Ambridge's Harmony Hotel. And the other Ambridge Harmony Hotel

"Harmony Hotel"
Manuscript Group 354: Old Economy Village Collection
Photo Number 635b
courtesy of Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
Old Economy Village
used with permission

Just a short distance northwest of the well-known and highly regarded Economy Hotel,* once located on the southwest corner of what is now 14th and Merchant Sts., there was a smaller, less impressive hotel. The Harmony Hotel, sometimes belittled as the "Tramp Hotel" or the "Hotel of the Unfortunates," hasn't been in business for many years, although its building still stands at 277 Fourteenth St.

Why those disparaging nicknames? According to Sarah Buffington, Old Economy Village curator:

"The guests at the Economy Hotel were told to arrive promptly at 4:30 for supper, so as not to keep others waiting. The staff was fed after the hotel guests, and then the 'tramps' were fed afterward. These homeless people were allowed to stay for one night, but were then told to move along. The Harmony Society kept track of them so that they wouldn’t overstay their welcome."

The date of the photo above is uncertain, but it probably dates from the late 1800s, before there was an Ambridge, or early 1900s. The building dates from much earlier, back to the establishment of Economy, and wasn't originally used as a hotel. Although it doesn't look like the typical, brick Harmonist house, it was the early home of Frederick Rapp, adopted son of George (Father) Rapp. Frederick Rapp later moved to a brick house that is on the grounds of Old Economy Village.

The three people in the photo are unidentified. but according to Buffington, the woman and girl may be Carrie Staples, a widow, and her daughter Katherine. Staples was a boardinghouse keeper there at the time of the 1910 census. 

The photo below shows a recent Google Street View of the former Harmony Hotel building:

277 Fourteenth St.
Google Street View
October 2013

What is not visible from Fourteenth St. is a large addition--that appears to me to be at least as large, or maybe larger, than the original house--built on the back of the building, probably around the time it became the Harmony Hotel. Buffington said the addition "is very much set up like an old hotel." You can see the addition from Boyleston St. Here's a satellite view of 277 Fourteenth St.:

277 Fourteenth St.
Google Satellite View

The other Harmony Hotel in Ambridge

To confuse Ambridge history more than it often is, there was another Harmony Hotel, across town from the one on 14th St. This Harmony Hotel, at 300 Merchant St., was built and operated later than the hotel on 14th St., but was also viewed as disreputable, especially by the American Bridge Co.

This Harmony Hotel was the bane of the American Bridge Co. for years. The company didn't want its employees drinking, and so devised deed restrictions that said that the area within the original boundaries of Ambridge was supposed to be "dry"--alcohol free--for 50 years. However, the Harmony Hotel, mere blocks from the company's plant and office, sold liquor. Legally. That was possible because the Harmony Hotel wasn't in Ambridge; it was in Harmony Township, at that time, just a walk across Merchant St. from Ambridge. Which I'm guessing made its site a very attractive spot for a bar...er...hotel.

The building shows up on the 1911 Sanborn Insurance map as the location of the planned "Hotel May," named for its builder. Sometime between then and 1915, the name was changed to Harmony Hotel. The battle between its owner and American Bridge Co. over the hotel's liquor license appears to have begun early. Here's part of the remarks made by F. T. Cadmus, the plant superintendent, from the Daily Times, October 22, 1915:

The liquor license battle continued in 1916 when the hotel was owned by George T. Davis. In an article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 14, 1916, Davis' attorney claimed that the American Bridge superintendent, Cadmus, had warned employees of the company that they would be fired if they were seen in the barroom of the Harmony Hotel.

So American Bridge must have been pleased by this announcement in the January 2, 1917, Daily Times:

A "temperance hotel" may not have proved to be as popular as the barroom at the Harmony Hotel may have once been, because in 1920, Divine Redeemer Church, across Merchant from the hotel building, bought it and converted it into a parochial grade school. After the church built a new school in 1961, the building was sold to the Karnavas Vending Co.

Karnavas Vending Co.
former Harmony Hotel
former Divine Redeemer School
300 Merchant St.
Google Street View, Oct. 2017

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*Later renamed the Old Economy Hotel in the late 1800s.

