Memory Lane

While researching potential images and stories to share in the last chapter of Images of America: Rock Springs Park entitled, “The Magic Lives On,” I was told of a group of volunteers who were putting together a Memory Room in a classroom of the old Chester High School Building, now the City’s Municipal Building. The room, I discovered upon visiting in 2009, was originally set aside as the Mayor’s Office, but the mayor gave up his new “digs” and moved upstairs, opening up the classroom on the main floor to the Memory Lane Committee.

In my youth, the old high school was an intermediate/junior high, including grades four through nine. "Memory Lane" was my fifth grade language arts room. Specifically, I recall drawing a winter mural scene on the blackboard with a variety of colored chalk sticks. The teacher was enthusiastic about my artwork until it was discovered one of my dark green pieces of chalk was actually a fat crayon. I was worried upon entering the same room, thirty-four years later, that the blackboard would still be there, complete with my impossible-to-remove wax evergreens. Fortunately, though, the they have all been removed and, other than the view out the window, the classroom looks nothing like the one I remember. The intsitution green walls are now white.

View of the old high school beyond the Cyclone taken from the top of the Aeroplane Ride in Rock Springs Park circa 1947. The school is shown prior to an addition being added, which would house additional clasrooms and one day The Memory Lane Room. (Courtesy of Sherry Emery.)

When I took the photographs below inside the old high school in December 2009, I was using a low-grade disposable camera as I had forgotten my digital camera at home, thus most of the dark and grainy images were not used in the book. (I had hoped to take a photograph of the Memory Lane Volunteers, but we were not able to coordinate it. The women are listed in the book on page 127.) The Memory Room project was just getting started when these photographs were taken and would not officially open until June 21, 2010, coinciding with a slide show talk I gave in the cafeteria, sponsored by the Chester Kiwanis Club to kick off the publication of the book.

In the hallway outside my old Fifth Grade Language Arts class is the Chester Hall of Fame and Local History Displays. Inductee Plaques are hung above the display cases which were originally embedded with student lockers.

Inside the Memory Lane Room of the Chester City Building, two Hans Hacker paintings are on display. These were donated by Robert M. Hand, oldest son of owner Robert L. Hand. Bob willed the paintings to the city as per his mother Virginia’s wishes. The Log House (left) was once the family home of the Hands in Rock Springs Park. The second Hacker Painting is of the Carousel. Hacker, a celebrated decal and ceramic designer who fled Nazi Germany in 1939, painted hundreds of scenes of his new home, East Liverpool, OH, and the surrounding area.

Bob Hand, oldest son of Rock Springs Park owner Robert L. Hand is pictured in the hallway of the Chester’s City Building along with my mother, Margaret Cline, in the Chester High School Class Portraits of 1956.

My Grandfather, Clifford Otto Comm, a charter member of Chester's Kiwanis Club, was posthumously inducted into the Chester Hall of Fame on July 1, 2011. I was able to attend the ceremony, but have yet to see his plaque displayed along with the other inductees. I look forward to seeing it and Memory Lane again, soon!

$70,000 Buys Park in 1950

It was never completely clear to me, while researching the book, whether or not C.C. Macdonald purchased Rock Springs Park in 1926 or just leased it. His family suggested he bought the park, having always wanted to own one during his years as manager of Euclid Beach Park in Akron, Ohio. However, the documents I uncovered all listed Macdonald as “lessee” or “president” of Rock Springs.

What is clear is that he spent A LOT of money improving the park prior to his first full season in 1927.

C.C. Macdonald (Partial image courtesy of Tish Hand; see full photograph in Images of America: Rock Springs Park)

The old Victorian trolley park had fallen into disrepair following its glory days under the ownership of Charles (C.A.) Smith Sr. Smith bought the park in 1900 and added the carousel pavilion, lake, pool, and the World’s Greatest Scenic Railway. His park was hugely successful until a law was passed in 1912, prohibiting the Pennsylvania Railroad from offering reduced-rate excursion tickets; a law which would not be revoked until 1929, negatively affecting profits for Smith for many years.

Large group excursions continued to be the biggest moneymaker for the park until it closed in 1970.

Except for the final days of its existence, the carousel pavilion saw its worst years toward the end of Smith’s tenure as owner/operator. The image above shows the pavilion with broken windows and roof stains on July 4, 1917. Much later photographs show that even when the park sat vacant from 1970-1974, the repaired windows of the carousel pavilion remained intact.

When Macdonald leased the park in 1926, he vowed to restore it to its former glory. He removed the old scenic railway, which had been converted into something resembling a modern coaster, and built the Cyclone roller coaster from the ground up. He also upgraded the dance hall, added a small zoo and go-cart track and a restaurant in the lower trolley loop.

The red and green striped roofs of the park’s buildings, which I still remember seeing as a child, were added as a part of Macdonald’s original improvements.This image shows the striped roof of the Crystal Pool Bath House.

Images of America: Rock Springs Park fully explains the Smith to Macdonald transition, including why Macdonald and his wife, Grace, left Rock Springs after just a few years to become part owners of Idlewild Park in Ligonier. (See the Macdonald Years 1926 – 1934)

A recently discovered newspaper article from the Youngstown Vindicator dated October 7, 1950, suggests that Macdonald did not own the park, even though he had spent a lot of money in upgrades as lessee:

East Liverpool, Oct. 7. – Charles A. Smith Jr., today announced the sale for $70,000 of Rock Springs Park at nearby Chester, W.Va., to Mr. and Mrs. R.L. Hand, who have managed the 50-year-old amusement resort since 1935.

This article, if true, would establish that C.A. Smith’s son owned the park at the time of the sale to the Hands instead of the Macdonalds as was previously thought.

One detail, that should be mentioned, is that whether they were lessees or managers or owners both C.C. Macdonald and the Hands spent large sums of money in their early days as operators. Macdonald spent hundreds of thousands in upgrades and new features, and the Hands slowly purchased rides and buildings from 1935 to 1950.

It is most likely the *$70,000 price tag was mainly for the land, an investment which would pay off in a big way when the state bought the property to construct a highway extension and new bridge in 1974.

*$70,000.00 in 1950 had the same buying power as $640,526.69 in 2010.
Annual inflation over this period was 3.76%.