©2006 The Chestnut Hill Local

Local Life

During war, Hiller reports on life in Damascus
by BETSY O’NEIL

Chestnut Hill native Betsy O’Neil now feels right at home in Damascus, Syria, where she has observed many refugees fleeing from the war in Lebanon.

Ed. Note: Betsy O’Neil is a Chestnut Hill native and former teacher at the William Penn Charter School who has been living and teaching English in Damascus, Syria, for more than a year. She filed this report with the Local after war began recently between Israel and the Hezbollah terrorist organization in southern Lebanon.

Obviously people think I am in a danger zone. I do not feel it. Perhaps in my naiveté I think Israel won’t bomb Syria. But I cannot imagine it. Then again, people in Beirut probably couldn’t imagine it either a week ago.

Connection to Chestnut Hill history
90-year-old twins still as youthful as ever
by AUDREY LEVINE

Twin sisters June Spielman and Christine Morris celebrated their 90th birthdays last month at the Chestnut Hill home of Marianne Mannino, who is dating June’s oldest son, Dr. Charles Spielman. (Photo by Kristin Pazulski)

They enjoy painting, taking walks and spending time with their families. They love traveling and played varsity basketball and hockey during college.

And they just turned 90 years old.

June Spielman and Christine Morris, twin sisters originally from Prospect Park, Delaware County (but with a significant Chestnut Hill connection which you’ll soon learn) celebrated their 90th birthdays on June 14. Although they now live in two different states, they still remain close friends.

How did college graduate wind up cleaning houses?
by SUSAN GRAHAM

CLEANING UP: Susan Graham, of West Mt. Airy, has a college degree in Italian Literature, but for the last 20 years she has been a full-time house cleaner. To learn more about this seemingly incomprehensible juxtaposition, read the article on page 18. (Photo by Kristin Pazulski)

I recently returned to Philadelphia after a 20-year hiatus. I have often thought longingly of it in the intervening years, but couldn’t muster it up, take the plunge and relocate until now. I found a lovely place in Mt. Airy near the Wissahickon to live.

Twenty years ago, I graduated from Bryn Mawr College with a degree in Italian Literature. For spending money during college, I cleaned homes near the campus. One year, I earned enough to send myself to summer school in Florence, Italy. I worked cleaning houses during my other summers and between semesters. It paid better than other jobs available to college students and was perfect for a shy, bookish type like me.

Hill resident proud of ancestor, richest black in colonial U.S.
by JEROME O’NEILL

Mt. Airy native Ernest Cuff stands outside his home in Chestnut Hill. (Photo by Jerome O’Neill)

Ernest Cuff was born in a house on the 500 block of West Mt. Pleasant Avenue on July 1, 1929. Paul Cuffe, an ancestor whose name appears in many history books, was born 170 years earlier in a house on Chuttyhunk Island, Massachusetts. However, it would take persistence, devotion and another 66 years before Ernest Cuff could refer to Paul Cuffe, the richest black man in colonial America, as family.

Ernest Cuff, an African American with strong Native American family ties, was the youngest of six children. He recalls fondly how he and his five older sisters would climb the big trees outside their house in Mt. Airy. He attended Germantown High, and Carol Houston, his lone surviving sister, still lives close by in Sewell, New Jersey.

Hill teacher labors to preserve beauty of park
by PAULA M. RILEY

David Dannenberg, volunteer board member of Friends of the Wissahickon, is seen here cutting back overgrown trees in the Wissihickon. Dannenburg is currently leading the FOW Sustainable Trails Initiative, a three-phased, multi-year approach to making the 57 miles of national Recreation Trails more physically and socially sustainable. (Photo by Denise Larrabee)

This is the 14th in an ongoing series of articles by Paula M. Riley on Chestnut Hill volunteers.

Throughout his whole life, David Dannenberg has spent countless days hiking, biking, running, or cross-country skiing the trails of Wissahickon Valley Park. A Mt. Airy resident and history teacher at The Crefeld School in Chestnut Hill, Dannenberg now works to enhance and improve the park as a volunteer board member for Friends of the Wissahickon (FOW).

The Friends of the Wissahickon is a non-profit organization dedicated to working in and advocating for the 1,800 acres of Wissahickon Valley Park, part of Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park. They cooperate closely with Fairmount Park Commission to fulfill their mission of preserving the natural beauty and wilderness of the Wissahickon Valley and stimulating public interest therein.

Dannenberg currently co-chairs the FOW Board Conservation Committee and chairs the subcommittee on trails. Though he has enjoyed the park since he was a child, it was not until Dannenberg started teaching at the Crefeld School in 1999 that he became involved with FOW.

‘Current’ adventure for local restaurant’s diners
by LEN LEAR

Larry Horwitz is the head brewer at Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant, 1460 Bethlehem Pike in North Wales, which produces distinctive, full-flavored, handcrafted beers. All beers are brewed on site and include six regular brews and one or more rotating specials. Horowitz told us that he decided to become a brewer while in college in Ohio because “I was already drinking so much beer that I figured I should get paid for it.” For more information, call 267-708-2000 or visit www.ironhillbrewery.com. (Photo by Len Lear)

The Iron Hill Brewery & Restaurant at 1460 Bethlehem Pike in North Wales, about five or 10 minutes from Chestnut Hill, at the end of the Route 309 Expressway, normally keeps current regarding restaurant trends (for example, beer-pairing dinners, rotating beer specials, fixed priced dinners featuring two courses and two beers for $19.95, and curbside carry-out dinners).

However, on Tuesday and Wednesday, July 18 and 19, the restaurant was not very current, to put it literally. On Tuesday night, for example, according to restaurant manager Becky Koval, the restaurant and bar were filled with more than 200 customers, some of whom were there because of a Tuesday night “Texas hold-’em” poker promotion.

Readers may recall that on July 18, starting at about 8 p.m., there was a horrendous rainstorm accompanied by lightning and thunder. Soon afterwards, the lights began to flicker on and off at Iron Hill. Then they would go off for a few minutes and come back on for a few minutes. According to Koval, the chefs in the kitchen continued preparing food by candlelight. Finally, at about 8:30, the lights went off and stayed off.