After the 1933 Spang-Chalfant strike violence, the immediate aftermath

This blog post is a continuation of the story of the October 5, 1933, Spang-Chalfant anti-strike violence in Ambridge PA. If you haven't yet read about it, I recommend you read my blog post telling the story, illustrated by a number of photos and a newsreel: "Ambridge 1933 anti-union strike violence at Spang-Chalfant." If you have already read it, consider re-reading it. It's a shocking and sad story appropriate for Labor Day.

Strikebreakers on patrol after ending the strike at Spang-Chalfant
AP photo
October 6, 1933

Here's the Associated Press description on the back of the above photo:

Guard Steel Property: Deputies Sheriff are shown patrolling the railroad lines beside an Ambridge, PA., steel plant, around which there has been sporadic warfare between pickets and officers for several days. Tear gas and rifle fire have been resorted to by officers to halt the activity of pickets. 

Since I first started researching the story of that strike, I have been struck by how the workers who were trying to unionize were not only beaten, shot, and teargassed by deputized strikebreakers, but also I've frequently been taken aback by the number of local officials who led, condoned, or were complicit in the violence against the strikers, including the Beaver County Sheriff Charles J. O'Loughlin, County Detective Robert Branyan, Ambridge Burgess P. J. Caul, and county District Attorney, A. B. de Castrique, as well as local police.

But the mistreatment of the workers, or those suspected of being union sympathizers, didn't stop when the strike did.

A 1995 article in the Buffalo Law Review * describes some of post-strike incidents:

The next day, three carloads of police patrolled the streets breaking up groups of three or more at gun point, even on the steps of their homes. Many were routinely searched. Police raided the offices of the strikers to arrest several leaders of the strike, carrying off records and cash, without warrants. Leaders spent days in jail until released on habeas corpus. More than twenty men were fired at Spang-Chalfant. 

"Injured men were also interrogated about their work before treatment."

"Police violently interfered with people going to the funeral of the man killed [Adam Petrasuski], and two women, Edith Brisker and May Ecker, were arrested when they tried to speak to the crowd."

The Law Review article also tells the story of how a community member not involved in the strike was not only shot by the deputies, but also mistreated by the very people who should have cared for him:

Abuse was not limited to pickets, a bread delivery man showed the extent of municipal control.

 I was near Twenty-fourth Street. There were no pickets or strikers there. A bunch of deputies, not among those who came in from the outside but from those who were inside shot at me. They were stationed on the railroad tracks. I did not know what for. I had no stick or anything. I was just watching from a distance what was happening when the fellows from the railroad tracks shot at me hitting me in the back. . . . 

 When I first came to the hospital I had to hang around in the waiting room. I was very sick, so I found a bench and lay down. Pretty soon someone came to me, I don't know whether he was a doctor or who, I was too sick to look up. He asked me "where you work?" I was too sick to reply. 

 The same evening Dr. F.C. Forcey who is on the staff of the Sewickley Valley hospital and who is also the company physician of the Spang-Chalfant Company said to me "You are a red." I said "sure, can't you see all the blood from my wounds." Then he said "You ought to be shot." 

 Then Dr. Boruku, the second day when he went to take the bandage off the wounds, asked me whether I cry. I said no. Then he tore the bandage off my arms, tearing the hair with it. "You must be tough," he said. Then when he started taking the bandage off my head he said "We're going to have fun now." He tried to tear it off. It hurt terribly, tears were rolling down my eyes, but I said nothing. He could not tear the head bandage off, so he took the scissors and cut my hair.

After I collect more information, I hope to write more about what happened in Ambridge in the aftermath of the 1933 strike. Until then, on this Labor Day, think about how people literally fought and died for the employment rights and benefits many U. S. workers have today.
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* Casebeer, Kenneth (Winter, 1995) "Aliquippa: The Company Town and Contested Power in the Construction of Law," 43 Buffalo L. Rev. 617

No bars allowed: when Ambridge was dry--or at least supposed to be

"What was the most surprising thing you've learned about Ambridge from your research?" Lois Himes, a librarian at Laughlin Memorial Library, who died on October 17, asked me earlier this year.

