OHara Twp. My childhood area...got a history book now.

deepskyal

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Aug 17, 2007
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O'Hara Twp. My childhood area...got a history book now.

Speaking of collecting history books of areas......

This was in Thursday's pittsburgh Post Gazette.

I grew up in Kittanning Pike and went to Kerr School and thought this was neat as heck to see they spent so much time collecting history of the area.
Naturally, the area isn't the same as when I was a boy 50 years ago, but lots of "The Pike" remain unchanged.
Actually, the house we lived in was lost to a landslide when Rt.28 was built and they undermined underground springs on the hill behind our 100 year old house. That makes a lot of the houses on Kittanning Pike well over 100 years old now. Unfortunately, a lot of the houses were built smack dab up against the hillside, so no back yards and across the street are pretty close to the creek.

Kerr School made some significant changes to adapt to the ever growing population...it's huge now! But...my last drive by, some of the play areas I remember from when I went there, are still visable. Maybe they've been renewed since then, but the general topography remains and probably a jackpot to anyone that detects it and knows where the kids used to play versus where they play now.

This is also the same area I found my oldest dime..1886 or something like that. It's been a while.

I haven't got the book yet...kinda expensive I think for something that's probably small in pages...but definately something i'll have to go to the book store to check out.

Here's the article......

O'Hara history book 33 years in the making
Thursday, May 29, 2008
By Len Barcousky, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette




Courtesy of Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters Inc.
The space where this merry-go-round at Ross Grove was located in 1917 is now occupied by a National City Bank in the corner of the Fox Chapel Plaza's parking lot along Freeport Road in O'Hara. Note the "Forest Ride" in the background."General" James O'Hara, the Irish-born soldier in the American Revolution for whom O'Hara Township is named, was never really a general.

Volunteers writing a new history of their community confirmed that finding as part of their research for "Portrait of an American Community: O'Hara Township, Pa."

Separating facts from legends was one of the many challenges in producing the work, according to Tom Powers, chairman of the history book committee.

Committee members also uncovered new information about their families, discovered local links to national figures and relived portions of their early lives.

The final product is 280 pages and includes about 500 photos, drawings, maps and illustrations. Topics covered range from the region's geology 300 million years ago to the creation of the Bayernhof, a musical museum, in 2001.

The writing of O'Hara's history turned out to be a 33-year undertaking.

An initial effort was begun by Rachel Cook in 1975 -- the centennial year of the township's creation -- and was restarted in 1982 by Evelyn Conti. The effort began anew in 1994 with a re-formed committee organized by Ruth Weir.

O'Hara council budgeted $30,000 to underwrite the book, and committee members praised council's support for and patience with the project. They also had kind works for township Manager Julie A. Jakubec, herself a history buff.

The completed book is dedicated to Mrs. Conti, who died in 1993, and Mrs. Weir, for her work to keep the effort alive.

For Mr. Powers, the book project has led to discoveries about his own family. His ancestor, James Power, was the township's first settler, arriving sometime before 1797. (James Power added an "s" to the family name early in the 19th century.)

While searches for documents on the Historic Pittsburgh Web site, he found a reference to an 1846 interview with Power done by Lyman Copland Draper for a never-published book on colonial history.

That interview, which includes a description of a skirmish with Indians during a 1781 journey down the Ohio River, is included in the book.

Mrs. Weir, who served as committee secretary, has lived in the township for 50 years, literally surrounded by its history. She and her husband, James, live in a house on the grounds of Greenwood Cemetery on Kittanning Pike.

The nondenominational burying ground is the final resting place of about 43,000 people. They include Pittsburgh-born Playwright August Wilson, who was buried there in 2005.

Committee member Carol Szwedko did much of the research on the Rev. James R. Cox, a Pittsburgh priest with a national following. He was the driving force behind Coxtown, a community where unemployed men and their families could become self-sufficient on quarter-acre lots.

The development, begun in 1932, was located on 36 acres near Saxonburg Boulevard where Calmwood Road was later constructed.

Harriett Grdenich was 6 years old when she had her picture taken in front of a Coxtown cottage.

Now in her 80s, she had her daughter call regularly to see when the book would be completed, Mrs. Weir said. "Finally last week I was able to tell her it had been published and her picture was in it," she said.

Committee member Al Zimmerman, 81, recalled listening to Father Cox's radio broadcast during the Great Depression. "When he came on the radio, we all would sit down to listen -- even though we were Lutheran."

Researching churches and schools brought back many memories of growing up in the community, he said

Budgets were tight, and the O'Hara school board kept spending on frills like student transportation to a minimum.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, two battered buses carried students to the township's newly built Kerr School, Mr. Zimmerman said. The small vehicles were known as the "chicken coop" and the "pig pen," he recalled.

The book devotes several pages to the county's first airport. In 1925, Allegheny County foreclosed on a township farm belonging to the McRoberts family and constructed Rodgers Field.

Among the famous aviators who landed there were Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart.

The airport was built in what was the bottom of an ancient river valley, Mrs. Weir said, and landings were always tricky.

That proved to be the case when Earhart arrived on Aug. 31, 1928. She mistook a field next to the airport for part of the runway and struck a hidden ditch. Her landing gear collapsed and her plane went nose first into the ground. Neither she nor her passenger, her future husband, George Putnan, was hurt.

What is the story behind General O'Hara?

After emigrating from Ireland in 1772, Mr. O'Hara had successful careers as a soldier, a businessman -- with help from Sen. James Ross, for whom Ross Township is named -- and a federal official.

He initially came west and worked as a trader and Indian agent around Fort Pitt. During the War for Independence, Mr. O'Hara served as an officer in the Third Virginia Regiment, a unit he helped form and finance. He saw action on the Kanawha River in what is now West Virginia and later served as a quartermaster for Gen. Nathaniel Greene.

After the war, he returned to Pittsburgh as a storekeeper and involved himself in other businesses.

After President George Washington appointed him quartermaster general of the Army -- the staff officer in charge of supplies -- Mr. O'Hara began to refer to himself as "general," Mr. Powers said.

But when Jack Reynolds, a member of the township history book committee, contacted the U.S. Army's Carlisle Barracks for information on Revolutionary War veterans, he learned that Mr. O'Hara's top Army rank was colonel.

"If you have to explain what kind of general you are, you probably are not what people think of as a general," Mr. Powers said.

Other committee members include John Arch, Lee Campbell, Lydia Meshanko and council representative Joe Frauenholz Jr.

Copies of the O'Hara history are available exclusively at the Aspinwall Book Store, 20 Brilliant Ave., Aspinwall, 15215. The store's phone number is 412-782-7082. The cost is $39.95.

It also can be ordered online from Mechling Books at its Web site, mechlingbooks.com. Click on the Bookstore tab, then search for the word "O'Hara."


Len Barcousky can be reached at [email protected] or 724-772-0184.
 

tanner

Jr. Member
Dec 5, 2007
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Re: O'Hara Twp. My childhood area...got a history book now.

im in the lawrenceville area...im gonna have to check it out up that way
 

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