Sunoco dealers plan bombing of Northern Lights

So, yesterday I was skimming some old issues of The Beaver County Times* when I came across this ad:

Sunoco ad
advertising "bombing" of Northern Lights,
Beaver County Times, January 31, 1969

On February 1, 1969, Sunoco planned to "bomb" Northern Lights by dropping 3,000 Styrofoam balls from an airplane onto, I presume, the shopping center's parking lot, to draw attention to "The New Sunoco Antique Car Coin Game."

Nothing for kids to do except catch the balls--and try to scramble for the higher coin-value blue or yellow balls--and then nag their parents during the following week to take them to one of the listed Sunoco stations to redeem the balls they'd collected for New Sunoco Antique Car Coin Game coins. And maybe they'd win dinner with Romper Room's Miss Pat.

Because nothing says "Antique Car Coins" and "Dinner with Miss Pat!" from Romper Room like bombing a shopping center with Styrofoam balls.

Romper Room. So targeting pre-schoool age kids.

Young kids trying to catch balls.

3,000 Styrofoam balls.

Dropping from a plane.

In the Northern Lights parking lot.

What could go wrong?

I was away at college at the time, so I didn't know about this promotion until yesterday, but I assume that nothing awful happened since there was nothing about the "bombing gone wrong; what were they thinking?!" in the next issue of the Times.

I wonder how well a similar ad promoting a "bombing" of a shopping center would go over today. Even back then, the U.S. was in the increasingly unpopular Vietnam War, so perhaps a plan for a "bombing" via a plane was not the best image for promoting a game.

Does anyone remember the "bombing"?
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*Yes, that's what my life has come down to recently, skimming old newspapers and surfing websites to find information for this blog.

My Father Wore a Hat

Wiki Images

by Robert Giles

Most of the time, Dad wore a fedora – the one I remember best was black and grey herringbone tweed. There was a tiny blue feather in the hat band. 

It sounds dressy and it may have started out that way. But hats have a way of getting more comfortable after two or three years. I think that particular hat served Dad at least eleven years.  Near its end, it looked extremely comfortable.

Dad wore the fedora to church or when he went to the bank or when we visited relatives. When he went to work in the mill, he wore a grey cloth cap like a baseball cap, only with lighter material and a wider visor. It had tiny metal grommets that circled the crown. At the apex was a small round metal button.

Was there a badge with a number on it pinned above the brim? I think there was, at least during the early days. It must have identified him as an employee of the Bridge Company.

Sometimes he pinned his fishing license to his hat and forgot it was there. Mom would remind him that he wasn’t out on a stream bank and hinted that he could unpin it. 

Mom was the family barber and gave Dad a haircut every six weeks. He never ever went to a barber after he married Mom.

Mom wasn't always a steady hand with the clippers – I can show you photographs to prove it. Dad didn’t mind. Why spend good money on a fussy haircut when you’re going to cover it up with a hat anyway?

Dad sure had a big round head. I remember trying on his hat when I was nine or ten. It came down over my eyes. If I bent forward even slightly, the hat fell on the floor.

In winter he wore a red and black plaid hunting cap. It had ear flaps that you could leave tucked up underneath if you were vain about appearance or didn't mind the cold. Dad wore his flaps down from November through March.

I’m pretty sure he took his hat off when he went to bed. Mom made sure he took it off in church - it was customary for a man to remove his hat in a public building. 

The hat creased his hair and flesh in a circle where it rested on his head. It left an imprint like the one you might see on the head of a king who had doffed his crown. No one would mistake it for a halo.

Dad always wore boxer shorts, and thin sleeveless undershirts. Over these he wore long-sleeve shirts, winter and summer. The shirts always had matching breast pockets – the pocket on the left contained a complimentary “pocket protector” from the hardware store and a mixed row of pens and pencils.

He bought work suits at J. C. Penny’s – dark blue-green pants and shirts – cotton twill. He would buy several sets and wear them six days a week for several years, then replace them, alternately buying gray or olive ones.

Dad favored a monochrome look although once in a while a plaid flannel shirt would work its way to the top of his bureau drawer.

His socks matched his pants and shirt - a paler shade of the same color. He wore ankle-high ocher leather boots with heavy treaded soles and waterproofing. He held up his pants with a wide leather belt.

A Stanley tape measure was hooked to his belt. He carried a pen knife in his pants pocket. Sometimes he had sawdust on his sleeves.

He was five foot eight, and weighed 200 pounds for most of his adult life. Dad called it “husky”. He was low and thin in the hips but big through the chest and arms. His shoes were triple EEE wide.

He wore glasses – the kind with frames that are dark on top and clear on the bottom. Dad was always about 20 years behind – not that he knew it or cared. He wore loud, wide neckties from the forties through the 50s and 60s. His ties came back in style in the 70s.

When he went to work,  Dad carried a Thermos and a brown shopping bag with sandwiches, oatmeal cookies, a banana, magazines and two or three paperback novels (“pulp” he admitted freely). He liked anything by Louis L'Amour or Zane Grey. He always read the Saturday Evening Post, and Outdoor Life or Field and Stream.

He was a craneman and read through his breaks since he didn't want to bother returning to earth.