I had to think about Lois' question for a while, but then the answer came to me with absolute certainty, and no other fact about Ambridge I've discovered so far even comes close: the most surprising thing I've learned about Ambridge was that it was once dry. Dry as in alcoholic beverages could not be sold legally. And I'm not talking about just during the Prohibition years; I'm talking about the first 50 years of Ambridge's existence.

At least it was supposed to be dry for 50 years.

Yes, Ambridge, where long-time residents still boast about the number of bars the borough had back in the day when the mills employed thousands of hardworking, thirsty workers. I've heard the claim there were once 200 or so bars where millworkers could stop for a shot and a beer on their way home, no matter what shift they worked. Or maybe on their way to work, although the mills frowned on that.

"Steelworkers in corner beer parlor. Ambridge, Pennsylvania"
John Vachon
January 1941
Library of Congress

Yes, Ambridge, which people proudly claim once held the Guinness World Record for being the town with the largest combined total of bars and churches per capita. (But although I wouldn't be surprised to find that Ambridge indeed once may have had bragging rights to such a record, I've searched the Guinness database and could find no entry for Ambridge or "bars and churches." Nor have I been able to find evidence of any similar kind of official record elsewhere.)

In addition to all the bars, there were dozens of ethnic social clubs that supported themselves with their liquor and beer sales, made all the more lucrative because they were open on Sundays when the bars couldn't open.

"Bar at Catholic Sokol Club. Ambridge, Pennsylvania"
John Vachon
January 1941
Library of Congress

To be clear, not all of the area within the current boundaries of Ambridge Borough was dry, only the original Ambridge, located on land once owned by the American Bridge Co. and later sold through the company's real estate arm, the Ambridge Land Co. That property, which became the borough's First and Second Wards, extended from Big Sewickley Creek on the south to the current 8th St. (then called Bryden Rd.) on the north, and from Park Rd. on the west to Merchant St. and Duss Ave. on the east. I'll refer to it as the "dry area."

I think I first came across the startling information about the dry area in 2014, when I found a news clipping of a car in front of Ambridge's old Davis Hotel, in one of Bill Bowan's albums in Ambridge's Laughlin Memorial Library's archives. The clipping was one of the "Looking Back" photos the Beaver County Times once did from time to time.*

Group showing off car, George S. Capp at far right
at Davis Hotel, 1913
300 Merchant St.
Beaver County Times
July 9, 1984
courtesy Laughlin Memorial Library archives

I'm sure the focus of the original photo was the car--not common in 1913 Ambridge--and the group of men posing with it. But information about the photo, probably provided by Bowan since he was the one who had submitted the photo for publication, included this:

The hotel was almost on the boundary line of Harmony Township on Beaver Road. On the east side of Beaver Road was the township, where liquor sales were permitted.

The location of the hotel was controversial because Ambridge prohibited liquor sales before World War I...But its proximity to the Harmony Township boundary allowed liquor sale in the Beaver Road and Third Street area.

Well, that was a startling bit of Ambridge history. I've been looking for more information about Ambridge's dry area ever since. What I've found since 2014 has gaps, leaving important questions unanswered--including the big one, "Given the legal restriction against the sale of liquor, how did the southern end of Ambridge end up with so many bars long before 50 years had passed?!"

I am continuing my search, but here's what I know so far:

I've mentioned my research about "dry Ambridge" to a few people who have an interest in Ambridge history, and none knew about the restriction on liquor sales. And they'd immediately jump to the conclusion that the Harmony Society, once the owner of the land, was responsible for the alcohol prohibition. But while the Harmony Society's members may have practiced celibacy, they were not adverse to the consumption of alcoholic beverages. The Harmonists were famous for their winemaking skills. In addition, they owned a brewery and a distillery.

