I have somebody telling me I am a horrible human being, etc. etc. but there’s a big difference between being a blogger and what these middle school students have done.
He also announced on the air that he has a new stylist and a new hair cut so I am glad. His former style is like the some of the other hairstyles on men that I just don’t get. Especially if they have good hair. And there is a thing called too much styling product. And in general, regardless of what side of the aisle you are on sometimes the hairstyles they give candidates, male or female, are horrible. Especially with the women because they look very Stepford wifey.
Anyway, enough about that. Barry and I talked about the new legislation. I blogged about last night protecting residents against SLAPP suits.
Barry and I had a great time talking for a few minutes, and it was fun. Maybe we’ll even do it again, who knows? All I know is I’m really glad he didn’t say I had a face for radio because I might have to hang up on him then 🤣
The ability for any of us to discuss local things going on in various communities is very important. And basically today’s local media has been disemboweled. so many news outlets are dead. In our local communities, we really depended upon our local newspapers, and so many have shuttered themselves and gone out of business, or been acquired by things like hedge funds, who don’t give a crap about what goes on in our communities.
It’s really very sad. And you know Barry was nice enough to point out that I am a blogger so I am opinion based.
We’ll see what the feedback is. Because we all know there are so many people every day of the year who love to hate me and I still scratch my head at that one. First of all, they don’t know me, and second of all read something else. But when the haters gonna hate, then you must be doing something right is the other train of thought isn’t it?
Today’s will be up on a podcast soon. I encourage people dealing with issues in their communities to contact Barry and WCHE and see if they’d be a fit for his show. This really is about what is happening locally and it’s the stuff that you know politicians don’t want to get out there.
And face it here in Chester County. There are so many meetings that still aren’t recorded from municipality to municipality, and if they are, the recordings aren’t kept this show is your chance to let the sunshine into your community.
And I think I will sign off with a little thing to think about in West Whiteland, and it’s not about the Brickette.
I am seriously wondering if the newest member of the West Whiteland Board of Supervisors has fallen and hit her head or something?
Apparently there was a Democratic Committee Meeting last night and she had off-topic verbal diarrhea? Should she actually be an elected official? Look, I know I’m not suited for that life and I don’t think she is either and I can have that opinion. Maybe #Resign Fridays should be resurrected? And recall elections take what to happen? Is it something like 2/3 of the plurality of a municipality?
I thought she was a bad choice for a supervisor all along, and I’ve never not said that. But I have been watching since she has been sworn in and she doesn’t seem to get how to do her job. And politics and being a politician is for sure not for everyone. But you don’t see her at public events much do you? But when you do hear things about her it’s usually for what she’s saying that she probably should not be saying including in public meetings. I’m not talking about anything secret squirrel as I have no knowledge of that. And we leave secret squirrel/ squirrel time to West Goshen, anyway.
For example, this elected official has done things at public meetings where she has basically said a valued member of the community shouldn’t be opining on something when what they are opining on is a direct correlation to what their professional background is, so who is she to judge? I am (again) talking about what you can see which makes you wonder about what you can’t see and what you’re not hearing about doesn’t it? I find that troubling.
Now I know this politician doesn’t like me. She will, of course deny this, but she forgets that I actually know politicians don’t like critics and that’s a given but I don’t think she’s cut out to be a politician so I do think she should resign. She only got elected in the first place, because the then incumbent was being primaried and knew she wouldn’t survive.
Also, from a practical standpoint, she’s very uncomfortable with interacting with people. Stiff as a board as one of my grandfathers would have said.
Anyway, I had fun today so thank you Barry and WCHE!
Blues & BBQ last evening at Farm Boy BBQ at 625 N. Morehall Road Malvern, PA 19355 was super fun! It was BYO if you wanted an adult beverage, and some people did and some didn’t. It was a great mix of people of all ages and families.
