Joel Comm

Last March I spoke at ACE's CoasterBash. It was a priviledge to share a slide show of Rock Springs Park and a virtual ride on the Cyclone to members of ACE's Western Pennsylvania group. I attended with Dick Bowker, ACE's 10th member, and the guy who gave me most of the pictures for my book. We enjoyed a nice dinner and presenations from Idlewild and Kennywood and other parks in our Western PA region.

I didn't realize until I came home that my nametag incorrectly identified me as "Joel." When I walked in the door my wife asked, "So, how did it go, Joel?" Talk about deflation!

Actaully, I wish I was Joel Comm. On a vanity search I discovered Joel Comm, inventor of something called AdSense Secrets. It sounds like he's a rich guy. Joel, if you're out there, I may be a poor relation. Any chance you want to unload some of that wealth?

Rock Springs or Raccoon Creek Park?

(courtesy of Richard Bowker)

I first learned that Rock Springs Park was going to be torn down while on the playground of Chester Primary School (pictured above, center, with RSP in the background). Unfortunately, by the time I got the news via the playground grapevine, it was "Raccoon Creek Park" and not Rock Springs.

"Did you hear? They're going to tear down Raccoon Creek Park and build a bridge that's going to go right over our school!"

I couldn't figure out why they wanted to build a bridge starting 13 miles away in Pennsylvania and spanning the entire upper panhandle of West Virginia to East Liverpool, Ohio, but it suddenly made sense as to why folks in town were so upset about losing business due to the bridge. I imagined some sort of futuristic bridge casting a giant shadow over our tiny elementary school.

Eventually, I came to understand that it was Rock Springs Park and not Raccoon Creek that was to be razed, and that made me sad. By the time I was in the fourth grade at the junior high/intermediate school the park had been sitting unused for four years. Seeing the Cyclone and the carousel pavilion every day on the playground left me with many daydreams and plenty of questions. It would take 35 years to find some of the answers and I'm still learning.

Rock Springs Park is now on Facebook

Aerial View of Chester, WV and Rock Springs Park circa 1928

Grandaughter of one-time Rock Springs Park owners Bob and Virginia Hand, Kassy Hand Young, has a Facebook page were fans can leave memories, ask and answer questions, and check out never-before-seen photos of the park.

At the time of this writing, Kassy's page had 624 friends of "Rock Springs Park" and dozens of personal accounts and childhood memories. Check out the page at http://www.facebook.com/. Of course, you have to join Facebook to visit.

Images of America: Rock Springs Park also got a recent mention on Brian Butko's "News Along the Lincoln Highway" blog. He mentions the park's location along the Lincoln Highway when the transcontinental highway was rerouted through Chester, West Virginia.

Rock Springs Park book release celebrated

By NANCY TULLIS
ntullis@reviewonline.com








Joseph Comm, author of “Rock Springs Park,” signs a book for Patty Swiger at a signing event held Monday at the Chester Municipal Building. Prior to the signing, Comm talked about how his book came to be. (Photo by Nancy Tullis)

CHESTER - Standing along the first base line of his school playground in 1974, Joe Comm was abruptly pulled from a daydream when a kickball whacked him in the head.
"Comm, what are you doing out there?" his team mates yelled. "Get in the game."

Now a teacher of gifted children in Greensburg, Pa., Comm received a warm welcome Monday on his return to Chester for the launch of "Rock Springs Park," a book he authored in Arcadia Publishing's "Images of America" series.

From that first base line, Comm said he could reach out and touch the sun-bleached skeleton of the Cyclone, the once-mighty roller coaster of Rock Springs Park. The last run of the Cyclone was on Labor Day 40 years ago. The park was all but a memory during his boyhood in Chester, and its remnants raised many questions in Comm's mind.

He sought out the answers, and along the way, Rock Springs Park took on a life of its own.
Comm said he was known as a quirky kid - remembered by many people in Chester as that boy who wore his Halloween costume when it wasn't Halloween - and now he is a quirky adult. Being a teacher gives him the opportunity to spend the summer sharing his childhood memories and his quest to learn all he can about Rock Springs Park.

He said he wants to speak to school children and tell them about the park. He has shared the story of Rock Springs Park and his experience writing the book with his own students in Pennsylvania, and they were very receptive, he said.