Although I haven't seen the legal document that created the dry area, it's pretty clear from newspaper articles that the liquor restriction was at the behest of the American Bridge Co. American Bridge's interest in keeping bars out of Ambridge was obvious: they didn't want their workers coming to work under the influence or lose workers to alcoholism. Newspaper articles show that over many years dating back at least to 1904, American Bridge made a practice of challenging liquor licence applications in the Ambridge area, even applications coming from areas where liquor sales were legal, such as Ambridge properties to the north of 8th St. or in Harmony Township.

As far as I can determine, the dry area's liquor restrictions were put in place in 1903, so before Ambridge was incorporated in 1905.

The Pittsburgh Press, writing about a court case involving the liquor licenses of Ambridge bars in 1938, said that "The American [Ambridge?] Land Co., in turning over that section to the borough in 1903, specified in the grant that no liquor be sold there for 50 years." (Pittsburgh Press, April 30, 1938)

But that legal restriction didn't keep astute entrepreneurs from seeing and seizing the opportunity presented by Ambridge's dry area. Hence, the location of the Davis Hotel, which wasn't in dry Ambridge, but conveniently across Merchant St. from it. And that hotel wasn't the only such business.

In 1904, American Bridge Co. made "strenuous opposition" to granting liquor licenses to five Harmony Township businesses: two for retail licenses, two for wholesale licenses, and one for a brewery. "The deeds of all lots sold in Ambridge contain a clause prohibiting the sale of liquor on the property for 50 years, but several persons have applied for licenses just on the border of the town, where there are no restrictions regarding liquor." (Pittsburgh Press, March 29, 1904)

Yes, in real estate, it's location, location, location!

Ambridge Hotel
Eighth and Merchant Sts., northwest corner
circa 1905
courtesy Ambridge Borough

Location also may explain the seemingly odd site chosen for the Ambridge Hotel when it was built in 1905. It wasn't built in rapidly developing, but dry, Ambridge, which would have placed it nearer the train station, and would have been conveniently located for the growing number of potential guests. And the new hotel didn't join the other businesses clustered in the area that once was the Harmony Society's village of Economy, from 12th Street and north. But rather the Ambridge Hotel was built on the northwest corner of Merchant St. and Bryden Rd (now 8th St.), just a stroll across the street from dry Ambridge, making the hotel the first--and for years the only--Merchant St. business from that northern corner of Bryden Rd. to 12th St.

While liquor sales were always legal in the parts of Ambridge other than the dry area--except, of course, during the Prohibition era (1920 -33)--when were liquor licenses first issued in the dry area? I don't know the answer to that.

I do know that by 1938, there were 30 - 38 businesses in the dry area asking for renewal of their liquor licenses, which means their liquor licenses must have been issued before 1938.

The issue of liquor licenses in the dry area was hotly debated in early 1938. At the time, the "liquor trade" in the dry area reportedly employed 300 people with a payroll of $4,000. The claim was made that the only way to permanently settle the question of legality of liquor licenses in the dry area was by securing a release from every property owner there. (Daily Citizen, February 13, 1938)

And what role did the Borough of Ambridge play when liquor licenses were issued in the dry area before 1938? Again, I don't know. But I do know that in 1938, the Borough was adamantly on the side of the dry area businesses asking for their licenses to be renewed.

From the April 15, 1938, Daily Citizen:

Ambridge borough council will back liquor dealers of the first and second wards to have their licenses renewed despite restrictive property deeds, it indicated last night by voting a resolution against license refusal in the area.

The council said refusing to renew the licenses would "cripple businesses, lower property values and decrease borough revenue from licenses and taxes."

The Liquor Control Board wasn't swayed by the argument about the economic impact of closing bars in the dry area. The LCB refused to renew the liquor licenses of 36 bars in the dry area "after it was discovered" that the 1903 land grant "had specified no liquor be sold there for 50 years." I would have thought the LCB would have "discovered" the deed restriction before 1938, because American Bridge would have told the LCB about it before the licenses were issued, but I need to find information to confirm that.