I don’t talk about my pets much. As a matter fact, even though I’m a blogger, there are a lot of things I don’t talk about because so many are such a judgmental jerks a lot of the time, and my pets are very dear to me.
Today has been a soul crushing day.
At around 5:00 PM I said goodbye to a beloved dog. I know I haven’t cried all of the tears that will come in the middle of the night, and I just literally have a heartache.
She came into our lives 10 years ago this coming October. She had been a puppy mill pull from Ohio. She landed at ArF in the Hamptons.
One fall day, after my sister had picked her up in the Hamptons, we drove to New York City to pick her up.
She was a tiny little miniature dachshund, and so scared when we first got her. She had lived in a cage the first two years of her life. She was little and fluffy, and had a very funny personality. Her entire life she spent between 8 and 8 1/2 pounds, so she was tiny.
When she would see you enter a room she would bounce. Or she did that for me, she would literally bounce up and down. And she was so fluffy. She had little Clydesdale feet. If I watched TV in bed, she would sit on my shoulder like a little furry parakeet.
She was a happy little thing with really bad eyesight, who would do zoomies throughout the house until you were exhausted watching her and your sides ached from laughing. She also was a big begger. And the last few years of her life, I think she had 11 teeth, and she still could beg with the best of them.
This past December, she went for her regular vet check up and everything was fine, but Dr Hahn told me she needed a dental. But then in January all of a sudden there was this little bump on the side of her face. I thought it was an abscess.
But when we took her in to see Dr Hahn eight weeks ago, the look on his face told me everything. It was a tumor. It wasn’t an abscess because it was on the side of her mouth in the rear where she had had teeth removed a few years ago.
When you have a veterinarian who cares about his humans as much as their animals, it really helps. And the look on his face was so stricken because it was the kind of tumor you couldn’t do anything about and was already growing so fast. It has been a long day and I can’t remember if it was a squamous cell or a melanoma but it was one or the other.
So we had eight extra weeks with her. And I made her a promise the day of her diagnosis that I wouldn’t keep her alive for me.
I remember when we first got the diagnosis people kept asking me what can’t you just operate on her? I know we couldn’t. She was a 12-year-old dog with a giant tumor. If people want a tip going forward, don’t question someone’s decision if they’ve already worked out a plan with their veterinarian. It is already hard enough when you get this news.
For the past eight weeks I have loved every extra minute. I’ve had to soften her food so she could eat, but even today she ate a full meal just really really slowly because by the time she woke up this morning she couldn’t really open her mouth because of the tumor.
It’s always so hard trying to figure out when the right moment is to say goodbye to our pets. They give us unconditional love that we truly don’t have in this world.  I had decided this weekend along with my husband that I was calling the vet on Monday because I could see the stage she was getting to. She kept trying for me, but I knew I had to be the grown-up here.
So we set the appointment for this afternoon. This morning when I got up, she gave me the “look.” She was tired and she was ready. So we had one last day together.
Then, in a matter of minutes, she was just gone. But like my other dogs before her, she will live in my heart and memories forever.
Goodnight little Georgie, I love you.
Please support the animal rescue of your choice in honor of my little girl.
Today St. David’s Church in Wayne, PA did a pop-up version of their annual fair. Flea market, books, clothes, kids toys, and more.
It was just fun. It was a beautiful day. A lot of people were out. Apparently they were lined up to get in before it even opened at 9 AM. The church raised a lot of money for their outreach.
I didn’t get tons of stuff but I found a few treasures!
I just love older colored glass. That vase is of indeterminate age, but hand blown which I love. A pair of never used April Cornell pillow shams for $6 and antique hand towels for $2 each.
A handmade pottery wren house for the garden. And some books. Including a very special one, that my friend Eddie Ross wrote and gifted to me today out of some treasures he found….and he personalized and signed it.
I also found a little garden sign.
But in this crazy and often unpleasant world in which we live, today was just a nice day. Happy people having a fun time shopping and volunteering and kids also having fun.
