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The time and market for Allentown memorabilia has come and gone. With a changing population, and the graying of the older town folks, objects of our history are destined for the landfill. Even the local historic society concentrates on shows of general interest, such as Abraham Lincoln. In addition to having been a retail mecca, Allentown manufactured a large assortment of products. Allentown was stamped on tools, knifes, and metal products of all kinds, distributed nationwide. A local regional food product was the hard pretzel, a variation of the traditional German soft pretzel. Allentown had several pretzel companies. Miller's operated out of their factory at 732 Tilghman Street, between 1944 and 1978. In the coming months this blog will profile some of these Made In Allentown products, before litter and meaningless slogans became our legacy.
reprinted from July of 2013
Millers, Charles chips, have been replaced by retail jobs and warehouses distributing foreign goods.The lehigh valley had many local business's that are long gone. All the clothing manufactures from Northampton down to Easton. silk Mills, dye houses, shoe manufacturers. Foundries that made castings for U.s. made manufactured goods. This demise started in the early 70's The foundries were put out of business by the Clean Air Act, not by an effort to clean air but by a draconian method of forcing them to purchase equipment beyond their ability. It could have been a joint effort working together, rather than do it now or close up. We shifted the manufacturing of the clothing, shoes, steel, foundries and most all manufacturing goods to Asia, first Japan now China, to the point that we have a dependent economy, not able to provide basic necessities to the American people.
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