Showing posts with label History. Show all posts
Showing posts with label History. Show all posts
An original and well-preserved Goodyear-built Heights home, this English Cottage-style house constructed in 1920 features 3 bedrooms and 1 bath in a total of 1,282 sq. ft. The stucco exterior exudes lots of charm and much of the interior has been finished in contemporary colors. An updated kitchen includes many gourmet features, including a true professional-level cooktop. Original features like a brick fireplace and handsome staircase hall help this house retain much of its early 20th-century charm, while providing needed modern upgrades.The home features a spacious and shady backyard with 2 patio areas that are perfect for entertaining – with a brick pizza oven, a smoking pit and a separate firepit. Basement has roughed in plumbing for bath
Notes: 490 Saint Leger Ave. Akron, OH 44305/ 3 bedrooms and 1 baths; ready to move in. The home has gas forced air heat and includes Professional Cooktop / Oven & Refrigerator. For more details, click HERE.
https://m.signupgenius.com/#!/showSignUp/60b044dafaa2baaf94-public1
On Wednesday and Thursday of this week, we will be researching Historical Housing at the Goodyear Library from 10 am to 4 pm. We will show you how simple this can be and we will work together to confirm the style of housing within the historical area.
Friday is our Reservoir Park Pool Party from 4 pm to 7 pm Come and celebrate the artwork done by many of our neighbors and friends along with Mac Love @ play.
GHCAC will be hosting their Cookout on Friday evening from 6 to 9 at the corner of Goodyear and Honodle.
If you are able to volunteer with any of the above activities your help would be most appreciated...there is a lot to do - and "many hands will make it go much more quickly"
Walks will start at Malasia Park, at the corner of Malasia Rd. and Emerson St., and will take approximately an hour. Refreshments will be served at the Gazebo Park after each of the walks and will be provided by R.I.G.H.T. Dogs are permitted on both routes.
If you want to have breakfast before the 10am walk, we highly recommend Julian’s on Pioneer!
The project was directed by Love and @PLAYAkron, a Knight Cities project that is working to create interactive art projects in every Akron neighborhood.
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| One of Akron's new City Water Mains being installed in Goodyear Heights. |
Notes: 1811 Tonawanda Ave. Akron, OH 44305 / 3 bedrooms and 1 bath; ready to move in and enjoy. Central air, forced air heat and detached, 2-car garage. Wood-burning fireplace.
For more details, click HERE.
The process begins with a preliminary questionnaire, which gives a general overview of the nominated area and requires the submitter to provide detailed information about the proposed district. This information generally covers four different criteria, which describe an area’s significance in terms of:
a) Historic significance in terms of key national or local historic events
b) Association with important people of national or local importance
c) Definitive characteristics, representing the work of a master, or distinctive features that make it representative of a type, period or method of design/construction
d) Association or potential for archaeological discovery
While many historic districts have been deemed eligible for the National Register of Historic Places using just one of these criteria, Goodyear Heights can claim to have significance using three of these criteria; a, b, and c. That provides a distinct advantage in pursuing our application.
Our preliminary paperwork also included a number of photographs, including houses, streetscapes, parks and other images which will provide our SHPO evaluation team with an image of the neighborhood’s current condition. Also important were maps of the proposed district and historic maps of the original phases of the allotment.
It’s a long evaluation process; once the materials are reviewed, a site visit to Goodyear Heights will be made by the SHPO to further research the neighborhood and, providing the submission is approved, they will provide recommendations and guidance for preparing the final application for the National Register of Historic Places. This will be submitted to the National Parks Service.
So – our work has just begun! If you have questions, or would like to offer help if it is needed, we would certainly like to hear from you. In the meantime, be sure to sign our online petition, which will help us as we pursue obtaining assistance from the city of Akron on this project.
There was a meeting on July 11, but you can still participate in a community garden survey initiated by Summit Metro Parks. This survey is intended for any resident of the Goodyear Heights, Ellet and City of Akron interested in gardening, socializing, volunteering or coordinating garden-related activities.
A community garden provides a source of inexpensive, high quality food, an opportunity for activities and socializing, and a source of community pride! Please take 5 minutes to help Summit Metro Parks look at your community’s needs and desires. Your responses are welcomed and protected. Please share this link: http://bit.ly/SMPgardensurvey with other neighbors of the Goodyear Heights Lodge which is located at 2077 Newton Street, Akron 44305.
You might be surprised to know that community gardens are not a new thing in Goodyear Heights; during the First World War, many residents worked together to grow vegetables on the allotment's vacant lots. During WWII, a portion of the metropolitan park was also used to grow vegetables in support of the war effort!
