The Saga of “Chestie”

by Erin Doane, Curator

On the morning of July 25, 1940, a half-grown gray kitten strolled into the offices of the Community Chest, located in the Federation Building in Elmira. Undeterred by the summer heat and humidity, the kitten frisked away the hours. At the end of the day, janitor Thomas Rutzke gave him sleeping quarters in the building’s boiler room. Two days later, Miss Thelma Ewald of the secretarial staff added the newly-dubbed “Chestie” the kitten to the Community Chest rolls. A photographer from the Elmira Star-Gazette was there to capture the momentous event.

Miss Thelma Ewald and “Chestie,” Elmira Star-Gazette, July 27, 1940

Just days later, calamity struck the staff of the Community Chest. A headline on the front page of the second section of the Star-Gazette at the very bottom of the page read: “Anybody Seen ‘Chestie’? He’s Strayed.” By August 8, when the article ran, “Chestie” had been missing for almost a week. He was last seen by Thomas Rutzke when he put the kitten to bed in the boiler room after a long day of sleeping on files in the office and following the janitor around the building on his duties. James Harper of the Community Chest offices conducted a thorough search of the neighboring alley and byways but was unable to find any trace of “Chestie.”

Elmira Star-Gazette, August 21, 1940

On August 19, a half-grown gray kitten strolled into Elmira City Hall. William G. Morrison, manager of the auditing division of the City Welfare Department arrived at his office that morning and found the kitten asleep in Joseph F. Kienzle’s chair. Various staff members at City Hall, including dietician Mrs. Ruby B. Brewin, took to feeding the cat milk, dog food, and ice cream. They called him “Fifi” and “Jerome” but staff at the Community Chest were sure that he was actually their “Chestie.” The secretaries were particularly anxious for the return of their adopted pet. A Star-Gazette reporter went to City Hall to find out the truth and interview the cat but he disappeared into the neighborhood of the Meat Inspecting Department before the reporter arrived.

Elmira Star-Gazette, August 21, 1940

Unfortunately, there was no further articles about the stray kitten’s saga. Did “Cestie” return to the Community Chest? Did he live out his days as a beloved pet at City Hall? Did he move on to another building and collect another set of office parents? The world may never know.

Archives Explained: Part II

by Rachel Dworkin, Archivist

People often asks me what happens to their things after they donate. I already discussed what happens to collections of papers, but what about one-off donations? I am regularly given one or two random items someone found in their basement or grandma’s attic. As with the larger collections, my job is to find a home for these items and make sure they are accessible to researchers and staff.

Let us take, for example, this mounted flour bag which was recently donated to the museum that I cataloged last week. 

The flour bag in question

Step one is to label the item. Every single item in both our paper and 3D collections has a unique number used to identify it. This flour bag’s number is 2018.0032.0003. The 2018 refers to the year in which it was donated. 0032 indicates that it was given by the 32^nd donor of the year. 0003 indicates which of how many items that person donated. In this case, the flour bag was the third item of three, the other two being a photograph and a jug. We use pencil to label our paper-based item and either cloth labels or a special lacquer on our 3D items.  

This is where it bag lives now

 Step two is to find a home for the item. In our archives we have two types of collections: organic collections which were created by a person, business, or organization and given to us by them in their entirety; and artificial collections created by the staff from multiple donations based on a specific topic or format. Some examples of artificial collections include our photograph collection, which contains photographs, and our religion collection, which includes material from various churches and synagogues. Single-item donations are always filed within the artificial collection which best suites either their topic or their format. Based on its size, I chose to file the mounted flour bag in our oversized items collection.

Step three is to create a detailed catalog record of the item. I describe, measure, and photograph it. I do research into the item’s background in order to place the item into its historical context. In this case, I used the Elmira City Directories to figure out when the company which produced the bag, Elmira Steam Mills, was in operation and where it was located. Once I have all this information, I enter it into our museum database along with its location information. Here at the Chemung County Historical Society, we use a program called PastPerfect. We also have a second database linkedto our website which researchers can use to search our collections. 

Catalog record for the flour bag in PastPerfect

Embarrassing Moments

By Kelli Huggins, Education Coordinator

 

Embarrassing moments: we’ve all had them, and people in the past were no exception to this shame. While I won’t be sharing any of my own personal lowlights, I do really enjoy a regular column that ran in the Elmira Telegram in the 1910s which printed reader-submitted embarrassments for everyone’s enjoyment. If you spend some time reading them, you’ll realize that there are certain situations that are universally embarrassing, regardless of the decade in which they occur. However, some others are a little hard for us to relate to in the 21^st century. Below are a selection of some of my favorites:

The most embarrassing moment of my life was when I sat down on a custard pie at a picnic.

My most embarrassing moment was when I attended my first dance. I was not a good dancer and as the music stopped I heard my partner say under his breath, “Well, thank goodness!”

The most embarrassing moment of my life was when I went to a party with a girl. During the party it began to rain pitchforks. Another youth offered to take the girl home under his umbrella. She declined, saying she would rather go under my umbrella. Imagine my embarrassment later when I had to tell her I had no umbrella.

It was late when we arrived at the theatre and the house was dark. Our seats were in the balcony, and as I went down the aisle I laid my hand on what I thought was a post, but lo and behold. It began to move. What was my horror to find that the object was a man’s bald head. In my embarrassment I stammered in an audible tone, “O, pardon me, I thought you were a post.”

While parading down one of the streets in the loop I noticed that everyone looked at me. Being as homely as they make them, but perfectly healthy, I commenced to think I was getting better looking. After several passersby laughed out loud I looked at myself from head to toe and discovered that in my haste I had only one spat on. To make matters worse I had the spat on over a shoe and the top of the shoe was gray and the spat white.

