Henry Lynn for in the Age of Steel: Oral Histories from Bethlehem Pennsylvania
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This is an interview with Henry Lynn for In the Age of Steel: Oral Histories from Bethlehem Pennsylvania. The interview was conducted by Roger D. Simon on July 14, 1975 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. 00:00:00 Simon: Henry Lynn at his home at Moravian House in Bethlehem, July 14, 1975. My name is Roger Simon. Mr. Lynn, tell me whereabouts that you were born and about when, if you will. Lynn: I was born out at 409 Church Street across from the Nisky Hill Cemetery. I was born the ninth of September in 1887. 00:00:59 Simon: Have you always lived in Bethlehem? Lynn: All my life. Simon: What was that neighborhood on Church Street like when you were a youngster? Lynn: Well, they were all homes, with the exception of a corner grocery store, but everything else was homes around the whole neighborhood. Simon: What kind of families lived around there then? Lynn: All people that worked at the Steel1, practically. Simon: What did your father do? Lynn: He worked at the Steel for—I don’t know how old he was when he left, but then he went into the meat business, had a meat market. Simon: Where was his meat market? Lynn: On 88 East Broad Street, one of the sections that’s torn down now. Simon: 88 East Broad Street. Was he a butcher? Lynn: Yeh. 1 Bethlehem Steel Simon: Was he an immigrant or was he born— Lynn: No, he was born here. Simon: Do you know what your family background is, where your people come from? Lynn: Well, I asked. My grandmother used to say we came from Germany, but I could understand that now. But Dr. Lussier2 (sp?), when we were first married, he asked me where the Lynns came from, and I told him I thought Germany. He said, ‘I’m going to look it up.’ And he said we were a cross between the French and Irish. He said the name wasn’t always spelled L-y-n-n. It used to be F-l-y-n-n. But then somebody dropped the ‘F’ and made it Lynn. Simon: But your grandmother said it was German? Lynn: Yes, she—I’ll tell you why. She had a cousin that committed a crime, and he belonged to an organization that would help him. So they brought him down to Germany and got him on a boat at 12 o’clock at night and got him out of there, and that’s why she thought they came from Germany. Simon: You never identified yourself with the Pennsylvania Dutch3 then, though, particularly? Lynn: No. Simon: With that group. Lynn: Although I never could talk a word of English when I went to school, or started school, I mean, but— Simon: What did you speak? Lynn: Pennsylvania Dutch.4 2 Project staff were unable to identify this individual. 3 Emigrants and the descendants of emigrants from southwestern Germany and Switzerland who settled in Pennsylvania in the 17th and 18th centuries. 4 Pennsylvania Dutch (or Pennsylvania German) is a dialect of High German spoken by some emigrants and the descendants of emigrants from southwestern Germany and Switzerland who settled in Pennsylvania in the 17th and 18th centuries. Simon: You did speak Pennsylvania Dutch. Lynn: Yes. Simon: That was your native language? Lynn: That’s right. That was what we spoke. 5 00:02:30 Simon: What did your father do at the Steel, the iron company , I guess it was called then? Lynn: At that time it was the iron company. I don’t know what he worked at, to be truthful. I don’t know. Simon: You don’t remember that period when he was with the iron company? 00:00:59 Lynn: No, I was just a kid then, and I guess I was only about nine years old when he left and went into the meat business. Simon: And he had a shop on Broad Street. Lynn: On Broad Street, that’s right. Simon: Did he have that for a long time then? Lynn: Yes, we had it until the Depression of 1904, I guess it was, and then things got bad, and he said, ‘I better get out before we lose what we have,’ so then he quit. Simon: Did he just retire then? Lynn: No, we went in the flour and feed business then. Simon: Flour? Lynn: Flour and feed. 5 The Bethlehem Iron Co. assumed the name Bethlehem Steel Co. in 1899 and then Bethlehem Steel Corporation in 1904. Simon: Did you go in business with him then? Lynn: We were in business together