Thank you in advance for your assistance in gathering community information regarding community gardens.
The following article is from a 1916 Edition of the company newspaper, The Wingfoot Clan. It provides a lot of interesting details on the progress, and news of a naming contest:
“Sixteen streets of the new allotment, Goodyear Heights No. 2, are as yet un-named. A part of them are continuations of streets and roads already existing and a few have been christened with appropriate names, but sixteen remain to be named. This must be done at once so they can be recorded, and to do this the Goodyear Heights Realty Company is offering a prize of $5.00 in cash to the Goodyearite or member of a Goodyear family who submits the best list of sixteen names before Saturday noon, July 22nd. A blank appears at the bottom of this page which should be filled out and sent in to Mr. Apel. A map of the new sub-division appears on the insert to give you an idea of the lay of the land.
The work on this allotment has progressed more rapidly than the average man appreciates, and is being pushed faster because Goodyear Heights is practically sold out, but a few lots are left. Though it is yet virgin farm land, it has been carefully surveyed and plotted, and the contracts for all grading have been let. The plans for the sewer and water systems are now being made and the contracts call for the completion of all this work by January 1st, 1917. Paving of the streets will then be started early next spring.
The work of designing the sub-division is being done by the same artists who designed Goodyear Heights, and the layout preserves all the natural beauties, the woods, hills and orchards and the little creek valley, converting some of them into parks, others into beautiful residence sections. Prizes will be offered later on for the naming of these places. Goodyear Heights No. 2 is destined to become in a few years one of Akron’s show spots, a residence section ideal for the working man of moderate income.”
While push-reel mowers were not new at the time, not everyone had one—and they were only of practical use if one had a yard planted with well-tended grass. For more troublesome spots, the vacant lot next door, or other areas where a mower could not be used, something more substantial was called for. In this case, it was the Community Scythe.
Today, just about every household owns their own personal weedeater—but this old time solution seems pretty reasonable and entirely neighborly. Pretty cost-effective, too.
(The accompanying article is from the Wingfoot Clan)
So, when it came to getting those workers back-and-forth to the job, the company quickly realized that establishing a Goodyear Heights bus line was the sensible way to go. Of course, you couldn’t expect a company like Goodyear to use just any bus to serve the route, at least not for long. Soon enough, they came up with a novel way not only to move people, but also to demonstrate their technological prowess and demonstrate the performance and longevity of their most advanced pneumatic truck tires.
The company had demonstrated the tires’ heavy payload capabilities through cross-country demonstrations, and they were looking for new ways to show off the product via the heavy demands of day-in, day-out 365-days-a-year transit usage. To do this, they created a Frankenstein of a vehicle that passengers would surely never forget.
"His conviction that the ultimate motor vehicle would be multiple-wheeled, taking the same evolution as the freight car, led to P.W. Litchfield’s working out plans for the first six-wheeled vehicles ever put into practical use in America several years ago.”Since the six-wheel version was deemed a success, Goodyear decided to go one better in 1922, by building an eight-wheel version, with full four-wheel steering at the front. At the time, it was considered a marvel of modern engineering, though we are not so sure about how the vehicle’s looks were received by the people of Akron. Perhaps the best gauge of that is the fact that there were no successors to the eight-wheeled leviathan, and that later service routes were handled by more conventional forms of bus transport.
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| A line up of Goodyear delivery trucks joins the 6-wheel version of the bus on Seiberling Field. |
Back when Goodyear was just getting started, Frank Seiberling wasn’t planning to be limited to the tire business. Goodyear was at the forefront of many advanced technologies, and was fully staffed with some of America’s brightest engineers. These were the same men that built the neighborhood’s streets, planned for its water and sewer utilities, and ensured that Warren Manning’s innovative design became a reality. The company’s expertise in rubber made the construction of balloon and blimp envelopes a natural, and Seiberling’s enthusiasm for flight was the impetus needed to make sure Goodyear became a world leader in lighter-than-air flight.
So it was that when Melvin Vaniman, a noted aerial photographer who had taken up piloting airships, needed a new airship to make a second attempt at an Atlantic crossing, Goodyear manufactured the craft’s giant rubber gas bag. Vaniman—who never actually lived in Akron—had attempted a crossing in 1910, but was forced to ditch in the ocean due to an engine failure. Thankfully, he and his feline co-pilot “Kiddo” survived.
Just as Vaniman was attempting his first transatlantic flight, Goodyear engineer P.W. Litchfield was attending an airship meet in Paris, and on his way back to the US, bought new equipment in Scotland for spreading rubber on fabric and brought two Scotsmen back home with him to operate it. Soon, Goodyear was developing advanced balloon and airship designs, and the company was eager to test them out.