"I wanted to write the book to show my own children what it was like to grow up in a small town," he said. "You could try anything, and get away with nothing."

He said he is often asked how he found the time to write a book, juggling family responsibilities in a household with four children, and his full-time teaching job.

"Well, I've been driving around for four months with a bathtub knob in my car because I haven't had time to get to the hardware store for a new one," he said.

He noted, however, that now that the book is published, he will spend part of the summer catching up on all those routine repairs and household chores. He said his love affair with Rock Springs Park, however, spurs him to talk about it incessantly, and he can sneak in Rock Springs Park references in any conversation.

Comm told the receptive crowd at the book signing, sponsored by the Chester Kiwanis Club, he hopes the book will be a springboard for others to share their own memories.

The audience had the chance to wander the halls of the Chester Municipal Building and view the hallways and the Memory Lane room crammed with pictures, souvenirs, yearbooks, and other memorabilia of Chester High School and Rock Springs Park.

Although he only saw the park after it was silenced, Comm said, "When I heard Rock Springs Park would be erased, it made me sad. I always had the hope that some rich guy would buy the park and save it for us."

Instead the park gave way to a new highway and a new bridge over the Ohio River.

The people who came to the book-signing have their own memories of the roar of the Cyclone, the strains of organ music from the carousel's Wurlitzer, and forging life-long friendships at the Virginia Gardens Dance Hall.

Displayed prominently in the Memory Lane room is a large painting of a night at the Virginia Gardens Dance Hall by local artist Jack "the Ripper" Owen of Chester.

Comm's book in hand, Jim Pryor said he and his wife went to the last dance in the Virginia Gardens Dance Hall. He said when he was in elementary school, Rock Springs Park was still operating, but dwindling.

"The bumper cars and the carousel were still there," he said. "We lived in the country, and back then, making a trip into town to Rock Springs Park was a big adventure."

Library contest in line with historical books

By NANCY TULLIS (ntullis@reviewonline.com)

NEW CUMBERLAND - Just as two books about Hancock County life by men who grew up there are fresh off the press, Swaney Memorial Library staff is encouraging area children to do some "hometown" writing of their own.

The library staff is accepting entries in its first writing contest for children. Entries can be submitted through July 30.

Anna Raines, director of Swaney Memorial Library in New Cumberland, said the library's first story writing contest gives local children a chance to show off their writing talent.

The topic of the library's writing contest is "Life in Hancock County."

Entries will be judged by Swaney Memorial Library board members. Winners will be selected based on content, creativity, organization and mechanics.

"We want to see Hancock County through the eyes of our local children," Raines said.
Stories are to be hand-written by the children and 250-500 words, Raines said. Children may submit entries to the library by July 30 and winners will be announced Aug. 5.

There are two categories for entries: authors in third through fifth grade; and sixth through ninth grade. Entrants are to write on only one side of a sheet of paper.

Stories may include illustrations, but they are not required, Raines said.
Each submission must include a cover sheet with the child's name and grade level, a contact phone number and a word count.

Recently published books "Rock Springs Park" by Joseph A. Comm and "Growing Up in the Last Small Town - A West Virginia Memoir" by Bob Barnett are now available for purchase.

Comm will be a guest of the Chester Kiwanis Club at 7 p.m. Monday in the Chester Municipal Building for a book signing. His book is one in Arcadia Publishing's "Images of America" series. After a meet-and-greet, Comm will speak at 8 p.m. about how his book took shape.

"Rock Springs is near and dear to the hearts of a countless number of people, each of whom has a 'Rock Springs story,'" said Catherine Ferrari, executive vice president and CEO of Hancock County Savings Bank and a member of the Chester Kiwanis' planning committee for the event. "This is truly a special event that will enable us to go back in time and share those stories."
The Rock Springs book release is timed to coincide with the 40th anniversary of the park's last year of operation in 1970.

Comm moved to Chester with his parents when he was 3 years old and grew up witnessing the silent skeleton of the Cyclone, which had been the Rock Springs Park roller coaster, Ferrari said.
Currently a teacher in and resident of Greensburg, Pa., Comm became fascinated by the lost but beloved amusement park.

