Philadelphia Milk Show - 809-813 Chestnut Street - 1911

Horn and Hardart Restaurants - Downtown - Ice and Refrigeration Blue Book 1920

*Brunswick - Brunswick Refrigeration Company, New Brunswick New Jersey

Breyers Ice Cream - Wonder Box- Advertisement - Dry Ice Pack - Pennsylvania Gazette - 7 Dec 1928

University Museum - Pennsylvania Gazette - March 8, 1929

Woodcut by Thornton Oakley

Annual Banquet, National Association of Practical Refrigerating Engineers, Hotel Lorraine, Philadelphia Pa, December 2, 1921

.

Philadelphia Ice Palace Opening February 11, 1920 - 45th and Market Streets

Phila. Inquirer 10 Feb 1920

Soda Fountains in Philadelphia - Ice Palace (Arena) 4530 Market Street Among Others - The Soda Fountain February, 1922

Philadelphia Arena

Society Women Serve Soda - Emergency Aid of Pennsylvania - The Soda Fountain - August 1922

Dixon-Miller Tea Room / Soda Fountain - 15th and Walnut Streets - 1921

A ~ B Stove Company Battle Creek - Deluxe Model - Circa 1936 - Claude H. Alexander Photographer

Stoves - Unknown Scene - Claude H. Alexander


The above stove I would describe as the "delux" model with a warming oven on the top right for dishes or finished dishes, sweet and or savory pies etc., along with what looks like storage space on the bottom with two compartments probably for pot storage. 

A more common apartment model that I remember from sharing an apartment up near Columbia U. close to four decades ago that still had such an antique in it, rent control and all that and the landlord's reluctance to spend on any upgrades on kitchen hardware (below). The apartment with three bedrooms and 1-1/2 baths if you counted the tiny maid's room off the kitchen was in the possession of the same family since the building was built in 1929, father to son to grandson. Great grandson no longer eligible or "grandfathered" into old Rent Control Laws per his date of birth.  Oven and stove needs a big box of matches nearby for use.

A~B Gas Stove - standard model - circa 1927

Perhaps this stove (first photo above) was in the the photographer Claude H. Alexander's Bleigh street house in Mayfair. I also see my grandmother's toaster on top of the warming oven, where you had to manually turn the bread for toasting toward the heating unit and what looks like a leather camera bag on a shelf near the window. 

The A~B Stove Company in Battle Creek was doing business in that name until 1945 when it merged with "Michigan-Detroit Stove Company" - now out of business.

One bit of interest to me in research of A~B was an A~B stove in 1916 that they introduced a stove model that was half gas and half coal. Saw one of these models in an antique store in Easton about 2003 in mint or restored condition with price to match. 

Steel Pier Atlantic City - 1936 - Sand Sculpture of Neptune on the Beach - Sketch Artist for Tips - Claude H. Alexander - Ford Exhibition - Muriel Page and Her Flame Dance Act from 1935

Steel Pier 1936

3533 Bleigh St.(Ave.) - Sample Home - 1936 - Claude H. Alexander

3533 Bleigh Street

Clarke and Kniskern - Realtors - Guest Home Furnished by John Wanamaker

Inquirer 19 Jul 1936

Inquirer 19 Sept 1936

J Jacob Shannon & Co - 1744 Market Street - Hardware - Mechanicals - Contractors

Advertisement - Atlantic City

Engineering and Contracting - 29 June 1910 - "Must Have Catalogs"

Public Ledger 27 Feb 1917

Jack's B & R Services - 2220-22 Germantown Avenue - Claude H. Alexander

2220-22 Germantown Avenue

Phila. Inquirer 8 May 1955

Auto Gear and Parts Co. 3038 Frankford Ave - Claude H Alexander

Auto Gear and Parts

Auto Gear and Parts Co. 

Phila.Inquirer 15 Dec 1944

Car Wreck - Wakeling Street East of Torresdale Avenue 1930s - Claude H. Alexander

Car Wreck

Excerpts Speech Dr. R. Tait McKenzie - Dedication Sculpture "The Homecoming" - Pennsylvania Gazette 13 Oct 1922

Claude H. Alexander - 1894-1978 - Mechanic - Irish Immigrant - Philadelphia Area Photographer

I ran into, backed into,  this photographer's negative collection at the Philly Library collection. 


Then looking around the Internet to document an address on one of the photos I found a bio of a guy with a similar name and the connection in both presentations is the tractor photo(s). 

No bio on the Philly Library stuff. Nothing really published as an obit either on the Internet, my means of research etc.

And interesting bio on one of my favorite subjects, Irish Immigrants, and their contribution to American culture. And since this is an American Doughboy. I liked the story. 


Flag Honors Irish Immigrant


A photo by Claude H. Alexander of the model of "The Homecoming" memorial of the original in Cambridge England, of sculptor Dr.  R. Tait McKenzie @Penn, no doubt at one time on display in Philly?

The photo that a friend J Rowe sent to me from the Philly Library collection by email was of a Gas Station 1930s, no address, which if you grew up at Frankford and Glenwood Aves. would by the image of 3742 Frankford Ave in backgound have to be a local icon of in its day, 1950s-60s repurposed as Cass's Restaurant, more like a greasy spoon and or corner luncheonette. 

Frankford and Glenwood Aves. or 3744 Frankford Ave. with old George L Horn Public School in background (left)

Address - 3744 Frankford Avenue - Frankford and Glenwood Aves - Harrowgate  

Karl Bitter - Broad Street Station - City Terra Cottas - Post Train Shed Fire - Harrisburg Courier - 5 Aug 1923

"Chinese Wall" - Broad Street Station - Market Street - Karl Bitter - Cities of America - Terra Cotta Series - 1903 Wikipedia Commons

Shed Art - Terra Cottas - Karl Bitter? - Broad Street Station

First I heard of these city terra-cottas in the old Broad Street Station. Sounds a bit like it has the makings of an urban legend. 

I have not seen any references until now in much research on the Internet on Bitter. Not to say that sketches and photos do not exist but they likely are still unscanned/imaged in libraries or dedicated art archives on the subject.

Queen City Discovery


Is this the source of your story? Any other clippings? etc.


In terms of further research the likely place to find data would be search on Stephens, Armstrong and Conklin and later Armstrong and Conklin as famous Philadelphia terra cotta makers and under that old spelling, not necessarily terracotta. That and unpublished Karl Bitters archives wherever they may exist. 


The Clay Worker

This article make its sound that the Bitter bas reliefs on ten American cities would be finished and installed after the opening day of the newly expanded renovated Broad Street Station. That would mean to me less newspaper articles on the subject.

That duplicate terra cotta panels may have been installed in PRR stations around the country, along with panels put in BSS. Terra Cotta is a product that can be duplicated in mass etc. 

That the Cincinnatti panel could have survived the 1923 fire and then be placed in the Cincinnati train station sounds like an internal corporate thing on which little published material is likely available. 

An interesting tangent to the whole old BSS story btw.