Did you know?
“Fayette Man Featured on Collier’s Front Cover,” was a headline on the front page of the Uniontown Evening Standard 70 years ago this week.
Collier’s, a competitor of The Saturday Evening Post, had chosen to feature two Fayette County natives in 1943.
An illustration depicting Sgt. Edward B. Malinay of Chestnut Ridge appeared on the front cover of the Oct. 2 edition of Collier’s.
Malinay had earned a Purple Heart for his heroism during “a thrilling episode during the bombing of the enemy base (near Rabaul, New Britain).
The accompanying story told of the courageous efforts Malinay made to save the life of his partner, Cpl. Donald Kerns.
Malinay and Kerns had been engaged in a bombing at 29,000 feet, when Kerns fell unconscious.
It was reported that Malinay risked his own safety, by removing his oxygen mask and carrying Kerns to safety within the bomber.
Malinay would later be awarded a Purple Heart, and a promotion.
Kerns and Malinay had been fighting together since Dec. 8, 1941 – the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Ironically, another Uniontown man had been depicted on the cover of Collier’s Magazine just a few weeks earlier.
The July 24, 1943 edition of Colliers featured Uniontown’s George C. Marshall on the cover.
Collier’s, by the way, was first published in 1888. It stopped publishing in January of 1957, but the Conshohocken, Pa., magazine was resurrected in February of 2012, and it exists on a bimonthly basis today.
They say, “You live and learn.” I’m always open to that.
I’ve known for a long time that Stewart Avenue in Uniontown was named after Andrew Stewart, the U.S. Congressman from German Township, who served for four terms in Congress.
What I didn’t know was something I discovered in the Sept. 23rd, 1932 edition of the Uniontown Daily News Standard.
Stewart, because of his fierce defense of American business interests, was known as “Tariff Andy” across the country.
According to that 1932 Daily News Standard item, there is also a “Tariff Alley” named in honor of Stewart’s nickname located in Uniontown.
It seems that “Tariff Alley” “runs from Fayette Street parallel with Stewart Avenue east.”
The following day, (on Sept. 24, 1932) the Daily News Standard carried another item I’ve found to be a bit fascinating.
“At random: there are nearly ninety-five thousand people in this country who do not know how old they are,” said one of those items.
Birth records, to that point, weren’t nearly as important as they are today, I guess.
Back on Sept. 24, 1975, the Uniontown Evening Standard carried a front page story that shows that those folks at certainly NASA had their eyes on the future.
“NASA Studying Windmill Tests,” said the headline for a story about how NASA engineers had “placed a giant experimental windmill into operation after indications it may be a practical supplement energy source.”
In 2013, there are dozens of wind farms across the country, and 83 countries around the world are using wind power on a commercial basis.
Readers of the Sept. 30th, 1893 edition of the Uniontown Evening News may have been encouraged by one story on the front page, but perplexed by two others.
Baseball fans may have been heartened by the news that the New York Giants had arrived from Pittsburg (without the h), for two games with a local baseball team.
It was one of many visits to Uniontown by Major League baseball players over the years.
Right below that story was another story that may have caused some distress.
“A GHOST ON THE RAILROAD,” was the headline for an item about how Uniontown residents had seen a ghost “wandering up and down the P.R.R. track,” near the fairgrounds.
One resident said that “about 12 o’clock last night he met the spirit of the other world and when he spoke it immediately vanished,” said the story.
But on the top of that front page, that day, there was an even more macabre story.
“THE DEAD ALIVE,” was atop a story that chronicled a strange set of circumstances in Somerset.
“Monday evening a telegram announced the death at Garrett, of Miss Halley, a 14 year-old daughter of Thomas Halley of Cumberland, Md.,” said the lead paragraph.
The girl had been riding a horse-driven carriage when the horse became frightened and ran away, causing the carriage to upset.
“Miss Halley fell on her head and broke her neck,” it was reported.
There was a valiant effort to save her, but to no avail.
Preparations for her burial were made with a local undertaker.
But before the undertaker could perform his duty, the eyelids of the “corpse” began to twitch.
That twitching took place only a short while before Miss Halley’s body was to be placed into a casket.
A physician was summoned and pronounced her alive, and that she was expected to live, at least, a short while.
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