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| Preston and Upson commemorated on a card celebrating their balloon race victory |
Success breeds success, and in 1917 Goodyear became involved in the effort to build an all- new airship for the U.S. Navy, designated the B-Class. The contract was large enough that four other firms—including B.F. Goodrich and U.S. Rubber Co. (Later Uniroyal)—teamed up to get the job done. With its immense experience in lighter-than-air craft, Goodyear led the project, and engineers Preston and Upson played major roles in designing a brand new generation of advanced airships.
Just as young boys of the early 1960’s loved to follow space heroes named Shepard, Glenn and Grissom—boys of the early 1900’s closely followed the daring exploits of airship pioneers like Vaniman, Upson and Preston, which were highlighted in newspapers around the world. It’s nice to know they’ll always be remembered in Goodyear Heights.
That said, the Pond still gets much of its water from natural springs that flow down from Goodyear Heights, and large drains were installed during the neighborhood’s construction to allow natural water flow to find its way down to the Pond. Additional drains were installed at the Pond to lower its overall level by about four feet; this was done to dry up the swampy area at the bottom of Goodyear Boulevard so a solid road bed could be laid down. These drains, in turn, sent overflow into the Little Cuyahoga.
About two hundred years ago, Blue Pond covered two or three times as much space as it does today, and reached all the way over to the ridge at East Akron Cemetery. At the time Goodyear Heights was being built, it was a nearly round body of water, with open banks almost all the way around. Even in the late 19th century, it was a source of amusement and recreation; a boardwalk was built around the lake, a bandstand was built over the water, as was a small dancing pavilion. Investors had collected about $30,000 for additional improvements, but those plans were abandoned when the president and treasurer of the organization made off with the money. A few years later, Goodyear took over the property and had Warren Manning develop an overall landscaping plan as part of his Goodyear Heights work. The plan, which included dozens of tennis courts and other structures, was never fully carried out; the recession of 1920 made it impossible for the company to complete Manning's impressive design. Several years later, Reservoir Park was created, and the everyday recreational needs of Goodyear Heights, which had been mostly served by Blue Pond Park & Seiberling Field, carried on further up the hill.
Mysteries continued to be associated with Blue Pond. For years, people claimed that the pond had no bottom, though later railroad surveys had measured it to be 90 feet at its deepest point, which is still surprising. Some of these rumors are based on witnesses who insist that during the construction of the old dance hall, seven piles had to be driven, one on top of the other, before solid bedrock was reached. This was later refuted by people who were actually involved, who explained that only four piles were driven—next to each other, each one longer than the previous, before the longest was found to be sturdy and of sufficient depth.
Perhaps more sinister were the old rumors that people who drowned in the pond were never found—or that occasionally, bodies would slowly rise to the surface, but then recede again below the depths before they could be recovered. That may have been enough of a spook to keep small children away—at least without parental supervision.
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| Blue Pond in 1913. Goodyear Blvd. just beyond the tree line - East Akron Cemetery mausoleum at upper right. |
Even to this day, there is a rumor that a train car came off the adjacent railroad track and tumbled into the Pond’s depths, never to be recovered. Again, there is no known basis for this story; it may have come about through the existence of some widely circulated pictures taken during the storm of 1913, which flooded the city and blew out the Little Cuyahoga throughout east Akron. About a mile north of Blue Pond, the rail lines were undercut and some train cars did fall into the river bed; the relation of the rail line to the water is somewhat similar and the areas resemble one another to some extent. It is possible that people may have looked at the photos and seeing the locations noted as “East Akron” - mistook one location for the other. It’s hard to say now.
Today, the biggest mystery surrounding Blue Pond is the safety and quality of its water. It was assumed that for years, some chemicals may have made their way into the pond from the Goodyear Research labs (right across N. Johns Ave.) – the spot was originally on EPA radar, but it was officially “archived” many years ago, which generally means that it poses no significant threat and that it is no longer subject to testing or monitoring. If it could be reclaimed as a useful body of water, Blue Pond could again be a great asset to the neighborhood.
Ever since last summer, when we had our Goodyear Heights history walks, organizers on the R.I.G.H.T. Committee and other friends of the neighborhood have been investigating the possibility of having the original allotment officially designated as a historic neighborhood. This designation would include some “branding” by the City of Akron, appropriate historic markers, and providing some helpful assistance in the effort to get a portion of The Heights named to the National Register of Historic Places. It's a critical first step in a process that we believe will lead to a revitalization of this unique Akron neighborhood.
That effort has resulted in new historical research and development of educational information, initial outreach to the community and this website! A preliminary application questionnaire for the National Register is being prepared for submission to the State of Ohio, and a team of volunteers is preparing an action plan to ensure recognition and preservation for the Goodyear Heights neighborhood.
