It was a historic farm. Farmed until the bitter end. Part of a Penn Land Grant. But when Jack Bogle passed away, Vanguard which had bought the land at some point during his tenure, sold it….for development. Next is the old historic resource survey form, which seems to have disappeared from Pennsylvania websites?
So listen, if this had to be mega warehouses or whatever why is the whole site a ghost town? You can apparently just drive in and someone I know did that and sent the following video with this note:
Not one tire rub mark where truck drivers are always turning wheels hard leaving black marks. Not one oil drip. Pure virgin concrete.
Here, you look for yourselves:
So this begs the question which is a horrible thought and that is what else could this site be used for and does Uwchlan Township know or keep tabs on this? The sad fact of life is don’t you wish you could look at swaths of land like this and not worry it might someday become a freaking data center?
I rode in my friend Barry’s flag balloon on 9/11 in 2012 over Chester County.
Twenty- five years. Let that sink in for a moment. Twenty-five years and a not so long from now, the first plane was hitting the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan.
Where were you? I was pulling in to my office garage at 2 Tower Bridge in Conshohocken, PA. I heard the news come across the car radio. I sat there in silence with tears running down my face saying to myself (out loud, actually) “They came back.”
I know I’ve told this story since 9/11 but I really did come out of the World Trade Center shopping concourse above the garage when they blew up the garage in February 1993.
It’s 8:45 AM and 8:46 AM the moment of silence at the World Trade Center Memorial in NYC begins.
25 years ago today, everything changed. 2983 people lost their lives.
On February 23, 1993 there was the first attack on the World Trade Center. The attack is one that people don’t talk about.
The years move away from the dates, but we never forget. They are literally dates which live in our minds in infamy. To paraphrase FDR, who was in his time, referring to Pearl Harbor.
One of the photos in this post opens with is one I took one summer and it is the controversial 9/11 Memorial in New Jersey. Known as the “teardrop memorial”, it is located in Bayonne. I think it has a kind of strength and beauty to it.
In 2006 I wrote a piece for the local paper:
Sept. 11, 2006, is the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and United Airlines Flight 93’s crash in the field in Shanksville, Somerset County. This date has special significance to every American, and intense personal significance to far too many individuals who lost friends and loved ones.
But September 11, wasn’t the first time terrorists visited the World Trade Center. In truth, Feb. 26, 1993. was the date of the first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. I worked in New York at that time at an office located downtown in the financial district.
On that day, I had accompanied an office friend to the World Trade Center to grab an early lunch and to check out some stores in the shopping concourse. We were back outside the Trade Center buildings, getting ready to cross the street, when suddenly the ground shook and moved. I remember that we were looking directly across the street at Century 21, a department store in Lower Manhattan. Then something happened that rarely happens in New York: Everything went eerily still and quiet. We looked up at what we first thought were snowflakes beginning to float and fall from the sky. After all, it was February. Then car alarms began to go off one by one like the cacophony of many distorted bells. The snowflakes, we soon discovered, were in reality ashes.
People began yelling and screaming. It became very confusing and chaotic all at once, like someone flipped a switch to “on.” At first, we both felt rooted to the sidewalk, unable to move. I remember feeling a sense of panic at the unknown. We had absolutely no idea what had happened, and hurried back to our office. Reaching it, we were greeted by worried coworkers who told us that someone had set off a bomb underground in the World Trade Center garage.
I will never forget the crazy kaleidoscope of images, throughout that afternoon, of all the people who were related to or knew people in my office who sought refuge in our office after walking down the innumerable flights of steps in the dark to exit the World Trade Center Towers. They arrived with soot all over their faces, hands and clothes. They all wore zombie looks of shock, disbelief and panic.
Of course, the oddest thing about the first terrorist attack on New York City is that I don’t remember much lasting fuss about it. I do remember that President Bill Clinton was newly sworn into office, but I don’t remember him coming to visit New York after the attack. Everything was back to normal in Lower Manhattan in about a month, maybe two. After a while, unless you had worked in New York, or lived in New York, you simply forgot about this “incident.”
So, on the morning of 9/11, as I pulled into my office building’s garage and listened to the breaking news on the radio announcing that a plane had struck the World Trade Center, tears began to run down my face unbidden. I knew in my heart of hearts what happened. I said to myself, “Oh no. They came back.”
I remember picking up my cell phone to call my father, whom I knew to be, at that time, on an Amtrak train bound for New York City. I remember him telling me it was fine and he’d be fine. I wanted him to get off in New Jersey and take a train back to Philadelphia. But the train was already pretty much past all the stations and getting ready to go into the tunnel to New York. That very thought terrified me. To this day, I still do not understand why Amtrak did not stop those last trains from going into New York City as the news of the World Trade Center attacks first broke.
I next remember getting in the elevator and getting off on my office floor to find people clustered around television sets and radios. And the news kept getting worse: first one plane, then a second, then a third, and then a fourth.
The images and news just didn’t stop. Camera cuts from lower Manhattan to Washington to Somerset County. They are images that have to be ingrained in everyone’s mind forever like indelible ink.