In life, we all need more days like this. Actual community in action.
Video came from dad and Philadelphia Magazine posted it. Dad got video from LMPD apparently.
Just when I thought Lower Merion couldn’t get any more ridiculous…well it IS a full moon…but I digress…. Anyway, a Kimco Realty babe at Suburban Square (using that term very loosely) called the police on GIRL SCOUTS SELLING GIRL SCOUT COOKIES IN A LITTLE RED WAGON in Suburban Square ! Picture of a red wagon below for illustration.
Yes, this really happened. So imagine my horror when I saw this in Philadelphia Magazine and a big HT and thank you to Victor Fiorello for covering this :
Suburban Square Calls Cops on Girl Scout Cookie Sales
It’s that time of year: Girl Scout cookie season! ….Most of these Girl Scout cookie sales you see go off without a hitch. But that wasn’t the case on a winter Wednesday earlier this month at Suburban Square. That’s the very Main Line-y shopping center in Ardmore.
Ardmore resident Eric Lowry showed up outside the Starbucks at Suburban Square with his 13-year-old daughter…Between his two daughters, Lowry has been helping sell Girl Scout cookies for close to 10 years. And he says he’d never been told that the girls couldn’t sell wherever they chose to. They’d even sold at Suburban Square in the past.
But on this particular day, an executive with the Suburban Square management group, Kimco Realty, approached Lowry and his daughter and asked them to move. “They said we had to stop selling cookies because we were standing on private property,” Lowry tells me, insisting that the specific spot they were on was not private property, but public. “They threatened to call the police as some kind of intimidation tactic.” Lowry flat-out refused to move and dutifully documented the encounter on his cell-phone camera.
At some point thereafter, the Suburban Square executive relocated to a different part of Suburban Square. There, she spoke with officers from the Lower Merion police department who had arrived on the scene. As seen on police body-cam footage that Lowry later obtained and published on YouTube (yes, this guy actually jumped through the required hoops to obtain body-cam footage from the cops), the Suburban Square executive explained her dilemma to police.
Part of that dilemma, it becomes apparent, is that Lowry’s Girl Scout cookie setup was outside of Starbucks. And Starbucks is a Suburban Square tenant that sells cookies, so the Girl Scout cookies were presumably creating a business conflict. She said that Starbucks was “freaking out.” (A manager at that Starbucks told me they have no comment on the matter.)
And Starbucks is TOTALLY part of this and they don’t want to comment? The big enormous coffee company couldn’t handle little GIRL SCOUTS pulling a little red wagon? They viewed them as competition we guess? Yo David and Goliath, Starbucks? Remember how that sitch turned out? I will be honest, I do not buy anything from Starbucks and have not for years. Their coffee always tastes burnt and they are overpriced on everything.
So Starbucks is no stranger to controversy from coast to coast, and aren’t saying anything according to Philadelphia Magazine. If I still lived in Lower Merion, truthfully I would put THAT Starbucks and Suburban Square on my skip it list. (They get all touchy when you say “boycott” so I would merely spend my money elsewhere as a personal choice.)
Part of the problem I have with this after watching that video that Philadelphia Magazine got from the dad (body cam footage I guess which is technically public information if you want to pay for it, which is what the dad did), is the whole misconception by Kimco’s doofy chick on camera talking about the sidewalks as if it was their private street? Really? I thought St. James place in Ardmore has been a public street in Lower Merion Township since the 1930s? And sidewalks are not public any longer? And Coulter Avenue is a public street too, right? Does Kimco own the Lower Merion roads/ streets now? Very confusing and am I suffering from bobble head disease? I sure hope not.
