Yesteryears:Jun 15, 1991 Vol 1 No 2
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o/o[. 1, 9{p. 2 Saturday, June 15, 1991 50 Cents Romanian immigrant Nicholas Orashan poses with Of!e of ~he violins he crafted in the years following hzs retirement as a Salem shoemaker. The docks and the Ellis Island immigration depot are shown in this early 1900 postcard published by the Photo & Art Postal Card Co. of New York; By Lois Firestone the people were warned, they'd be sent back. It town of Salem where they bought property along 296 S. Ellsworth Ave. In 1906, with the help of HEY JOSTLED FOR STANDING space on was whispered that if an inspector marked an "E" in chalk on a coat they would be deported. But if friends, Orashan got a job with the Spidel Shoe Co. the ship's deck, the weary immigrants in Salem as a shoemaker, a trade he had learned as Twho had been jammed for weeks into the crowded instead they were handed landing papers, they were free to go. a cobbler's apprentice in Romania when he was in staterooms below. Finally, they could see in the his early teens. disfance the jutting buildings of New York City "We were berded like cattle into a big room and pushed in groups along railings that divided the The shoemaking business gradually declined as and the towering Statue of Liberty, symbols of the man-made materials began replacing leather in freedom which had eluded them in the countries room into several passageways," Mrs. Sanders remembers. An inspector looked closely at the face, shoe manufacture, so Orashan decided to go into where they'd been born. business for himself irf a building along Broadway Then· came the clamor and confusion of Ellis hair, neck and hands of the newcomer, then asked the age and what kind of work he or she could do. Avenue. Later, he built a two-story brick shop on. Island. Wilson Street behind his home. Large numbered tags were pinned to their coats One doctor inspected for diseases and another for eye problems. The final test was whether the For nearly five decades, he cut and glued leather as they filed ashore into the immigration station shoes - a specialty was orthopedic sboes - and teeming with shouting guards and people speaking answers they gave to questions about job pros pects, money and sponsoring relatives were repaired them. When he was 65 he decided to a variety of languages. retire to devote time to his violin making, some Emilia Sanders was only 4 years old but she acceptable. Tfie last stop was before a stem official who thing he'd been itching to do since he was a young remembers the day she stepped onto American soil man in Romania. with her parents, Nicholas and Ludovica Orashan. riddled the immigrant with questions like "Can you read and write?" "Who paid your passage?" He had carved a violin from a wagon wheel hub The long trip from the Romanian city of Becoean in when he was a youngster, and had taught himself Transylvania had been filled with elation tinged "How much money do you have with you?" "Have you ever been in prison?" to play the instrument. In retirement, unable to· with apprehension. play because of a broken little finger on his left Aboard ship, word had sifted through the fore The Orashans - mother and father, Emilia, Earl and Victor - made it through, armed with a train hand, Orashan settled for making and repairing and aft decks about the hurdle ahead of them: they violins - people came from around the country to called Ellis Island the "Island of Tears." If they ticket to Niles, Ohio. The family wasn't destined to didn't pass the medical and legal inspections there, live there, though; they would settle in the bustling Turn to ELLIS on page 3 From a kid's perspective Another Burchfield mystery to solve By Lois Firestone As I pored over the story of D-Day when we were selecting this week's front page from the past I thought back to that time, remembering bits and pieces from those years - I was 9 when the war started and moving into my teens when the end finally came. The strutting Adolph Hitler was the villain and his symbol was the swastika. I puzzled over that because my mother's bank passbook had the same design on its cover: I wondered how the First National Bank could so openly back the Nazis and get away with it (That institution, and others who were using the ancient symbol, quickly changed their logos). I worried- most of the time over the safety of my cousins, uncles and neighbors who were fighting the war - I still treasure the bright blue metal cannister filled with Nazi armbands, pins, epaulets and uni form insignia my uncle Clyde brought back from Germany for me - and