until the Bender & Person firm went out of business, and then Nate Fritch6 and my dad bought them out, and then we were there until my dad wanted to retire, and then Nate Fritch and I had it until we had a fire, cleaned us out. Simon: Where was this first flour and seed business? Lynn: Back of—let’s see. What is it? It was in the back of the bank, corner of Adams and 3rd Street. We were back in McKinley (sp?) Street. Simon: On the South Side. Lynn: On the South Side. Dirks & Everetts7 (sp?) Hardware Store was in the front, and Pete Davis8 had a candy store, and then the Five-and-Ten, but then the bank took it over later. Simon: What was the name of it? Lynn’s, is that what it was called? Lynn: Yes, Lynn’s Feed Store. 00:04:16 Simon: What did you call it when you had it? Lynn: We still left it at Lynn’s Feed Store. Simon: Same location? 00:00:59 Lynn: Same location. Then when we burnt out there, I went in for myself up at Broad Avenue and 3rd Street, where the gas station is now, and, of course, Depression came along. Simon: That was it. 6 F. Nathan Fritch was the son of Trion D. Fritch, owner of the milling operation T. D. Fritch & Sons. F. Nathan and his brothers ultimately bought out their father’s interest. Trion died in 1908. 7 Project staff were unable to identify this business. 8 Peter Davis was operating a candy store on the South Side of Bethlehem in 1911. Lynn: Took all my shirt. (laughs) 00:04:39 Simon: Took your shirt. Let’s go back to your Church Street days. What kinds of things did you do as a boy? What did you have for recreation? Lynn: Really didn’t do much of anything. All you could do was set in the house and help your mother or watch them out working in the garden. You didn’t own a baseball or anything like that, those days. 00:00:59 Simon: Sandlot baseball? Lynn: No, no, we didn’t have anything like that. Simon: Any parks? Did you go to the fairgrounds? Lynn: Later on, we used to go to the fair, and then, of course, we didn’t live on Church Street then anymore. But you would go out to Central Park. Simon: On the trolley? Lynn: But, of course, in our days when I was a kid, we didn’t get there very often. We had a pretty good-sized family, and my dad couldn’t afford— Simon: Fancy, fancy trips. Lynn: That’s right. 00:05:40 Simon: Most of the people in your neighborhood worked at Steel? Lynn: Most of them did, yes. Simon: Then did you live over the meat store when you had that? 00:00:59 Lynn: Yes, we moved up to there when—well, first, when my dad started, we lived down on North Street, one of the buildings that’s been torn down now too. Then after he went into business, he worked for F_____ Winch that time, but then he moved up. When he started his own meat market, we moved up a little further, and then we moved into the same building. Simon: So you lived over on Broad Street. Lynn: Yes, that’s right. Simon: What was Broad Street like in those days? Lynn: Well, I know one time we used to have boys across the street we played with, the Kensmith9 (sp?) boys. Their father had a drugstore, and, of course, we’d run back and forth across the street. But one time we had such a heavy snow, and people shoveled it out, and the trolley company came and pushed it back. Then we dug tunnels through to get over from one side to the other. Those days, we had snow. Simon: Yeh. A lot of people lived on Broad Street then. Lynn: Oh, yes. Simon: Over all the stores and everything. Lynn: You know, sometimes I’d tell them when—around the corner was old D_____, corner of Broad and Main, had a cigar store there, and there was an ice cream factory, and old Jim Foltz10 (sp?) had a store up there where the drugstore is now, and when I tell him that we had a police booth out in the middle of Broad and Main and on a rainy day they had to throw planks across it so the cops could get out into the booth, they can’t understand that. But that was true. Simon: It was all dirt. Lynn: Oh, yes, muddy. Had an awful time. Simon: What about sidewalks? Did they have any sidewalks? 9 Project staff were unable to identify this family. 10 Project staff were unable to identify this individual. Lynn: Well, we had the sidewalks. Simon: Wooden or concrete? Lynn: Well, some concrete and some brick.