It took a couple of days for my father and brother-in-law (who had already been in New York on business) to get out of the city, but eventually they got home safely with many stories to tell of what New York was like in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. A lot of people weren’t so lucky. They never saw their loved ones again after that fateful morning. Many people in the Philadelphia and greater Main Line area lost friends, coworkers and loved ones.
On September 11, I knew people who were lost, but fortunately I didn’t lose any loved ones. I remember for a brief time it seemed we were all a little nicer to each other, and politicians actually seemed to come together as one and grieve as a nation grieved.
But here we are five short years later. I have only seen the site one time where the World Trade Center once stood proudly. That was about a year after the attacks. I remember a distinct pit in my stomach and looked away from the car window. This past June I was in Washington, and had the same intense, awful feeling in my stomach as we drove on the highway past the Pentagon.
Life must go on and time can’t stand still, but all in all I can’t help but wonder: What have we learned since about our country and about ourselves? Five years after 9/11 what have we learned and what have we forgotten? What do we need to remember?
So back to the morning of 9/11 when the first plane hit. I realized then my now late father was on a freaking train to New York City. I pulled out my cell phone, which looked like a weird small brick from Nokia I believe.
I called him. Miraculously he answered. I asked him where he was, and he said Metro Park I said good is it stopped at Metro Park? He said yes why and I said a plane just went in to the World Trade Center. I think it’s a terrorist attack get off and take a train back before you can’t get out of Manhattan.
I will never forget what he said, and it was that the Amtrak conductor assured all of the passengers there was nothing to worry about, and he was just going to continue into New York City.
We didn’t actually talk to him again for a couple of days because you couldn’t get phone calls in or out of New York right after 9/11 for a good couple of days.
I remembered this particular part of 9/11 over the summer when I was at my nephew’s wedding in the Hamptons. It was there I literally saw a guest I hadn’t seen since my late brother-in-law’s funeral many years ago. It was a friend and someone my late brother-in-law used to work with whose family literally lent my late brother-in-law and late father an apartment for a few days because they couldn’t get off the island of Manhattan after 9/11.
People kind of forget that part of the chaos post-terrorist attack. The being cut off from people we knew in all sorts of places, who had ties to places like NYC or Washington, DC.
Other things I remember? Having a couple of childhood friends who were siblings show up on missing and possibly dead lists. One worked for Marsh & McMcLennan and the other for the Port Authority of NY and NJ. One sibling in particular was on that list for days after 9/11. Turns out one or both were out of town.
But I will never forget that feeling of combing through those lists looking to see whom we knew was on those lists. On one list were two guys that went to college with me. One I knew peripherally the other not at all, but I knew who he was. Both were close friends of another friend of mine’s husband.
I remember having a conversation with someone after 9/11 who had a job in the Pentagon. They were the opposite side from where the plane hit.
So many people had stories. I also remember speaking with someone well after 9/11 who if I remember correctly was from like Michigan or something and they knew people who physically went to NYC after 9/11 because they were trying to find family members that worked in the financial district and in the World Trade Center buildings.
A related aside is many years ago before 1993 or 9/11, I had a couple of interviews with brokerage firms or financial places in the World Trade Center buildings. I remember I did not like going up in those elevators. And I also remember there were like big escalators in that building as well. People thought it was such a cachet to work in those buildings and I remember thinking back then they’re just too tall, even in a city of skyscrapers.
I think a lot of us also knew first responders who were from other areas who went to New York City to help. I also know a couple of people whose family members were first responders in the New York Metropolitan area.
In that vein over the years, you’ve had the people who claimed they went to New York to help after 9/11. But didn’t. You even had a guy who said he was assigned from NYPD down to the financial district after 9/11 to help look for people or whatever they were all doing, but really wasn’t he was in the Bronx or something. You also have the tall tales with the current president when it comes to 9/11.
I really despise the people who fake things about being part of efforts post 9/11. I don’t understand people that need to build their own images on a national tragedy.
Someone I know who was the first responder said today that the best way to honor people on 9/11 is to be the people we all were 9/12.
I saw this drone show thing from New York and it’s very moving. I’m sharing a snippet from the ABC affiliate up there:
As a country from the most local things to national, we are a cesspool of messiness. People wanna tell you what it’s like to be a patriot or an American. They don’t have the first clue. We have become an international embarrassment, not strength. And because of the current administration, we are once again I believe wide open to incidents like what happened 9/11 25 years ago.
We have a president who wants to tell tall tales about 9/11 and even issue AI generated ridiculousness to make himself look like a hero on whatever his truth social account is.
We have a president with an administration which kowtows to him when they know they shouldn’t. I can’t decide if it’s because they are actually afraid of him or they can’t admit they made a mistake in getting behind him. of course the other point to ponder is some of them simply put are just stupid especially the women I have never seen so many ridiculous women in positions of power. It’s embarrassing to be a woman and look at them. Bad plastic surgery and Botox-laden twits. And the men? Half of them who are in positions where they have anything to do with the military have no military background. They’re just there because they’ll do what what’s his name wants.