Of course what really piqued my interest here, is I actually know who the dad is. I knew Eric Lowry peripherally from when I was active in Ardmore and lived in Lower Merion Township. He’s a very nice man with a nice family. Active in the community. Helpful. And he is a very peaceful person, so Ms. Kimco 2024 must have been something special for him to go buy body cam footage etc. (Lower Merion charges for the privilege and it’s more than the cost of a couple of boxes of Girl Scout Cookies.) Also if Ms. Kimco 2024 was recorded by him during their interaction, there is no expectation of privacy in a public space and that took place on a public sidewalk. I guess she gets that now?
Of course also as per Philadelphia Magazine, now Kimco seems to have issued a cover their ass statement. They will give them a booth but they have to fill out a form? Does everyone do this with Girl Scouts? I simply don’t know but honestly? Those people were hostile towards kids selling cookies? The hell with them. I feel utterly disgusted by this example of stupid human tricks.
Please note, I do not have a problem with Lower Merion Police Department here. I feel for the officers that had to deal with the Kimco people. Lower Merion Police Department did not cause this, Ms. Kimco Realty 2024 and apparently Starbucks did. And as for Kimco, their statement to Philadelphia Magazine IMHO is not an apology, and there should be one. That entire Girl Scout Troop in my humble opinion deserves an apology spa day in Suburban Square with lunch on Kimco as far as I am concerned. And Kimco can certainly afford it.
This just blows my mind completely. It’s mean. Again, no tables or booths, they were pulling a little red wagon. It doesn’t get cuter than that.
Support your local Girl Scouts and help these kids meet their cookie goals. And support your local coffee shop and let chain Starbucks sit. And maybe trade in Suburban Square for Main Street Ardmore which is always more user friendly.
Again, please support Girl Scouts selling Girl Scout Cookies. It’s as American as Apple Pie. Calling the police on little girls selling Girl Scout cookies is NOT.
And I will tell you that if you don’t wish to bring Girl Scout cookies into your own house because you don’t eat them or whatever you can buy them as a donation and the Girl Scout troops will give them to people who need a little extra treat in the community.
This opinion is brought to you by the First Amendment.
The last thing of Margery’s I had framed this past fall of 2023.
I have written about Margery Niblock many times. I have even met people through my writing who also collected her work and knew her. Today I found out from my mother that she died on February 6th at her son Marc’s home in Bucks County. She was 86.
I sit here kind of sniffling, still not knowing what exactly to write and feeling quite sad and every one of my about to be 60 years.
I have so many memories of her.
Here is a photo from the Portland Police Department from her time in Maine:
Photo courtesy of Portland Maine Police Department Facebook
The Portland Police Department wrote a wonderful post about her on Facebook:
The Portland Police Department is saddened to announce the passing of Marge Niblock. Marge passed away on February 6, 2024, after a brief illness.
Marge was from Philadelphia, where she was an artist and court stenographer. In 1979, she ran for Sheriff of Philadelphia losing after garnering a solid 7,500 votes. While not earning the job, she made new lifelong friends, which she is best remembered for.
Marge came to Portland in 1989 and settled into her new home on Quebec Street on Munjoy Hill. She quickly made her way to the Portland Police Station to meet up with Chief Michael Chitwood, a friend from Philadelphia, and then proceeded to befriend all of us over the next 33 years.
Chief Chitwood had her sit on dozens of promotional panels and citizen groups during his tenure. She continued to be a sounding board for every chief that followed. Chief Sauschuck made her an official member of the department when he convinced her to run for Civil Service Commissioner. After her appointment, she sat on almost every interview panel for police officer candidates during her terms as a commissioner.
Marge also served as the crime reporter for the West End News. Marge would often be seen driving through the city in the Flame Mobile, looking for her next scoop. Most of her crime reporting was filled with questions, because Marge liked to understand why the crime was committed or why a certain victim was targeted. Her stories were filled with whimsical observations and often featured animals. Marge was more interested in the wayward opossum walking across the Million Dollar Bridge than a murder arrest. When a circus performer had their car broken into and his costume (including the bright red nose and colorful socks) stolen, her story questioned if the thief would use the stolen items or just discard them.
