History center plan
is one for the books

By Diane Prokop
Times Staff Writer

When organizers of the Center for Northeast Philadelphia History laid out their mission, it was direct and uncomplicated.
The region’s history had to be preserved, especially for generations to come.
That history, in large part, is information about the neighborhoods and the various names they went by before and after their incorporation into the city of Philadelphia in 1854.
The history center, or CNEPH, would become a central hub for information and make it more accessible to the public, with cross-directories and a Web site with links to neighborhood historical societies, landmarks and topics of interest.
During last week’s meeting at the Fox Chase Library, the group formally expanded its mission with the creation of its first subcommittee to document historically significant buildings and those that are in danger.
"The Northeast has a record now of losing more homes to stupidity," said Harry Silcox, CNEPH co-director.
The committee was born out of necessity and proved its value recently by jumping into action to bear witness to the passing of the Reuben Parry house, a late-1700s stone farmhouse at Knights Road and Chalfont Drive.
"It was a real gratifying moment that this fledgling group was able to document it," said Bustleton/Somerton historian Bruce Conner, who is chairman of the new committee.
The historic home’s owner, Fred Weiss, reluctantly sold the property because it demanded much care. The house was razed last month to make way for construction of three single-family homes that’ll be priced at about $489,000 each.
Holmesburg Civic Association president and historian Fred Moore photographed the home’s demolition, as if he were some battlefield correspondent. He also brought a much heavier artifact from the house to last week’s meeting — the 1798 date stone, which will be housed at the Historical Society of Frankford.
The society was founded more than 100 years ago with the goal of preserving all of Northeast Philadelphia history.
Over the summer the group will work to prepare an inventory of their neighborhoods’ historic properties. Those properties would be designated as such because of their locations, what took place there or who lived in them.
In other business, Temple University professor and author Allen Hornblum told the group about work on his latest book on Harry Gold, who lived on Kindred Street in Oxford Circle. Gold, a laboratory chemist, was convicted of being a courier who moved secrets from Los Alamos, New Mexico, to the Soviets during the Manhattan Project, the secretive campaign led by the U.S. to develop the atomic bomb.
Hornblum, whose works include Acres of Skin, Confessions of a Second Story Man: Junior Kripplebauer and the K&A Gang, and Sentenced to Science, asks anyone who may have known Gold, who was paroled in the mid-1960s and died in 1974, or worked with him at the former John F. Kennedy Hospital to contact him at 215-331-0537. ••
Reporter Diane Prokop can be reached at 215-354-3036 or dprokop@phillynews.com