Steelton: Then and Now

I hadn't yet moved here yet when these Dickinson college students came a-projectin' through our community in 2001.

I love seeing these photographs, but they're already outdated. Things have changed again. The "school" they show (last photo) is now an apartment complex with some pretty decent lofts.

There is a typo (error, anyway) on that page. We have nowhere near sixty thousand residents. Make it a tenth of that and then subtract a few hundred more.

John B. Yetter's book (below) is filled with priceless photographs and other documents of early Steelton.

The first one, a beach in Steelton. Unimaginable today. Although we do have a little boat launch at the end of town still.

From the Dickinson site:

 The river has been used for many recreational purposes over the years.  From 1886 to the 1930s, a Steelton Ferry took visitors and residents around the River, averaging about a dozen trips a day.  It also used to haul wagons so that customers could attend the Steelton Market. 

        A few of the islands, especially Bailey's Island and White Island, were used for church picnics, fishing, swimming, and boating.  Several steamboats and boat rentals took people to the islands.  Frank Albert and Harold Kerns remembered the boat rentals and islands in one interview: 

FA: That was the way they used to go over. Now, there was another fellow's name, Willard Shrauder.  He ran a boat place and he had what they call big batties...Anyway, he had two big boats they were called the batties, but he also rented canoes. And at one time, the beaches were sandy, just like you see at the beaches at the shore... He would charge you a nickel to take you over on a big battie [which could hold] fourteen people.

HK: They had canoes.  Pop said, at one time, they had forty boats that he rented.

FA: Oh yea, he had a lot of boats. On the other side, the railroad owned it. He had buildings and his canoes were on 

racks... Not only that, he put a dance pavilion over there on the island. And he made homemade root beer and stuff and sold it to them too! Now this was when things were tough, man! For a one-armed man, he was a hard worker! 

It absolutely amazes me that there used to be a (perilous!) "walking bridge" out to little Bailey's Island. Check out the photo. How'd you like to be on that in a thunderstorm? The Susquehanna is not shy about drowning people in any of its stretches. It's usually the deceptively "slow" parts of the river which claim the most lives.

This (1903)

becomes this (1911).

West End of Steelton.

Dredging the Susqehanna off Steelton for coal on the bottom (dropped from previous operations). They could gather and sell twenty-five thousand tons a year.

Men paving.

Poor mule whose life is tied to dredging.

Oh Gosh, this photograph gets me. I can't tell you the number of times I have stood exactly where those girls are standing. It's right down at the bottom of my street, such a pretty view still. And I can instantly overlay the past with the present through this photo. You would totally recognize this today, as the principal buildings seen here are still standing. The church has lost its belfry. That church is beleaguered, for sure, has seen better days, but the voices still peal out of there on Sundays. It has one little air conditioner below the big stained glass window (at right, cropped out of the photo). That little unit can't do much in summer to cool down that worship service. Such glorious voices I hear coming out of there.