I spent hours every week writing lefl:ers on the tiny V-Mail stationery we were required to use for overseas sending. So I wasn't too concerned about inconveniences on the "home front." I do know that it was a big treat for us three kids to get a new pair of shoes or a coat because of "rationing," a subject my mother was always talking about. She bought the shoes, clothes, sugar and butter with the coupons she tore from ration books, and when the stamps were gone, that was that. Companies put out a white-colored substitute for butter, oleomargarine. Each package came with an orange powder she mixed into the white stuff to make it look more like butter. But it didn't, and it didn't taste like it either. She used honey and maple syrup in lieu of sugar, and baking powder instead of eggs in her recipes, I remember. She got a lot of ideas from her Victory Cookbook. Nylon hose were precious - nylon was being Photo courtesy of Kennedy Galleries, New York City used to make parachutes and other war essentials - Call us if you can identify {he site of this 1916 Charles Burchfield painting entitled "Val.ley Road with House." The road actually and in those days women's hose had seam lines run ning down the center back leg. I was intrigued by a named Valley Road in Damascus is in a flat area and is an unlikely site. The artist probably just meant the house was on a road in magazine article back then which told women how a valley. Burchfield (1893-1967), considered one of America's greatest watercolorists, lived in Salem from 1898 to 1921 an.d painted to use a dye on the legs and a pencil you could buy hundreds of paintings in this area. A retrospedive exhibition of his works is planned for next year at the Columbus Art Museum. to make those lines. Retreads were common, too, because tires were impossible to get. So were the autos and trucks to put them on. And refrigerators and stoves. Just Yesteryears about everything. _ Then the war was over and everyone became can be found at the following locations: prosperous. And eight years later Dwight D. Eisen hower was elected the 34th president. It was my first RURAL AREAS year to vote, and I was elated when my childhood Hull's Super Duper hero, World War U's supreme commander of the West Point Grocery Allies, won. Cambell's Deli Dairy Mart Lisbon Bev. Barn Al's Party Shop Sparkle Market Lisbon Party Center Morgan's Drug Super America RURAL AREAS Buckeye Beverage Quick Stop Hilltop Market Rite Aid Drug Store Akenhead Dairy Lisbon Office Empl. McConahey's New & Used IGA Carry Out IGA Hanoverton 9 Fairfield Market Jackson Market Nemenz Foodland Paperback Books Edling's County Str. Damascus Nan's Deli Carry Out Greenford County Buckeye Pharmacy A weekly historical journal Store 10-02 Country Pantry Published by the Salem News . Brian's Carry Out Gromoll Drug Founded June 8, 1991 Ryan's News Mahoning Valley 161 N. Lincoln Ave. Walgreen Drug Dairy Dairy Mart Salem, Ohio 44460 Ben Franklin Dairy Mart 5-258 Dairy Mart Kendricks Phone (216) 332-4601 Rasul Bros. Mkt. Country Fair Lease Washingtonville Beadell's Drive Sami's Thomas E. Spargur Pharmacy Quaker City IGA Sparkle Nemenz Little Corner Store Timberlanes publisher I general manager Village Shop Dairy Mart Giant Eagle Gene's Rite Aid Pharmacy Apothecary Harry L. Stewart Sparkle Super Mkt. CITY (SALEM) Amoco managing editor Vittle Village Fenskes Thrift Drug Oslon Pharmacy Salem Drug Nemenz Hours: Sam's Quick Shop Sunoco Rite Aid Monday - Friday 10-5 Lois A. Firestone Sport Center IGA USA Market Saturday 10-4 editor Or Call 332-4601 To start your 636 Second St., Salem Marda M. Hazel subscription to Yesteryears advertising executive ~~~~~t;~1ir- '.Yes-teryears ~~~~~~~\. Saturtfay, Jwie 15, 1991 A batch of newly arri_ved immigrants pa~iently a'?ait ~heir turns, 1_1lOVing from stall to stall, to be checked by ~actors anq legal ~nspectors b~fore bems admitted mto the Umted States. This interior view published by rhe Detroit Publishing Co. m 1907 is rare and thus a collectible item. Photo courtesy cl Salem Historical Society Nicholas Orashan created this viola with its unusual carved head and donated the instrument to the Salem Historical Society Museum where it is on permanent display. Orashan also was adept at marquetry, decorative inlaid work on furniture and accessories, like picture frames. ~f.~~ <'~ Ell. w-~ ,,~~ IS j:f{~ '·:<i'l;\......._ Continued from page 1 ./;(.!}!)- ~'/~(;- have their instruments repaired. He made 20 in all from tools he made himself drawing from a collection of wood, some specially ordered but most picked up from old buildings tom down around town.