From the final end of the Christmas season to a rash of burglaries, from plans for a six-story building downtown to breaking ground at Olean General Hospital, here’s a look back on the week that was 100, 75, 50 and 25 years ago in this edition of Turning Back the Clock.
April 24 — The Christmas season is “all done and over.” Many Oleanders who use the North Park for a shortcut to their homes and places of business discovered this morning that the Christmas tree which shone so brightly last Christmas eve in the public celebration and which has been trying to take root has been dropped to the ground, loaded into a truck and taken to the dump four months after the holiday. The evergreen was the only bit of color in the park during the winter months, but now that new “shades of the Irish color” are being show, the old standby was discarded.
April 30 — After eight years in the United States, Paula Patton, 17, was taken to the Erie train bound for New York to be deported to Kovno, Russia, where she was born. Mental deficiency is the reason given for deporting the girl — whose parents and siblings are allowed to stay in Olean. “Why should they take my Paula from me and send her to a starving country?” said Mrs. H. Patton of East State Street, prostrated on the ground as her child was sent away. Many prominent men of the city have dispatched telegrams to President Warren G. Harding to intercede on the girl’s behalf, but so far the efforts have fallen on deaf ears in Washington.
April 24 — Burglars breaking into a pair of Armory Place businesses Friday night got about $130, police said. The robbers broke into the cash drawer at Winchester Optical Co. and took about $200 — but $115 was in checks. They then are believed to have taken between $12 and $15 from the jukebox in the Archie Bowser billiard parlor. A board was used to climb up the rear of Neal’s Restaurant, 146 N. Union St., and the burglars are believed to have climbed over a roof and entered the billiard room through an unlatched window. Five more area places were burglarized Friday night, including the Coliseum roller skating rink and the Walter A. Smith Furniture store in Ceres, the general store in Little Genesee, and the Bert Ensworth and Louise Clarke gasoline service stations in Allegany.
April 28 — The First Presbyterian Church congregation is adamantly opposed to the Loblaw “super store” planned for across the street from their church, the Rev. Whitney Trousdale told the Common Council. “The Presbyterians are not happy about the proposed store because we don’t think it will add to the beauty” of the area, Trousdale said. The minister stressed potential traffic problems due to the store, and asked aldermen if there were steps to block the development. After the complaints, city officials said they would reach out to the company to discuss possible alternatives or ways to alleviate concerns. Today, the store is the home of the Olean Public Library.
April 25 — City officials inked a deal with the state Urban Development Corporation to build a six-story building with stores, a senior center and 100 apartments on the cleared corner of North Union and East Sullivan streets. The deal declares the UDC as the “preferred developer” for the site, and Montgomery Ward — which owns a store next to the site — has the first right of refusal on the commercial space on the ground floor. Never built, today the site is the home of the Cattaraugus County Campus of Jamestown Community College.
April 28 — Olean schools Superintendent Oscar Pultz resigned from his position in the aftermath of the acquisition of the former Thatcher Glass Co. site for a new secondary school. While that project is moving ahead with demolition, “it seems apparent I have reached a point where someone else — someone who is not an issue with the community — could better carry out the program,” he said, adding he leaves Olean “with enthusiasm” and not as a response to personal attacks amid the heated acquisition process that led to several public votes and lawsuits.
April 28 — Olean General Hospital broke ground on “a brilliant future” when CEO Robert Catalano lifted the first shovel of dirt for a $30 million expansion project. “We are not building a new hospital wing, we are contributing to the rebuilding of Olean,” he said. Along with more space and a new central entrance, the project will expand the emergency department, expand the waiting rooms, add new surgical suites, add a short-term stay unit, and expand visitor amenities. Meanwhile, officials at the Salamanca Primary Healthcare Complex — the former Salamanca District Hospital — have reported that the Changing Seasons drug and alcohol treatment unit has closed and the future of the facility is in jeopardy.
April 29 — After complaints from merchants and residents over a deal to demolish the Palace Theater and other North Union Street structures, Olean Mayor James Griffin reported the city has little say in the matter. “This certainly isn’t an outcome we would have gone after to achieve, I will say that, but the reality is this is a private land deal,” he said. “The city does not have the authority, nor should it, to tell people what they can do with their own property.” Officials noted the multi-million price tag to save the circa 1917 historic theater had proven to be too expensive with a lack of help from the state or federal governments.