Several of us were fortunate to be on her Christmas card list, which would be a scratchboard print, usually with an animal theme, and always delivered in person. The lucky ones of us could convince her to do a scratchboard of our homes. The process included a long visit to take photographs. Only a few of us received a wood carving for our desks.
She was an incredible person with a huge heart. She would walk through any neighborhood in Portland, and someone would know her, or she would stop and talk with someone she had never met before.
In November of 2022, several of us saw Marge for the last time at the Portland International Jetport when she returned to Philadelphia to stay with her other family. She told all of us, “I’ll be back.”
I have memories of Margery lasting a lifetime. I loved her from the time I was a little girl. She was one of my parents’ friends who fed my imagination and love of art. She taught me and many other kids at St. Peter’s wood block and linoleum (and I still have a scar on my right arm to prove it) . She was my friend and a family friend. Her art will live forever on my walls. But I will really miss talking to her once in a while.
Even when I was a kid, Marge didn’t treat me like a kid. I remember her prints hanging on clothes lines at the Headhouse Craft Fair that she started along with my mother and others. I remember the giant Great Dane who I think was called Tiger (or that is just some random memory having to do with it’s brindle coat), and the little mutt thing named Fang (I swear I think that was the name.)
Other funny memories include being at their house when the Great Dane decided to nap underneath the coffee table in the living room. Then it stood up, taking a table full of cheese and stuff with it…until that all hit the floor.
I also have a memory of some dinner over at the Niblocks when Marge was making a leg of lamb. It was Dijon mustard encrusted. Maybe it was a Julia Child recipe?
And the art. So many memories of the art she created, including what she created for Unicef.
I remember when she moved to Maine. And then for a while she made the most beautiful jewelry out of silver and beach glass from Maine. They sold it at the Independence Seaport Museum. There is a necklace she made for sale on eBay now actually. I still wear my jewelry she made once in a while.
I remember a few years ago when she told me she wasn’t making any more art and wasn’t going to bother with her computer and that I could just keep calling. And call and talk to her I did until one day she stopped answering the phone in Maine. That was how I found out she had moved back to Pennsylvania.
Marge was incredibly bright and I loved speaking with her. Miles and years would just melt away. She was just a wonderful woman. I knew she was slowing down, and that is why she came back from Maine to be with her son. But life being life, I didn’t get to see her again after she arrived back in Pennsylvania in 2022. I wanted to, but I did not want to intrude on Marc and his wife.
So dear Margery, you and yet another piece of my growing up years are now completely my memories. But I will keep you in my heart and memories, and aren’t I lucky to have some of your art live with me.
Thanks for being one of the cool grown-ups in my life. We will all miss you and your infectious laugh still tinted with a New York accent after all of these years.
I recently watched the movie version of the Judy Blume book, Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. When the book came out, I was about the age of the main character, Margaret. I had just moved from the city to Gladwyne. I remember quite vividly it was like moving to a foreign country.
I remember everybody in seventh grade talking about the book. My mother wouldn’t let me read it, so of course I snuck / bought a copy. what I remember about the book most of the time is it kind of spoke to me because of the age. And also my being a new kid in a new community.
Moving to the Main Line wasn’t the easiest. Like Margaret, I had lived in the city so suburbia was truly alien to me at first. It was not that it was bad, it was beautiful but so different. You could open windows at night for one, and there were horses across the street, and down the road.
Making friends at almost 12 wasn’t as easy when you were a new kid trying to fit in with girls who were your grade but a year older and who have known each other since kindergarten.
Something that initially made it a little easier was that we lived close to a friend of my father’s from high school and he had a daughter my age. Because of her I did start to make friends but just like Judy Blume’s Margaret, I still struggled with my place in my new world. (And oh the parallels of my moving to Chester County in my late 40s and becoming a stepparent!)
Parts of the movie that were in the book so resonated once again included secret clubs of girls. I remember slumber parties where they tried to call up the spirit of Jim Croce on a ouija board.