However, the LCB's decision was quickly reversed in court based on a similar case in Philadelphia that had been decided in favor of the liquor licensees. Plus, the judge reasoned, "the denial of licenses to reputable merchants in the restricted area would allow bootleggers to invade the territory." (Pittsburgh Press, May 1, 1938)

But even after that court decision, American Bridge continued to object to liquor licenses. As late as November 1948, the "restriction against taprooms...under a 1903 property deed" was cited as one of the reasons local clergy and the ever-determined American Bridge Co. opposed the transfer of a liquor license from 348 Maplewood Ave. (also in the formerly dry area) to 398 Park Rd., across Park Rd. from the company's large office. (Daily Citizen, November 19, 1948)

I'll continue to look for information to fill in the current gaps in the history of liquor licenses in the dry area, and I will update this article if I find anything important. If anyone can supply any of missing information about the dry area, please let me know.
_____

* In 1920, the Davis Hotel was sold to Divine Redeemer Church, which used it for its grade school until 1961. I wonder if the hotel was sold because Prohibition made running it a lot less profitable than it had been when could sell liquor. The building is now used by Karnavas Vending Co.

Group photo: Suffragettes, 1909-1910; Abstinence Union, 1906

Lorianne Stangl Burgess provided me with this wonderful photo! According to Lorianne, the group of young women standing in front of the window of the Ambridge Laundry were not laundry employees, but rather were suffragettes waiting for the beginning of a march down Merchant St. At least that's what she was told by the person who sold her the photo. But I haven't found anything in my research to confirm that information.

Suffragettes in front of the Ambridge Laundry
400 block of Merchant St.
circa 1909-1910
owned by Lorianne Stangl Burgess

Here's what's written on the back of the photo: "4th 5 St., Merchant. 1909 -10. Ambridge, PA."

Suffragettes photo reverse

The Ambridge Laundry once was on the east side of the 400 block of Merchant St. as shown in the postcard below. On Walter Wacht's Ambridge Reprise site, he says the postcard photo shows a 1906 suffragette march. I can confirm that the postcard goes back to at least 1906, because the one I own is postmarked October 1906.

Postcard

Suffragette Temperance march

400 block Merchant Street

postmarked Economy Pa,  October 3 1906

I've been trying for many months to try to learn more details about any suffragette marches in Ambridge, but so far, haven't been able to find anything. The hunt continues!

Update July 14, 2016:  While so far, I have found nothing definitive to explain the nature of the march shown on the above postcard, I'm increasingly leaning towards its identification as a temperance, not a suffrage, march. Maria Notarianni, who oversees the Good Samaritan Parish Archives, says that the Archives' copy of the postcard identifies the scene as the "1906 Catholic Abstinence Unions Parade."

The May 28, 1906, Pittsburgh Press says that on the previous day, the Catholic Total Abstinence Union of the Pittsburgh Diocese had held a large temperance rally in Ambridge.

Walter Wacht recently gave me the source of his identification as a suffrage march. "The picture (where ever I got it) had the caption." So there are conflicting identifications of the photo.

Here's a photo of women leaving the Ambridge train station for the temperance march:

Women arriving for temperance parade
May 27, 1906
Laughlin Memorial Library archives

Typed caption: "Assembling of the temperance parade after the arrival of delegates from the Catholic Total Abstinence Union Pittsburgh Diocese. May 27th 1906."

The back of the photo says: "May 27, 1906 - Womans (sic) Temperance League of Pgh - arriving for parade in Ambridge Pa."

Here's a photo of the arrival of men for the same march:

Men arriving for temperance parade
May 27, 1906
Laughlin Memorial Library archives

Handwritten caption at top: "May 27, 1906 - Start of a Parade from R. R. Depot. Note - Adams Express Office, Upstairs R R. Ticket Office; Amer. Bridge Co. & Suspended Arc Lamp on Corner."

The Ambridge Soap Box Derby

Twin Trailer entry,
Ambridge Soap Box Derby, 1960

A note on the back of the photo says:
Twin. Trial Day. This was a few days before the final day. We called the final day "D" day. You either have it or you come back and try again next year.*

Since the Western Pennsylvania Soap Box Derby Fun Run is being held on 14th Street today, and the Derby will be held there on June 7, it seemed like a great time to post some photos of the 1960 Derby. 