We are an international joke. We are also because of the actions of this administration creates increasingly vulnerable situations. Spoiled boys shouldn’t be playing war.
And I keep waiting for elected officials to find their spines to stand up to this stuff and write the ship that is capsized that is our country and democracy. And all they do is talk.
The 25th anniversary of 9/11 falls on the 250th anniversary of this country.
Liberty weeps and so do I.
Remember, 9/11 accurately.
Remember those who lost their lives. Remember the first responders and others from all over not just New York City, who are still alive and struggling with health issues and what not because of what they were exposed to on that fateful day and the days thereafter. Honor all those people and this event by getting your asses to the polls on election day.
It’s time to right the ship of democracy.
To be an American is who we are. We come from all walks of life. We come from all races, creeds, colors, nationalities. We are a nation, literally born of immigrants, and it’s time to start treating those people with respect which means getting rid of the frozen feds.
Be a real patriot, not one that just expects a check from a crazy old man who seems to think that’s what it takes to get people to vote. we all know the phrase. The check is in the mail and if you think he’s gonna pay you anything I can sell you a bridge in Brooklyn.
Well, that’s my rant for the 25th anniversary. As Americans, we have an obligation to be better than what we currently are allowing in this country.
Packed house in Westtown Township and I hear many are calling out Supervisor Tom Foster and it’s not Ollie Ollie Oxenfreed.
Oh and breaking news they fired the entire historic commission on bullsheit trumped up charges.
Jodi Nawrocki ran for office trying to convince people she loved historic preservation, and what’s her first big act as a supervisor and the baby chair of the supervisors who doesn’t know how to run a meeting? To axe a volunteer commission. I guess she still believes in the tooth fairy if she expects to believe that this has nothing to do with the Darlington Inn or politics. she is just one of three disgraces, but she’s the only Democrat on the board and she might as well just be Tom Foster’s Sarah Palin.
Oh and former non-profit name- dropping- former -stupidvisor Carol DeWolf? I love love love the ego in you that you can’t bother to introduce yourself to the audience. You’re not the queen freaking mother, but you are still obnoxious, and now that you’re just regular old Carol from Westrown I think you can just stand at the podium like a normal person.
There is no point in being subtle here. This is a complete shit show and a travesty. This is obviously political and if you’re on a board in Westtown, you should just resign now before they fire all of the rest of you.
And that manager, she needs to go to. She also doesn’t know what in the Sam hell she’s doing.
What a freaking joke. Except it isn’t is it? This is actually really bad for residents and I’m allowed to have that opinion too.
So how can they get rid of that entire board of stupidvisors and the manager? and in the meantime, I hope everyone on that historic commission knows that they are entitled to a televised hearing and bring lawyers.
Oy I can’t with this chick “Carly Closes.” Today it’s like Carly does Wayne, and is that like Debbie does Dallas? Dunno. She is going to say I am a petty beeatch, but this time she is co-opting literally one of my most favorite bits of quirky history. So favorited by me that I got a state approved historical marker that I still check on every time I am in Wayne.
Please note this is a public post a la wants to be an influencer on social media.
Let ME get into it. First and foremost, she can’t even pronounce what she’s trying to co-opt to shill with. She is speaking about the Wayne Natatorium in North Wayne. She doesn’t even have the location right. Literally the pool was Willow Avenue in North Wayne, Little Chicago. That’s right— where Willow Avenue is today was the pool. They blocked up the Gulph Creek to fill the pool, as well as utilizing springs underground and it was very popular for a short amount of time.
It was the largest outdoor pool in the country and one of the largest in the world at the time. There were swimming championships, and there was ice-skating in the winter. There were ladies and men’s dressing rooms, and there was a clubhouse and at the end of Willow Avenue before it takes the dog leg part of that clubhouse used to exist until there was a fire and when they rebuilt it, I don’t know if they saved any of it because there was a really cool fireplace and that then rental property that was from the original clubhouse.
This is a photo from around 2005 I think of the clubhouse fireplace mantel I mentioned
Carly implies with her interpolation that it was like a sideshow circus freak kind of an attraction and it really wasn’t that. It was part of Wayne at the time. So can I say thousands and thousands past through the pool? No, because I don’t think we really know. The other thing is it wasn’t just drought that caused the pool to fade in popularity other things gained popularity like cycling as in bicycles and golfing. While it was open it was popular. And there were swimming championships and exhibitions.
Again, I know about the Wayne Natatorium because I got the sign for it. Yes indeed I really did. I went to the board of commissioners in October 2009 in Radnor Township to get their approval. I wrote the application I raised the money, my nonprofit sponsor was the Radnor Historical Society. But I did the work. The chair of the historical society at the time was Ted Pollard and he told me back then I was on my own because he was focused on getting a sign for Bishop Richard Allen when he visited the Bryn Mawr section of Radnor somewhere off of Bryn Mawr Avenue probably close to where the WaWa is today if I remember it correctly. In 2009 they dedicated a small park on Brook Street in Bryn Mawr to him. At the time, Ted Pollard told me to wait and I said no because whatever the state emphasis was that year for historical markers, I felt the Wayne Natatorium stood a better chance of making it. And in the end I was right. The Bishop Allen Historical marker didn’t actually make it to marker status until 2023.