Dad considered the rainbow trout to be the world’s finest expression of beauty, but on a road trip, he would pull onto an overlook and order everyone out of the car to appreciate the sun going down over the mountains.

Dad lived to be ninety-five. He looked like a stranger lying there in his casket among the flowers, in a dark suit, motionless, thin and without his hat.

The David Shop

The David Shop
The Daily Citizen, January 7, 1959

In 1959, Ambridge businesses ran a series of "Meet Your Ambridge Business Establishment" ads in The Daily Citizen. Each week, the ad would focus on one of the businesses listed in the ad with a photo and a brief write-up about the store. On January 7, 1959, the focus was on The David Shop.

The write-up of the store said it was founded in 1947 by Mr. and Mrs. David Apple, who also managed the shop, originally at 704 Merchant Street, but it had been at 658 Merchant Street for three years. According to the ad, "The David Shop carries a complete line of clothing for women with the exception of hats and shoes."

I don't remember much about The David Shop. If you do, please share your memories in the comments.

Update 2/3/2014: A June, 1955, The David Shop ad:

The David Shop ad,
Beaver Valley Times,
June 29, 1955

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Magical Moments Child Care,
658 Merchant Street,
Google Street View

The most current photo I could find of 658 Merchant Street was a Google Street View showing the building occupied by Magical Moments Child Care.

The Demolition of the old Ambridge High School

Ambridge Junior and Senior High School,
Ambridge Golden Jubilee Souvenir Program, 1955

Ambridge High School,
Bridger yearbook, 1964

The first Ambridge High School, built in 1914, was at 740 Park Road in the building which later became Park Road School. My grandmother was among the students in grades 7 through 12 who attended that high school. 

In 1925, a new Junior High School was built in the 900 block of Duss Avenue for grades 7-9. In 1938, an annex to house the Senior High School was built on the south side of the Junior High School. My mother went to grades 7-12 during 1936-42 in the combined Junior-Senior High School. She remembers a beautiful school with gleaming marble and polished wood.

Fast forward to the mid-60s when I went to the high school for grades 9-12. While the sturdy brick exterior of the school seemed to be holding up, the interior, worn and dated, looked older than its actual age. I remember dripping pipes, drafty windows, and in winter, some classrooms would be steamy hot, while others would be freezing cold.

The electrical system was worrisome. The girls' gym, where the boys played varsity basketball, was laughably outmoded. The showers in the dismal girls' locker room no longer worked, for which, I suspect, most of us were grateful.

The large contingent of baby boomers coming through the school added to the wear and tear on the building. To put it mildly, repairs and updating were sorely needed.

After Ambridge schools merged with Baden, Economy, Harmony Township, and South Heights in 1971, the high school underwent a major renovation. In 1979, the school underwent another renovation that included the construction of a field house south of the main building and a new cafeteria where the boys' gym had been located. 

However, some school board members continued to talk of a new high school. In 2005, the year after the high school was declared eligible for the National Registry of Historic Places and Preservation Pennsylvania added the school to its list of historic buildings "at risk," construction of a highly controversial new high school began northwest of the then-existing school. The "old" high school was demolished when construction of the new school was completed in 2008.

P.J. Shotter took photos of the demolition of the old school and has given me permission to post them here. The photos below, plus more, are in P.J.'s slideshow, "Ambridge High School."

All photos of the demolition of the "old" Ambridge High School courtesy of P.J. Shotter, used with permission.

The Super Bowl - Who Needs It?

by Robert Giles

I bet you remember the object pictured on the left. It's a paper football. 

The football is made from a standard 8 1/2" x 11" sheet of paper folded into a tight triangle.

There are various ways to fold a sheet of paper into a football. 

Follow this YouTube link for simple folding instructions --

Simple but Fun Fold

Once you have made a football, you can play a game with a partner. The two players sit opposite one another at a table.  

To score a touchdown, you "hang" a side or corner of the football over the edge of your opponent's goal line (the edge of her side of the table). You have to do this within 4 tries (downs).

If you fail to get a "hanger" within 4 tries or you flick the football completely over the edge of the table (your football goes out of bounds), your opponent takes over on her own goal line and begins to flick the football across to your side of the table (as she would also do if you had scored a touchdown).

A player has to "flick" the football across the table, not "push" it. The finger must not linger. 

A "hanger" or touchdown yields 6 points. When a touchdown is made, the player attempts an extra point. The opponent approximates goal posts by touching his two index fingers point to point with thumbs erect. 

You guessed it. You have to flick the ball through the air and between the opponents "uprights" (thumbs) to score the extra point. Hold the football perpendicular to the table top and flick it good. Technique is illustrated in the following link --

How to Play 

Did I mention that the football is ordinarily flicked while it is lying flat on the table top (it is only held erect when attempting an extra point)?

The game ends when the players decide to quit or an adult intervenes and puts an end to the "nonsense" (or you can set a point limit like 50 or 100 points).

You can play this game while sitting on the floor as long as there are two parallel lines to demarcate the players' goals.

Indulge in as much "trash talk" as you like and never forget, the object of the game is to win at all costs.
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Note: This is the game I learned growing up in Byersdale. As you might expect, there is variation in the rules (we allowed a player 4 downs to achieve a hanger and we did not have kickoffs or the option of kicking a field goal).