Ambridge held its first Soap Box Derby in the mid-1950s--so far, I've been unable to find the year, so if you know, leave a comment.

Ambridge Soap Box Derby parade, 1960
500 block of Merchant Street at 6th Street corner

Note on reverse:
This is the parade for the soapbox derby. I [Walter Kasper] was parade chairman. The parade came down Merchant St. to Eighth St. Up 8th St to Duss Ave. This is were [sic] the races started.

Behind the parade car are G.C. Murphy, Father & Son shoe store, and S&S Shoes. Streetcar tracks are still visible on Merchant Street.

Ambridge Soap Box Derby, 1960

Note on reverse:
Jack Dunn and I [Walter Kasper]. Soap Box Derby. July 4, 1960. Picture taken 3rd & Merchant.

The races were big events back then. Organizers held a kick-off event with refreshments where racers could register. Before the race, there was a parade--and not a tiny one. In 1974, 64 units were expected to march in the parade which began at First and Merchant Streets and ended at the old high school on Duss Avenue.

On race day, thousands of spectators would turn out to watch the cars roll down 8th Street and cheer the racers on. 

Kasper Funeral Home entry,
Ambridge Soap Box Derby, 1960

Note on reverse:
Richard Gutowski and I [Walter Kasper]. 1960. Soap Box Derby. This was my 2nd Entry in the Annual Soap Box Derby. Richard was a semifinal winner.

"The Flying Coffin,"
McCabe Funeral Home entry,
Ambridge Soap Box Derby, 1960

note on reverse:
The Ed McCabe Funeral Home entry (The Flying Coffin)
This is just trial runs, so the boys can see how their car operates. From here they make minor adjustments.
1. Sam Piccinini
2. Walter Panek (Mayor of Ambridge)
3. Walt Kasper ramp boss
4. Made the Ramp
Car did not win the derby.

Ambridge Soap Box Derby, 1960 **

note on reverse:
This is the starting ramp of the contestants who are participating in the soap box derby. The starter has just given the release for the two cars on the ramp. I [Walter Kasper} am looking down to the finish line.**

Back then, the racers--boys only until 1972 ***--would build cars of their own design and materials, so the race was not only a test of driving skills, but also engineering, as well as the wallets of the racers' parents or sponsors.

Enthusiasm for the event seemed high through the early '70s, although even in 1972, the derby director, Fred Loedding, warned that if Ambridge didn't register at least 50 racers, it would lose its franchise. Still, the Derby Committee had plans to build a permanent track in Economy Park. 

But then, interest of the boys and girls, as well as sponsors, fizzled.

The last year the "Ambridge Area Soap Box Derby" was held was 1975. Local interest had waned. Beaver Falls and Ellwood City discontinued their derbies, so instead, the "Beaver County Soap Box Derby" for racers from all of Beaver County as well as Allegheny and Lawrence Counties, was held in Center Township.

In 2009, through the efforts of Tom Patrician, a member and former president of the Ambridge Area Chamber of Commerce who fondly remembered the derbies of his youth, soap box derby racing came back to Ambridge.
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* Although all the photos in this article are courtesy of Bob Mikush, the current owner, the notes on the photos appear to have been made by the late Walter R. Kasper, then the owner of the Kasper Funeral Home at 547 Eighth Street, now Kasper-Hahn Funeral & Cremation Service. All photos are used with permission.

** Note the Gabor Electric building which once stood on the southeast corner of 8th Street and Duss Avenue. The lot now appears to be used as a yard for the house on its right.

*** Girls competed in the national soapbox derby for the first time in 1971. I'm sure that race organizers had a perfectly rational reason why only boys could race before 1971, I just can't figure out what that reason might have been. Were girls incapable of building a car before '71? Were girls unable to steer a racer until '71? Was racing unsafe for girls before '71? Did girls suddenly develop an interest in the derby in '71? Or was racing one more thing girls weren't allowed to do because [insert not-a-good reason here.] 

I note with satisfaction that once girls were allowed to participate, girls started winning races at both the local and national levels.