Two people in particular from Radnor Historical Society were instrumental in helping me and letting me into the archives of the historical society at Finley House. One was Greg Pritchard, who is now history everything with Lower Merion Township and is the Lower Merion’s HARB person. The other was Beverlee Barnes, who is the preservation planner at the Delaware County Planning Department.
Some of my other great supporters of this project back in the day is former commissioners John Nagle and Hank Mahoney, Sam Strike who used to be with the Suburban and Wayne Times, Bob Zienkowski now manager of East Vincent, my late friend Andy Lewis who was on County Council in Delaware County, as well as being a Haverford Township Commissioner during his life, and another dearly departed member of the Radnor Township community, Steve Paolantonio.
So seriously, I really want cool history preserved, and I want people to love the history, but when people co-op the history for personal gain, (and I’m entitled to that opinion, this is a public post across social media platforms) I think that’s wrong.
And if you’re going to speak about local history at least correctly pronounce what you’re speaking on. Otherwise you sound ridiculous and twatwaffleish.
*Note a lot of this was my own research, some of the items came courtesy of the Radnor Historical Society and their archives. The newspaper I showed screenshots of called The Philadelphia Times was in existence from 1875-1902, when I think it was merged into The Public Ledger.*
The Wayne Natatorium was written about in defunct Philadelphia area newspapers at the turn of the century and the Philadelphia Inquirer has written about it here and there including August of 1992. That article spoke about Fennimore Lake, Martin’s Dam, Mill Dam, places that no longer exist like Lea’s Lake, Cathcart Lake and the Wayne Natatorium.
In January 1896 there was a “Ghost Carnival”. The folks who attended back then we Main Line and Philadelphia notables and executives and families of the Pennsylvania Railroad. (Philadelphia Inquirer, January 19, 1896)
The Philadelphia Inquirer in 1899 also reported on an “enjoyable skating carnival.” (Philadelphia Inquirer, January 15, 1899)
At the end here are my photos and photos friends gave me from when we dedicated the sign – we received commendations from the state as well as Delaware County. We had Radnor Township officials present, my (then) home township folks from Lower Merion Township there, state representatives and a state senator.
So Aesop still says when Carly wants to close her mouth instead of the sound of her own voice, she might actually learn something. But until then she will be just another realtor using the area’s history as a social media marketing tool.
I hope you all have enjoyed actually learning about the Wayne Natatorium today.
Cheers! Hope the Canadian Wildfire smoke clears soon, don’t you?
The fantastical green serpentine stone of the Darlington Inn
You know it started out like your basic hotter than hell day in Chester County yesterday. Then it got really hot in a particular township. Westtown Township to be precise.
It started when I was sent this message:
This is the current historic commission:
Now I have to be honest, Westtown Township has an enviable historic commission. They really work their tails off and I know they’ve been desperately trying to save the Darlington Inn.
Let’s chat Darlington for a moment. In 1843, David Taylor, who was a sculptor by hobby and a strong Whig supporter, carved Henry Clay’s face into the stone at Darlington. Henry Clay was the Whig presidential candidate in 1844.
So Taylor bought the house in 1843; he carved the face in 1844. In 1860 he also carved a likeness of his black dog, named “Lincoln” after the 16th president, who was then a presidential candidate. Now this is only part of the fascinating history.
Back to our present in Chester County. As we know, in late April and early May, there was like a big meeting and they put the zoning change for the Darlington Inn on hold.
And before we get to that, there’s the endless curiosity I have with odd politics. So that new supervisor, Jodi whatever her name is? She’s been a supervisor for like six seconds and now she’s the chair? I watched her the other night. She can barely do a meeting. She needed a lot of handholding. Daddy instructs her constantly. Did she even finish that “supervisor school” new elected officials take?
However Jodi Nawrocki (I finally looked up her last name because I figured I really can’t refer to her as supervisor -Jodi -what’s -her -name) sure seems to have loved the Darlington Inn and the serpentine stone when she was running for office, didn’t she? so one would think she would be appreciative of a historic commission that was advocating for its survival and what not? But I do think that’s worth mentioning. So maybe it’s pertinent?
So how did she become instant chair of the supervisors in Westtown after just being elected? Was it like a cup of soup salt barf ramen noodles just add hot water?
Oh wait I forgot to mention something else. It seems like Westtown Township and Tredyffrin share the same solicitor? I find that very interesting if it’s true. I always find that crossover interesting don’t some of you?
