Streetcar Sunday - Sayre, Pennsylvania

Sayre, Pennsylvania is located in the Penn-York Valley along with the towns of Athens and Waverly.  The New York-Pennsylvania border cuts through the valley, but there are no physical borders between the three towns, which have seamlessly connecting street grids.  According to Ken Bracken, President of the Sayre Historical Society, the Waverly Sayre & Athens Traction Company provided streetcar service for  the three towns from 1916 until 1930.  Mr. Bracken also mentions that the street looks very much the same today, except for the bank on the corner, which was badly damaged by a gas leak explosion one night in the 1960s.

Sadly, after 1930, there was no public transit for a very long time. Today, the Endless Mountain Transportation Authority provides bus service in the area.

I also would like to mention a great website if you are conducting any history or genealogy research on relatives from Bradford and Tioga Counties in Pennsylvania or Chemung County, New York. Joyce Tice has put together an incredible genealogy and history website for the area.

Camp Upton, N.Y.

The picture above is a real-photo card of Camp Upton, on New York's Long Island. Camp Upton isn't there anymore; in its place you will find Brookhaven National Laboratory. Camp Upton was built hastily in 1917 as an induction and training center for World War I soldiers. One of the soldiers at Camp Upton was Sergeant Irving Berlin who wrote Yip, Yip Yaphank while he was there. The commanding officer at the camp wanted to build a community center at the camp and thought that Berlin could help raise $35,000 to build it with a musical revue. The Yip, Yip Yaphank production included the famous song, Oh! How I hate to get up in the morning, and made $80,000 for the Army, which never built the community center.

The camp was deactivated after World War I, and the land was designated Upton National Forest and  reforested by the Civilian Conservation Corps. With the advent of World War II, the camp was reconstructed and put back into service. Camp Upton was then declared surplus on June 30, 1945, but it was decided that the base would not be dismantled.  Instead, it was converted into a research center for the peaceful uses of atomic power. These are all world War II era cards.

Youngstown, Ohio

Jack from Youngstown, Ohio asked me if I had any postcards from his city. I thought I didn't, but I found one after all, and here it is! You can see from the postcard that railroads played an important role in Youngstown. Not surprising, since it was a center for coal and for steel. These industries drew people from all over the world and led to a diverse ethnic distribution, including Welsh, Irish, German, Eastern Europeans, Italians, Greeks,  Syrians, Lebanese, Israelis, Latin Americans,  and Africans.

The decline of the steel industry in the 1970s meant that Youngstown had to redefine itself and diversify economically. Other cities have had to deal with similar transitions , and it's often very difficult. I hope that Jack will have something to add to this.