My most painful as well as most embarrassing moment was when I once occupied the speaker’s platform with six men. I being the only woman. I had a new frock for the occasion, an airy-fairy thing that made me feel I was at my best. But not for long . How can I describe my physical torture and mental anguish when I discovered that I was not the only inhabitant of that dress? My right to be therein was being disputed by a flea! Squirm and writhe as I would and pat and smooth with my hands, I could not persuade that flea to leave nor yet to dwell with me in harmony. To leave the platform was out of the question and when in a few minutes my address was called I was frankly and plebeianly scratching!

The Popcorn Truck in Wisner Park

by Erin Doane, Curator

One of the most famous sights at Wisner Park’s summer market is the restored antique popcorn truck that was originally owned and operated by Frank Romeo from 1930 until his retirement in 1971. Many people who remember Romeo and his truck have fond, nostalgic memories of the kind man who sold popcorn, peanuts, and other treats in the park. Not many are aware of the struggles that he went through to become a beloved fixture in downtown.

The Popcorn Man by Lori Mustico

The website https://www.elmira-ny.com/popcorn/index.shtml has a wonderful history of the work undertaken by the Popcorn Truck Preservation Society in the late 1980s to restore the “Red Wagon” to its former glory. It is definitely worth reading about all the time and effort that went into bringing the popcorn truck back to life, so to speak. My focus here is going to be on the truck’s first life with Frank Romeo.

Frank and Constantina Mustico Romeo with the popcorn truck, 1971

Frank Romeo was an Italian immigrant who came to Elmira in 1912 at the age of 17. He was drafted into the military in 1918 and served in World War I. In 1922, he began his nearly 50-year career in the popcorn business. At that time, he had fallen ill and lost his job. He told a Star-Gazette reporter years later that his doctor told him “if I didn’t get more air I might as well build my own box. So instead of building a box, I built a push cart. And I started selling popcorn.” The southeast corner of North Main and West Church Streets in Wisner Park seemed the perfect place to get fresh air and sell popcorn he popped by hand over a coal stove on his cart.

In those early days, however, Romeo had not settled on that corner of the park as the only location of his business. In July 1929, he had a popcorn and soft drink stand on West Miller Street in front of the Southside playground. On the night of July 10^th, a drunk driver crashed his vehicle into the stand. Romeo received $335 from the driver in $10 weekly installments to cover the damages done. A clerk who happened to be at the stand at the time also received $60 for hospital expenses and to replace his clothing that was ruined in the crash.

Little Red Wagon Set by Talitha Botsford

In 1930, a local car dealer made a specially designed popcorn wagon on a two-ton chassis for Frank Romeo’s business. With this new truck, he settled into his corner near Wisner Park at North Main and West Church Streets and had no desire to leave. Even his arrest that year for violating section 154 of Article 12 of the city ordinances would not move him. The text of the law reads:

No person shall permit any vehicle owned or controlled by him to stop upon or anywise encumber any public streets or places within the City of Elmira…for a longer period than 15 minutes along any block while engaged in selling or offering for sale any provisions or merchandise;…and no person shall erect or maintain any booth or stand, nor place any barrels, boxes, crates or other obstructions upon any such public street or places for the purpose of selling or exposing for sale any provision or merchandise.

Romeo’s arrest came after Alderman John B. Sheehe registered a complaint on the floor of the Common Council against the operation of freelance street peddlers. He introduced a resolution directing police Chief Elvin D. Weaver to act to enforce the ordinance. Romeo’s friends and fellow military veterans rallied around him after his arrest, believing he was being discriminated against. No other merchants had been arrested even though nearly every grocer or fruit dealer in the city was in violation of the ordinance for having boxes and crates full of merchandise on the sidewalks in front of their businesses.

Romeo pled not guilty before the Recorder’s Court and was represented by Attorney Harry Markson, a veteran himself of World War I. After the war, veterans were given state licenses to operate as peddlers. Romeo had such a license as well as a city permit to operate his business. The city’s recorder found Romeo not guilty of violating the ordinance regulating the operation of street peddlers and ruled that he had a legal right to sell his wares any place in the city at any time because of the ex-serviceman’s license he held. The recorder also noted that any peddler without such a license was in violation of the law and would be punished.

Elmira Star-Gazette, April 26, 1930

Romeo’s victory in court helped establish him and his red popcorn wagon as fixtures in downtown Elmira for years to come. There were still some bumps along the way, though. On June 9, 1931 his truck was damaged extensively by a fire that was believed to have been caused by defective wiring. A leak in the gasoline tank added fuel to the fire. During World War II, butter became scarce and rather than use a substitute that would bring down the famous quality of his popcorn, he shuttered the business and did other work. At the end of the war, he returned to his parking spot on the corner of North Main and West Church Streets. 

Even when the city put in parking meters, public outcry led the city to set aside the parking space for Romeo for as long as he wanted it. And he stayed there until he retired in 1971. He was in his 70s at the time and had become a bit jaded by conditions in the area. His popcorn wagon was vandalized on occasion, once having its tires slit. In an interview several years after his retirement he said, “It was those park people. The hippies. I couldn’t see staying open just for them.”

Popcorn truck on the highway, 1971

After retiring, Romeo sold his popcorn wagon to Kenneth White, a school teacher, for $1,000. White intended to use the truck as a source of summer income but he only ended up selling popcorn from it a half-dozen times before parking it in a garage. Nearly 20 years later, the newly-restored popcorn truck made its triumphant return to Wisner Park. Now, the truck lives full-time in a specially-constructed brick and glass building near the corner Romeo had claimed as his own and it comes out to provide warm, fresh popcorn at the Wisner Market.

When the popcorn truck returned to the city in 1988, 25 1-pound bags of the original popcorn Romeo had purchased were found in the back.