Anywhooo….it seems at some point in June a Supervisor named Ed Yost resigned. He was moving out of Westtown so he literally had to. And when I was checking out this most recent meeting there seem to be a lot of contretemps about how a new supervisor was appointed. Someone named Frederick Manger. I also think he came from the historic commission and as the Saturday Night Live Church Lady would famously say “isn’t that special?” Also I have to ask the question is he a buddy of that one supervisor who’s like the cheese stands alone and is in control? So was this all by design even him going on the historic commission in the first place? And the supervisor who never seems to be able to leave Westtown might not like my questions, but there is nothing illegal about them
It is time for an intermission after a fashion before I circle back to what Westtown is actually trying to do to their current historic commission. Kindly allow me to give you a few snippets of the recent July meeting. I found them illuminating, fascinating, and like watching a municipal train wreck. I guarantee watching their meetings will create municipal gaper delay.
I hope you enjoyed the intermission or interlude, now it is time to go back to the whole historical commission thing. I posted the little screen message I got and I started getting other private messages from township cheerleader types:
Then an article came out yesterday afternoon in the Inquirer. A giant a-ha moment. Truly.
According to the article, the message I was sent seems kind of true, doesn’t it? And someone else after I posted the message essentially told me that this was about the Darlington Inn. That’s what the article says too, doesn’t it?
According to the article, there’s also an email that went out to this volunteer board, saying basically the supervisors were going to vote on their removal forthwith and they were being told as a courtesy. Apparently this was all stated in some email shared with the paper that was from the township manager Liudmila (Mila) Carter (the one on the meeting recording who sounds like Yvonne from the Bullwinkle cartoon.) It seems as if there will be a publiclynching at the next supervisors’ meeting, and that some upcoming historic commission meeting has also been canceled by the Westtown Township.
Oh, but if they really wanted to keep their volunteer positions, they could reapply for it. Needless to say no one in Westtown was available for comment to a regional newspaper. It seems when the article was being written again to quote the Church Lady “isn’t that special?”
And of course, none of this was supposed to get out in the public purview, but it has. Because when things are rotten enough, they can’t be hidden any longer, can they?
Now let’s go to the July meeting that I have the snippets posted up above. I don’t have the whole meeting up, but also with that meeting or maybe it was another one (I’m not really sure) the township solicitor suggested easements to help protect the Darlington Inn. Jodi with an “i” didn’t think that was a great idea. (This is all in the Inquirer article too by the way I’m not making this up.)
Isn’t it kind of fun that Jodi with an “i” had the Darlington in her campaign when she was running for supervisor but now that she is supervisor I guess she doesn’t think it has the same amount of luster because she didn’t want to add what the solicitor suggested?
Here is the entire July meeting- what the heck I will post it and hopefully it doesn’t disappear:
Here are their June meeting recordings:
So now I’ve set the stage right? There’s trouble in paradise in Westtown. In my opinion, it’s a very interesting political scenario over there. You have one supervisor with lots of experience like Wiley Coyote and two novices? (Yes, I can have that opinion. I figure I’ll get that out-of-the-way since I heard that Westtown supervisors can still be rather petty.)
Anyway, it makes you wonder about who really is the puppeteer here and why they really want to get rid of the historic commission? And I have to ask does someone in particular want the Darlington Inn gone in Westtown Township?
I can also tell you how some of the made up stuff that’s floating around and is not true.
My sources tell me that the purported sunshine violations are bunk. Apparently it’s stems from historic commission members who want to go to some historic preservation network dinner? They are being told going to a historic preservation event is a violation of the sunshine laws?
Are. They. Freaking. Kidding. Me?
A social gathering is not violating the sunshine law. Talk about desperados grasping at straws.
Here- think I am making this up? I have emails and this is what you need to see (below in light and dark because I don’t know which is easiest for people to see.)
And it’s something that can be obtained on a right to know it’s not anything privileged. These are emails from the township manager, who apparently is also the head of building and planning and zoning and how can she effectively be a manager of a large enough township and do that as well?
I mean, call me crazy but I have gone to those Westtown Day things at historic Oakbourne and the historic commission people are all always there talking about the history of that township. I mean it was because of them and talking to them about the wonderful history of Oakbourne Mansion that we chose to get married there. So is THAT a violation of sunshine law too?
In my humble opinion the answer to that is no. This isn’t a violation of sunshine laws at all. It’s just bull twaddle.
And appointing a new supervisor in private and having to correct it is kind of wild, right?
This is the kind of crazy town bullshit that causes things to go south in a township. Who will be the fall guy or gal when that happens? You would’ve thought that elected officials in this municipality would have learned when they had to be talked into saving Crebilly in the first place, right?
I hate to say it, but if you live in Westtown or you care about the Darlington Inn, it’s time to start storming the Bastille over there because there’s something really wrong happening. These yahoos don’t have actual cause to divest themselves of their historic commission. It would just be more convenient for them to load up a board full of people they can control, wouldn’t it?
So are people, residents, taxpayers going to allow this to happen or are they going to call bullshit on these supervisors? Maybe the supervisors are the ones who should all be replaced?
I mean it’s getting to the point people that you have to wonder what municipality has not lost its damn mind in Chester County, Pennsylvania.
A recap before I leave you, followed by a delightful array of screenshots.
Westtown Township residents need to get busy. As was the case with Crebilly, in my opinion, rather troubling times once again. Meet your supervisors who wish to cancel your entire historic commission over trumped up BS.
