UNIONVILLE: Another lunch option

Earlier this fall I wrote about my friend Bob, who was unhappy that both Hood's BBQ and Foxy Loxy are shut on Mondays, severely limiting his lunch choices in Unionville. 
Perhaps it's just coincidence (although I know for a fact that Bob is a good customer of theirs), but Foxy Loxy will now be open on Mondays starting Nov. 28.

WEST MARLBOROUGH: A postponed hearing

The Nov. 22 hearing for the couple who want to add a second floor to the garage on their Springdell Road property was postponed because a sign announcing the hearing wasn't posted on the property, as required by law. 
Because of the glitch, the members of the West Marlborough Township Zoning Hearing Board and Dr. Frances Koblenzer, one of the applicants, agreed to move the hearing to Thursday, Dec. 8, at 7 p.m. at the township garage.
Dr. Koblenzer and Dr. Joshua Farber will need a variance because the height of the garage would be about 26 feet, higher than the zoning code's 15-foot limit for accessory buildings. The property is at 175 Springdell Road, which is on the west side of Springdell Road between Runnymede and Chapel Roads.
Even though the hearing couldn't be held as scheduled, the zoning board members took advantage of the fact that they were together and approved the appointment of the board's new solicitor, Fronefield Crawford Jr., of West Chester.

KENNETT: A century of life

One of my gym instructors could hardly contain his excitement when I saw him at the Y on Nov. 20. He leads a fitness class at the Friends Home in downtown Kennett Square and had a new participant in a recent class. She did really well, he said, but what really floored him was when she came up to him after class and told him that she was 100 years old.
"Wow!" he said, recalling the moment. "Can you imagine what she's seen in her life?"
Two world wars, the women's movement, the civil rights movement, the rise and fall of communism, the invention of computers ... he went through a whole list of 20th-century historic moments, amazed that one person's lifespan could encompass so much.
He said having the woman in his class was an honor and "it really made my year."

EAST MARLBOROUGH: Now a vacant lot

If you often travel on Doe Run Road, perhaps you've noticed the white cottage across the street from the Unionville bus parking lot, near the cemetery of the old Ebenezer AME Church. The long-vacant structure always intrigued me because of its odd proportions: it appeared to be taller than it was wide. I'm told that the last occupant was Florence Highfield.
Well, it is no more: it has been torn down. I drove past on Nov. 22 and workers were clearing away the rubble.

BONFIRE: A fiery celebration

We had a great time at a giant bonfire in Unionville the other night. The hosts had started the fire mid-afternoon, so by 6:30 p.m. it was red-hot and visible all the way from the road. A strong cold front was blowing in, so we huddled next to the fire under quilts and drank hot chocolate. Being outside next to a fire creates a certain camaraderie, so even though we were among the older members of the group, it was heartwarming to meet so many welcoming and articulate young people.
At one point my hat blew off and I threw off my quilt and chased after it. It got caught in the wire fence and for a second I thought all was well, until another gust caught it and it blew right through! I raced along the fence line looking for the next break, which was a few hundred yards away, then backtracked as fast as I could, but with steadily diminishing hopes of ever seeing my hat again. Unbelievably, I found it not even too far away. It stayed tied securely to my head with a scarf the rest of the evening, no matter how silly it looked.

POLITICS: Nothing new under the sun

I believe in the next political campaign I will take the advice that I came across the other day -- too late -- in a 1937 etiquette book:
"If you care too intensely about a subject, it is dangerous to allow yourself to say anything. That is, if you can only lecture about your fixed point of view, then you should never mention it, except as a platform speaker. But if, no the other hand, you are able to listen with an open mind, the chances are that you need put no barriers whatever on any subject. At the present moment Mrs. Oldname and Mrs. Kindheart, really the most devoted of neighbors, are so violently opposed to each other on a certain political question of today, that the first person who mentions the taboo topic must pay a fine."
Sounds like an excellent idea to me!

NEW GARDEN: 19th-century Toughkenamon

A friend from Massachusetts visited our area this summer to do some Owens genealogy research and sent me these wonderful old photos of the Toughkenamon crossroads. Her great-grandparents owned the Toughkenamon general store (now replaced by Deanna's Market) and lived just across Newark Road in a house that is still standing.


The family home, at the southeast corner of Newark Road and Baltimore Pike.



The home as it appears today.

The Toughkenamon General Store, which stood at the southwest corner of Newark Road and Baltimore Pike.