Alvin Fineman, planning committee chairperson, recalls dancing in the Virginia Gardens dance hall under the crystal ball, riding the Whip and the carousel, listening to the wisdom of Lowell Thomas or the music of Eddy Duchin and enjoying real homemade taffy. "Rock Springs Park is still in our hearts," he said.

Barnett's book is published by the Jesse Stuart Foundation, which regularly republishes many of the books of Kentucky author Jesse Stuart and periodically publishes books with Appalachian themes and settings. The book is about Barnett growing up in the 1950s in Newell.

"Bob Barnett has written an astonishingly accurate account of the innocence and naivete of the 1950s," said Cheryl Johns of Chester. "His memoir of growing up in Newell is both joyful and poignant."

Barnett retired in 2007 after 35 years of service to Marshall University as a coach, faculty member and administrator. He received a bachelor's degree in physical education from Marshall in 1965 and earned both master's and doctoral degrees from the Ohio State University.

"The book is about me, because it is a memoir," Barnett writes in the preface. "however, I also attempt to chronicle the response of people - specifically the people of Newell - as they tried to grasp the changing landscape of a post-war, modern America."

Advances in technology and the shift of traffic from winding two-lanes to multi-laned interstate highways changed the landscape of the American small town, Barnett writes.

"There are still little towns, but they are tied to a national culture in a way that small towns never were," he said. "The world has come into today's little towns through television and the Internet, on interstates, with McDonald's and Wal-Mart; and the unique character of each small town has vanished. ... My generation was the last to know what it meant to grow up in a small town."

Retired Huntington newspaper employee James E. Casto notes that the Homer Laughlin China Co. plays a key role in Barnett's account of his hometown. He said, however, that by substituting a steel mill or a coal mine for the pottery, the conversation could be about any one of countless numbers of small towns in 1950s America.

Casto referenced a passage in Barnett's book where he states, "Small towns in postwar America represented family and friends, security, and a chance to work in the mill and capture a part of the American dream."

"A dream, alas, that today has faded," Casto wrote in a review, "but it has been given new life in Barnett's affectionate memoir.

About the Author of Images of America: Rock Springs Park

Joseph A. Comm spent his childhood exploring every nook and cranny of his hometown of Chester, West Virginia, but the one place he could not explore was Rock Springs Park, a defunct amusement park which bordered his school’s ball field. The sight of the dilapidated rides and iconic Victorian carousel pavilion which still housed the hand-carved 1927 Dentzel merry-go-round beckoned to a ten-year old Comm, but the “No Trespassing” and “Beware of Dog” signs kept him from hopping the fence and crossing under the wooden supports of the Cyclone roller coaster for a look around; a boyhood fantasy and missed opportunity which led to a lifetime interest in the park.

Comm began researching Rock Springs Park five years ago when writing a children’s novel based on his experiences growing up along the Ohio River – a place once described as “The Showcase of the East.” While researching for that novel, Comm completed a detailed history and time line of Rock Springs Park and in 2008 he shared some of this research online, an effort to attract other fans to share their memories. Kassy Hand, granddaughter of one-time owners Robert and Virginia Hand contacted Comm and urged him to write a book strictly about the park.

Comm studied theater arts and education at the University of Pittsburgh and graduated with BA and MAT degrees. He is a gifted support teacher in Western Pennsylvania where he lives with his wife and four children. When not writing he finds time to sing and play his ukulele.

He hopes that Images of America: Rock Springs Park will bring back fond memories and inspire the telling of more stories to a new generation. Comm sees the book as his chance to give back to Chester and the entire Upper Ohio Valley Region on the 40th anniversary of park’s final season.

Book Release Date

I have been given a release date of late May for Images of America: Rock Springs Park and just wanted to take a moment and thank all of those people who have taken the time to share their Rock Springs Park stories and photos with me.

This adventure began four years ago when I started writing a middle grades novel which takes place in the 1970s and uses the then defunct amusement park in Chester, West Virginia as a backdrop.

Organizing my notes on this blog has allowed me to reconnect with my roots and has given me the opportunity to hear from some old friends and new acquaintances, and for that I am grateful.

This truly has been a wonderful journey!