First you have the new gal who ran on putting residents first along with the sentimentality of the history including the Darlington Inn. She is being led around like a puppy in a leash training class by the old timer who is literally on and off of the board and can’t stay away, can he? And then there is number 3. Buds with the old timer, correct? Once on the historic commission (isn’t that special and how’d he come to get there?) they tried to slide him in behind closed doors June-ish, correct? Kind of stealth and why didn’t the solicitor stop it and correct it then? I mean a solicitor should know, right??? So then number 3 was adjusted in during the July 6 meeting, correct? That’s neat shoehorning CYA if politicians can get it, right? Well his bio was up and then it was down right? Caught an important snippet still showing on a Google search that disappears when you click on it.
So now these people wish to magically erase the ENTIRE historic commission on made-up stuff? Hmmmm there’s something rotten in Denmark err Westtown and it seems obvious right? Like it’s 0”politically motivated retaliation or retribution? And what is the township manager actually doing about it? Shouldn’t she and the solicitor stop hiding about this?
Enjoy the screenshots snippets which in my opinion are so illuminating:
A good residents’ to do list should include start filing right to know requests in Westtown again ASAP.
Start with ALL communications between the supervisors (including the one who recently departed), the township manager, and the historic commission.
Ask for everything under the sun surrounding the Darlington Inn.
Talk to those who fought to save Crebilly to see what they might have vis-à-vis information that could be helpful.
Start looking into ways that the State Attorney General’s office could look into this board of supervisors.
Start checking out who would be good to replace all of these people who are currently supervisors with. How are their ethics going with the current supervisors? Are they violating oaths of office?
Stand up and stand withthe current Westtown Historic Commission, they deserve your support. Westtown residents you have to stand up and make some noise, and you should want to. This is pure, unmitigated bullsheit.
Today I was greeted by media images and footage of a white supremacist types in white masks, marching in our Nation’s Capital.
That’s not my America.
I think the deadly horrible hot weather is a reflection of the emotions and sentiments of the ghosts of our founding fathers.
This is what 250 looks like, America? We should all be ashamed. We are probably as divided as we ever have been in that saying something, considering the Civil War, etc.
I love this country, but I don’t love this point in our history. We are standing on the edge of a crumbling, dangerous precipice. I’m tired of politicians talking. They need to do something about this.
This country has all but forgotten from whence it came and do average people now actually know what it means to be American?
People are going to read this post and say “She’s not a patriot. She’s bad.”
Patriot is now an overused trigger word that has lost its meaning because people now have a distinct lack of understanding of the term and our US history, good bad, and indifferent.
No, I’m not bad. But I am fed up. I’m fed up with the pablum being shoveled at us from politicians on both sides of the aisle. I am tired of the ugliness, the divisiveness, the overt racism, and just anything ugly that you can attribute with a stereotype of what an ugly American looks like. I’m tired of the faux Christians who think they’re actually Christian. They are not. They are lizards who slither back and forth from under rocks.
Our country is in the toilet economically. The Wizard behind the curtain would like us to believe it is hunky dory but ya know how they are trying to reframe social security? We’ve paid into this our whole lives and it could be out of money or seriously cut by 2032.
The funny thing is I remember the Bicentennial. I was just a kid. and I remember people complained about it. And it wasn’t perfect, but I remember it was a real celebration and both sides of the political aisle came together for the greater good. I got to ride in a covered wagon to and through Valley Forge Park.
I saw an Inquirer article about the reenactment of the 2nd Continental Congress of some sort that was down at Independence Hall within the past couple of days and it was pathetic. Face it, today’s Congress couldn’t do anything that those men did 250 years ago, they simply don’t have it in them.
My country ‘tis of thee, don’t let a mad man subvert our liberty.
I will end with posting the Declaration of Independence because what else can we do but remind people what our founding fathers fought for ? Why? Because otherwise the future is bleak house.
In Congress, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
I remember the first time I saw Saint Peter’s Village as I guess a teenager. My father wanted to see it, so one day we went. I thought I had stepped into a magical place. It has felt like that every time I have been there since. It is in Warwick Township and has a cool history.
is a preserved 19th-century industrial company town located in a narrow gorge along French Creek. A company town. Much like the Village of Gladwyne, hence the reference. In the 1840s, iron ore was discovered there.
Cradled in the hills surrounding French Creek State Park was a run-down, sad-looking town called St. Peter’s Village. It’s cheerless, empty shops and crumbling walks hid this little Victorian hamlet’s history and charm.Originally founded and built as a ‘company town’ by Davis Knauer to house and provide services to workers of his Black Granite Quarry at French Creek, this picturesque Victorian community began to take shape in 1880.
For many decades families flocked to the village to ‘jump’ the rocks and picnic by the stream.
Winter sleigh rides and festivals were a constant as was, in later years, the sound of old Aunt Lena playing the saw. The village’s fascinating history and the memories of thousands who visited could not preserve it from the descent that followed the closing of the quarry and the subsequent selling of the village by the Knavery family in the late 1970’s.