Sign the Petition
One of the best ways you can assist in this effort is to sign our petition requesting the City to provide this official designation, erect appropriate identification signage, and support the effort to secure a place on The National Register of Historic Places. Gathering a large number of signatures will demonstrate that we have strong support in the community and go a long way toward making this all happen! If you need more information about this effort, click here – or email us.
You can sign an online petition, or add your signature to one of the petitions circulating throughout the neighborhood, at R.I.G.H.T. Committee meetings, or at a neighborhood business.
One of the first things people often ask about The Linda Theater is how it got its name. The answer is pretty simple: local builder and developer Ernest Alessio named it after his daughter. Assisted in the design and construction by his sons Lino and Reno, Alessio created a landmark that is not only closely identified with the surrounding neighborhood, but known throughout Akron.
The stretch of land along Goodyear Boulevard where The Linda resides was always intended to be set aside for mixed use (commercial & retail) development; in fact original plans by Frank Seiberling’s architect show a large, attractive Tudor-style building with apartments above and shops at street level. Due to the recession of 1921, it was never built. Over the years, a number of small frame buildings appeared here, including some grocery stores and confectioners, hardware stores and a pharmacy. Goodyear Heights Baptist Church laid claim to the north end of the block.
After WWII, there was building boom in The Heights as GIs returned from the war. In 1948, Alessio purchased some properties on the block and built the Linda to serve the growing neighborhood. An experienced general contractor who built other Akron buildings like the Federal Building and the old Akron Library, Alessio designed The Linda himself after rejecting an expensive architect bid. Son Reno managed the theater for many years and daughter Linda served at the concession counter.
Opening night at The Linda was a big hit, featuring the film “Tap Roots” – starring Van Heflin and Susan Hayward. Billed as “Akron’s Newest & Most Modern Movie Theater” it featured 500 seats, an advanced projection system and of course—air conditioning.
For almost 7 decades, the theater has entertained generations of Goodyear Heights and Akron residents, and has been successfully operated by current owner Ted Bare for many years. The theater continues to play feature films after they have finished their initial runs at major show houses—which allows big savings on ticket prices. In 2008, the R.I.G.H.T. Committee hired Akron artist Brian Parsons to create a large mural on the east side of the building, facing the Boulevard. It features historical, architectural and scenic images of Goodyear Heights from the last 100 years.
After WWII, there was building boom in The Heights as GIs returned from the war. In 1948, Alessio purchased some properties on the block and built the Linda to serve the growing neighborhood. An experienced general contractor who built other Akron buildings like the Federal Building and the old Akron Library, Alessio designed The Linda himself after rejecting an expensive architect bid. Son Reno managed the theater for many years and daughter Linda served at the concession counter.
For almost 7 decades, the theater has entertained generations of Goodyear Heights and Akron residents, and has been successfully operated by current owner Ted Bare for many years. The theater continues to play feature films after they have finished their initial runs at major show houses—which allows big savings on ticket prices. In 2008, the R.I.G.H.T. Committee hired Akron artist Brian Parsons to create a large mural on the east side of the building, facing the Boulevard. It features historical, architectural and scenic images of Goodyear Heights from the last 100 years.
If you’ve never heard of it, Akron2Akron is a locally-based project that invites the community to come together for informal monthly walking tours of Akron's neighborhoods. These walking tours have proven to be a great way to learn about neighborhoods in our city, engage in meaningful dialogue, meet new friends, and think big about how to utilize space in Akron. Most of the tours typically about an hour and end at a neighborhood establishment where participants have the opportunity to network.
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| Vaniman Street, looking north - about 1915-16. One of the first streets completed in Goodyear Heights. |
We created this website for the residents and friends of Goodyear Heights, one of Akron's most historic neighborhoods and one we are determined to preserve for future generations.
This website grew out of the effort to research and recognize the historical importance of Goodyear Heights--not only on a local level, but on a national level--as a prime example of garden city/worker housing from the early 20th century. This significance has been well documented in books and periodicals over the years, but has largely been ignored or forgotten on the local level. Our goal is to remedy this by having the original boundaries of the Goodyear Heights allotment marked and identified and have this historic district recognized on a local and national level. Long term, it would be our goal to have it listed on the National Register of Historic Places, as it has been deemed eligible for such a listing by the State of Ohio.
We are happy to acknowledge the assistance of the R.I.G.H.T. Committee and its members in assisting with these efforts and providing support. Together, it is our goal to work with residents to create a positive future for one of Akron's most historic, stable and unique neighborhoods.
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