A reader sent me the above image last night. It looks down the hill from 7th and Hamilton, north, toward Linden Street. He has been attempting to locate the old Lafayette Radio store on 7th street, because of a pleasant memory from his childhood. By my day, the store had moved onto the southern side of the 700 block of Hamilton Street. History is quickly succumbing to the wreaking ball in Allentown. All the buildings shown above, on the left or west side of 7th Street, have been knocked down for the arena. Most of the buildings on the photo's right side are also gone. I suspect the few remaining ones will be gone soon, as they have been recently purchased in speculation of the Transformation Phrase 2, the Event Center. With the departure of Salomon Jewelry, Tucker Yarn remains Hamilton Street's last remaining business from the glory days. It's first store, on 7th Street, can be seen on the left side of the above photo.
The above image can be found in Doug Peters' Lehigh Valley Transit
above reprinted from January of 2012
ADDENDUM JUNE 3, 2024:None of the buildings shown above, or businesses mentioned, still exist. Worse, new comers to Allentown know nothing of what was here before they arrived. Those of us with such memories of Allentown's past are in short supply, and of no value to the new guard. Never the less, I persevere with this blog and Allentown Chronicles, the facebook group. My solicitation to join the new park non-profit remains ignored.
What the photo doesn’t show is what’s been lost beyond the buildings, and our safety is chief among those unseen losses.
ReplyDeleteOver the weekend, a young man was gunned down in broad daylight at Fountain Park, a few blocks from 7th and Hamilton.
Mayor McClueless spouted some drivel about how the city is “…committed to addressing the systems that allow violence to occur…with a focus on social engagement.”
Equally clueless State Rep Josh Siegel said "We have a great record here in Allentown of catching the folks that break the safety and security of our city."
How comforting that must be to the victim’s family. I’m guessing that most residents, including the person murdered on Saturday, would prefer that our politicians focused on stopping the killings.
This isn’t rocket science. We need more police to protect us, not shot spotters and other gimmicks, and the police can be the ones who “socially engage” the criminals running rampant in the city.
anon@6:45: I'm disappointed, but not surprised, that Mayor Tuerk said that the shootings are preventable. He assumes if there are more job opportunities and affordable housing, these characters will sing kumbaya with him. In the meantime, I wish he would hire more police... I don't think that we have the money or time for his best hopes.
ReplyDeleteWe have turned into Brooklyn!!!!
ReplyDeleteI also found it interesting that when an elderly couple was hit by a vehicle last month (an accident), the mayor gave a very angry “I’m fed up!” comment on that, and has declared a goal of ZERO pedestrian deaths in the city.
ReplyDeleteBut for yet another murder in the city, we get the typical press release filled with political catchphrases and platitudes. Honestly, it was so generic that it might have been recycled from previous shootings.
Kind of lets you know how much he really cares about the murders/shootings.
I’m old. I’ve traveled to hundreds of small and midsize cities across most United States. Stayed overnight in many. I can tell you, most of those cities do not hold the same lack of respect for older, more charming and inviting buildings as Allentown sadly does.
ReplyDeleteOlder buildings can STILL work just fine well into the future. Of course, they need to be properly maintained along the way. The wrecking ball should only be a last resort solution.
To make matters worse, today’s architects and designers (especially as seen too much throughout the Lehigh Valley) replace more interesting and attractive stock with boring, sterile, thoughtless, Plain Jane, cardboard box-like, storage containers.
Some of the junk rising-up nearby makes me shake my head. It reeks of overstock building materials, some components left over from previous builds. In my opinion, structures built by Alvin Butz Company are most the most lacking productions. K-Mart designs, if you will.
One condition of the NIZ scheme was that it only pertained to new construction, but it was only to pertain to commercial, and they have fudged that for residential. Unfortunately, they didn't also fudge the new construction mandate. A major insult to injury is the beautiful art deco, WPA post office sitting there being vandalized. The Art Museum, Historical Society, etc. who should speak up, are only for cheese and whine, no value what-so-ever.
DeleteI see what you did there... cheese and "WHINE"... yep, you got it!!! If they got off their collective duffs and did something besides WHINE, this town might advance... but I digress... it is what it is!!!
DeleteWhen Allentown became the third largest city in PA, it was targeted and captured by the Harrisburg/Philly political kingpins. It is now a source of income, power, and influence for them, run not for the citizens of Allentown, but for political benefit. Conditions will not change until the elected positions, city, state, federal that represent Allentown are really contested when office holders' terms expire. Until then, you have no choice and the citizens are just in their way until the next time they need your vote. You get what you vote for.
ReplyDeleteSo I just read a new Op-Ed by the mayor on how the city can get to zero road deaths.
ReplyDeleteFrom his article: “Allentown’s population is 54% Hispanic and 13% Black. One-fifth of our residents live below the poverty level. We want a transportation environment that serves today’s community, so everyone can participate in the city’s prosperity.”
There’s so much to start on with just those two sentences, but it seems to me that if he’d really want everyone to participate in “the city’s prosperity”, he’d speak up about the largest government perk in the city’s history (the NIZ) being monopolized by a few white guys. But saying something about that truth could cut a political career short.
Instead, Hispanic and Black residents will have to be content with infrastructure “improvements” like fewer traffic lanes, more bike lanes, and fewer one-way streets.
In the past, that may have been viewed as throwing a few crumbs to those who the Mayor views as peasants. But in today’s political jargon, that’s “equity”
Hopefully, those groups will enjoy that slice of the pie, I mean “prosperity”.
I also read that article and thought "this guy oughtta live on a farm because he's one of the greatest manure spreaders in history!"
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