For over 20 years this charming Victorian town sat neglected with its magnificent Inn deteriorating into a shabby shadow of its former grandeur. But all that has now changed.
Tom Drauschak of Earth Companies, the builder of the nearby Stone Wall Golf Course, and his partner, Vince Piazza, the father of future baseball Hall of Famer Mike Piazza, purchased the Inn as well as several other buildings in the village two years ago and already life has come back to the town. Paver sidewalks were installed, the quarry had what can only be called a ‘face-lift’ and working with the Chester County Historical Society, existing structures have been restored to their 1880s Victorian charm and are now occupied. The historic Inn at St. Peters Village (http://theinnatsaintpetersvillage.com/), which first opened in 1881, has been radiantly restored…The best part, however, are the careful measures that are being taken to maintain the historical integrity of St. Peters. Mr. Drauschak is working with the historical society to ensure that the new construction will be representative of the architecture of the era, thereby making this lovely neighborhood fit seamlessly into the charming village and its setting. Home site reservations at pre-construction pricing are now being accepted. So, what happened to St. Peter’s Village? It’s Renewed, Revitalized and Open for Business!
Wellllllll….I had not really paid attention to the whole thing that this little village always had overlords err owners and then the news broke:
St. Peter’s Village, a 19th-century industrial town along French Creek in northern Chester County that’s protected under the National Register of Historic Places, is being put up for auction by its owners.
The sale includes the Inn at St. Peter’s Village and accompanying restaurant, 121 residential and 13 commercial properties and subterranean mineral rights to the land, according to Philly-based Traiman Auction Company. The village will be sold Sept. 30 at the Desmond Hotel in Malvern.
June 29 is ironically the feast day of Saints Peter and Paul.
AUCTION???? yeah this gets an oh fuuuuuuuuck for sure. The auction house has tried to be coy about ownership but Philadelphia Business Journal burst that cherry:
An entire 83-acre village in Chester County with a hotel, shops and over 100 developable home sites is being put up for auction by Piazza Management Co.
The historic St. Peter’s Village will be auctioned off Sept. 30 with no reserve price at the Desmond Hotel Malvern. At that time, the village will be sold to the highest bidder, no matter the price, and with no set starting bid.
~By Ryan Mulligan – Reporter, Philadelphia Business Journal
Philadelphia Business Journal also pointed out that this is the SAME Piazza tearing up Ardmore in Lower Merion Township for a mixed use development that will supersize and citify.
Radnor Property Group is set to begin construction on a mixed-use development in Ardmore that will add hundreds of apartments to an area drawing attention from multifamily developers looking to build near transit hubs.
The $187 million, 270-unit development at 100 W. Lancaster Ave. is planned to have about 30,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space and 480 garage parking spaces, including 108 for public use by retail customers. The project is named The Piazza at Ardmore after property owners Daniel Piazza and his family.
Radnor Property Group CEO David Yeager said he and Daniel Piazza view the project as an opportunity to “create a gateway” into downtown Ardmore.
Those are my photos from when I was in Ardmore recently and I was horrified. Another fun fact? Former East Whiteland Supervisor Rich Orlow works for Piazza, who also has a seemingly stalled project in East Whiteland – a car dealership.
Engineer’s plans, plot plans, and other property details will be available at the property.
Description
Owner has directed an Absolute Auction for their portion of its property located in historic St Peters Village, Warwick Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania.
Step into a one-of-a-kind opportunity in the heart of St. Peter’s Village, a nationally recognized historic destination in Chester County, Pennsylvania. This mixed-use development invites major builders, venture capitalists, and historic preservationists. Located in a growth corridor, this intriguing property sells at absolute auction to the highest bidder. The offering includes 121 Home Sites, consisting of 33 single-family homes, 33 twins, 34 town homes, and 21 expansive 2-acre home sites; also a wastewater treatment plant that services the existing structures, which must be improved by the buyer to accommodate the full build out. Thirteen historic and commercial village buildings—totaling approximately 43,500+/- square feet—create exceptional potential for retail, hospitality, or adaptive reuse. The property also conveys valuable subterranean mineral rights, including documented iron ore deposits, adding a rare investment dimension.
Also includes liquor license, utility systems, personal property, and goodwill
It’s all being sold “as is, where is”.
Now someone has to ask the question is Saint Peter’s Village being auctioned off to pay for Ardmore?
Well?
Last year part of the road was closed by PennDOT, does that have anything to do with this? After all it is no great secret in Chester County that PennDOT road closures can help kill businesses, right?
The small sewage treatment plant nestled into the hill behind St. Peter’s Inn discharges directly into French Creek, an “exceptional value stream” that the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection is charged with protecting.
The sewage treatment plant has had serious problems over the years with aging pipes that allowed stormwater to infiltrate. Every time it rained, the plant would not be able to handle the flow, and thousands of gallons of raw sewage were discharged into French Creek.