And the whole bra thing. My sister who is 3 years younger than I is the one who decided we needed bras. I still remember my mother’s face when my then almost 9 year old sister announced we needed bras. Of course, neither of us actually did but much like the book/movie everyone around us had them.
And deodorant/antiperspirant. My friends used name brands back then like Secret. My mother came home with Tussy roll on. I hated that.
Sneaking to shave my legs the first time….and slicing the crap out of them. That was followed by a lecture from my father with how his mother never shave her legs. Of course that made me think of all those old Italian ladies his mother and my great aunts knew who tucked mint leaves under their arms in the summer and my 12 year old self wanted to die on the spot.
Ear piercing. I lost that battle. I actually got my ears pierced in the health center my freshman year of college. When I was 17.
When school started in 7th grade, I went from a room of not quite a dozen kids, to a huge public school junior high with a completely overwhelming amount of students. I went from a small school in the city to a huge school that was like a city in itself.
Settling in, the mean girls were the worst. Some I still see as pretty much the way they were then even if they are now 60. No, they aren’t still wearing their Candies with tight French jeans and crimping their hair, or at least I hope not. And I still remember exactly how miserable they were to me and others back then. Sometimes I have thought I should thank them because they helped make me able to stand up for myself.
I have seen some of the former mean girls over the years as they have passed. One thing that has always stuck with me is I thought they were ridiculous then, and to an extent, now. Some are actually almost mummified caricatures of their former 12 and 13 year old selves. File under karma baby, karma.
However do you know where the worst mean girls existed? St. John Vianney Sunday School in Gladwyne. There was a girl who was a year behind me that live the next street over who used to harass the crap out of me in Sunday school. And what was it over? Clothes my mother bought me that were similar to hers. Things like a jumper. A corduroy jumper.
One of my friends and I have spoken about these “Margaret years”. And while we all moved past those years, but some of the memories linger and pop up unexpectedly. And watching the movie did bring some of the memories back. Same era, age, situation…which is why I liked the book my mother didn’t want me to read back then.
Life for me changed for the better when I was able to get out of the Lower Merion School District Schools. When I went to Shipley, another world and path opened. And I was finally in a place where I felt I better belonged. Part of it was fairly simple in that I never thrived in large schools and that was OK.
I’m glad that book existed for us back then. It spoke to so many of us. Parents didn’t want us reading it because it was controversial to them and contemporary to us. That book was hard for our mothers who were literally born in a different world than the one they were raising us in.
So isn’t ironic today when we hear about people today trying to keep books contemporary to kids today from them? Only these people today scream and scream and scream. I’m glad our parents didn’t act like that. It was simpler: they said no, we snuck the Judy Blume books into our houses, and everyone survived. I don’t recall them being dissected and screamed about in PTA or school board meetings.
Maybe more should watch the movie adaptation of Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret. It still offers perspective. The years pass, the situations change, yet there is always commonality.
You see, much like with politics, with life in general past is prologue isn’t it? And that goes hand in hand with we can’t bury our history by pretending things didn’t happen because our history will repeat itself.
Today was the promotion ceremony for officers in the East Whiteland Police Department.
Four amazing men were promoted to Sergeant/Detective Sergeant and one woman became the first female lieutenant in East Whiteland Township Police Department history.
I am not diminishing the men in any way, they have done so much and are so incredibly accomplished, but now Lieutenant Patricia Doyle has accomplished something that is also well deserved, but history making because she is the firstwoman in the East Whiteland Police Department to achieve this rank. She also comes from a remarkable law enforcement family. Sorry not sorry I think it’s kind of cool.
Little girls don’t all want to be doctors and lawyers and ranking politicians or whatever overly ambitious parents choose as a path, they also want to be in law enforcement or first responders as well.
Here is the list of promotions in case ummm well local media would like to cover some incredibly accomplished people.