Anyway….GLADWYNE PEOPLE like the good for nothing civic association and Lower Merion Township sit up and pay attention as this could be the fate someday of Gladwyne Village. You have a new owner turning it back into a company/mill kind of town. Don’t say it couldn’t happen in 19035, it certainly damn well could.
I am sure I am not the only one extremely worried about Saint Peter’s Village which to be honest has started to look a little run down in the past couple of years. If residents and preservationists don’t get busy and pay attention who knows what could happen here and it might be on the National Register of Historic Places but how many times have things on that register been demolished for “progress”?
No rest for the historic preservation weary, I’m afraid. Only potential profits for developers, right?
A photo sent to me during recent civic association meeting…
I spy with my little eye a new Inquirer article on the 19035. No not about the grifters currently visiting Club Fed or wherever that the civic association didn’t want mussing up their “vibe” but the article is about the equivalent of the hypothetical company town owners.
(Inquirer article has a pay wall and you have to subscribe to read it, unless they are still allowing people a few free reads a month?)
What do I say company town owners? Easy. In part this reminds me of our history when it come to factory / mining / mill towns when they were first settled (think 19th century.)
These company towns were controlled by the owners of the factory / mining / mill towns. They built the houses, school, local store, etc. etc. (Related aside: Gladwyne already once was a mill etc. town once upon a time, so is that the rich man poor man vibe the developers are going for again?)
Anyway these company towns had the ability to control every single person. They had literally a monopoly on everything. Workers and their families were dependent upon the owners of factory / mills / mines for their survival, which was a great way to control these people yes? Of course, history refers to boom and bust cycles with these towns which is why tourists visit ghost towns out west to this day, yes?
If you are interested in learning more about these types of towns see:
Yeah I know you think I am off on a tangent but the origin of the Gladwyne Village is HELLO a MILL TOWN. Do the upwardly mobile of nouveau 19035 really want to be owned again in a sense? Sociologically it’s a fascinating point to ponder.
So the article also talks about the mythical green space that is so fake sounding I can practically feel the sickly sweet taste.
Here is a link to what they presented to HARB at the beginning of May, which is what they presented to the 19035 gated community errr I mean Gladwyne Civic:
(I will tell you that Lower Merion Township’s website sucks, it’s as if it was designed to hide things, but I digress.)
So once again they are with the green space and fakakta gazebo with parking butting up against existing residents’ homes like it’s a city and WHY? Do they not see the big assed park that is 14.8 acres DIRECTLY ACROSS THE STREET?
I mean I am told that developer guy Andre worked in the village as a kid before he became an Andre? Does he have selective male Alzheimer’s or something? Are they literally BLIND as to the amount of green space, open space, natural water features, etc etc that ALREADY FREAKING EXIST IN GLADWYNE FOR ALL TO ENJOY? Are the residents also green blind?
Literally WTF in Gladwyne?
They don’t need a developer manufactured pocket park in essence….there is one across the street that is HUGE. Then there is Rolling Hill, Saunders Woods, Flat Rock Park, need I go on?
So these people and Lower Merion Township are either not listening hard enough, not caring enough to hear, or are just freaking green blind aren’t they?
Do the historic preservation and adaptive reuse. Rebuild the Gladwyne Pharmacy etc building, as that was probably just a favor for some pal that Walter Durham designed it in the first place because he designed houses, not mini malls. But leave the zoning alone which will threaten a well established historic district that is recognized on a local, county, state, and federal level. (Unless of course they plan to add a Trump Arch like planned for Washington DC?)
Listen harder and hear developers.
Don’t tart up the village. Do better, be better.
If these developers want their legacy in the 19035, they need to respect the legacy that already exists. Right now they are merely paying it lip service in my opinion.
For anyone interested in the bougie nightmare that they’re trying to create in the 19035 there is a meeting tonight. It is a PUBLIC civic association meeting.
The regular business of the Civic starts at 6:45 PM and I have been told the location this time is Gladwyne Elementary School. I am told the Haldon House stuff starts around 7:15pm?
The only reason I’m bothering with this is because the Civic doesn’t update their website anymore and there’s nothing on any of their meetings found easily- which of course speaks volumes. I doubt very much they are recording or zooming it so you need to show up if you’re interested.
The address of Gladwyne Elementary is 230 Righters Mill Road, Gladwyne, PA
I also have to ask is it wise to have the potential developer of the village as a business sponsor of the Gladwyne Civic Association? Is it just me or does it make you wonder about the people in charge of the civic? (I mean any more than their secretiveness in general about Gladwyne like it’s a gated community?)
Anyway, if you are so inclined, please show up. If they allow a zoning change, that historic village is DOA. Adaptive reuse and historic preservation aren’t the problems. A potential zoning change and nouveau development circus are. And yes, I can have that opinion because if you know Gladwyne, that is simply the truth.
Went to White Horse Farm in Willistown yesterday to pick up an order. We are part of their Butcher & Cream Club and have been for about a year now.
It’s nice to know your farmer and literally know where everything is coming from. This is a spectacular property in Willistown. You can’t just wander up the driveway, we were invited as we were picking up an order.
