| Notes |
- Niagara Gazette - 9/1972
HENRY BEDELL, who is 86, believes he
is the oldest resident of Youngstown. Or at
least the oldest reside/it of the village
(2,200 population) who was born there. In
all, Mr. Bedell has spent 65 years of his live
in the village and is a valuable living
source of Youngstown's history.
He is the only surviving charter member
of the Youngstown Volunteer Fire Co. on
Second Street. Mr. Bedell says that most of
his original village friends are dead now,
but he enjoys keeping busy - and that
apparently agrees with him.
"I have only been in a hospital to visit,
never as a patient," Mr. Bedell boasted,
adding^ that he's in excellent health and
eats everything. He has to keep his
strength up because he's also one of the
most active villagers for his age. Mr.
Bedell paints the exterior of homes in a
housing development as a pastime, which
he started at 78 - 10 years after
retirement. The painter continues working
from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. five days a week
as he has for the past eight years.
"I 'hit the sack' every night around
midnight and am Up by 5 a.m. - even
weekends when I don't work!"
For the first five of the eight years Mr.
Bedell worked for- the New York State
Power Authority which set up the housing
project of 111 houses built especially for
men employed by the authority.
"Before construction began, this area
was a swamp filled with cattails," the
painter noted. "Three years ago the
company sold out to Northfield Properties
IIIGVwhich has offices in Niagara Falls."
AND IT MIGHT WELL BE that Mr.
Bedell is the only survivor in Youngstown
and the surrounding area who ever played
pool with Robert Leech, a daredevil who
went over the falls in a barrel in 1911.
Ironically, Mr. Leech died after slipping
on a fruit peel in England. -
"Bobby owned and managed a pool
room on Main Street, andhe liked to play
pool with me because he always won," Mr.
°Bedell laughs. "I haven't played since
because my partners are dead. My other
favorite sport is bowling, but I haven't
played-in 20 years."
The painter who has thinning white hair,
and wears dark-rimmed glasses, has
resided at 506 Westwood Drive,
Youngstown, for the past nine years. He
was reared in a house located on Oak
Street which was demolished years ago.
"MY PARENTS, the late William B. and
Nancy Bedell, the former Nancy Phillips,
were natives and long-time residents of
Youngstown," Mr. Bedell said. "Dad was
an area cabinetmaker most of his life, and
Mom's mother, the late Mrs. Sadie
Wagoner, was born in the old French
Casstle at Fort Niagara, where officer's
quarters were located at the time."
Mr. Bedell attended the village's first
schoolhouse for kindergarten through
sixth grade, which was then located across
from the present First Presbyterian
Church on Main Street. He helped his
father make cabinets and did odd -jobs
until he was 19.
"At 19, I jointed the Coast Guard in
Youngstown (then called the Lifesaving
Crew)," he recalled. "For years before
joining, Coast Guardmen's patrols along
Lake Ontario used to fascinate me. I'd
always wanted to wear spyglasses and go
on patrols."
He remembered carrying torches if
boats were in trouble and reporting it to
the station so'the crew could rescue the
victims. "There were no motorboats in the
early 1900s only rowboats. I recall when I
was a member of a nine-man crew and as
part of our drill, the captain upset the boat
by tilting a ladder that extended across the
boat's bottom. Everyone got wet but the
captain.
"Out of the Coast Guard at 21, I did
carpentry work on service quarters in the
Quarter master Department at the Fort
for six years," Mr. Bedell says. "I still
remember swaying back and forth as Fort
prisoners lowered me on a bolson chair -
inch by inch - as I painted a 125-foot
flagpole on the parade grounds. Since then
it has been replaced by a smaller one in the
same location."
"I wouldn't care to paint it now, but I
enjoyed it when I was younger," he
chuckled.
Years later when he and William May,
another former Youngstown resident,
were digging small trenches for street
edge wooden forms for paving Main Street
(it then was a dirt road,) Mr. Bedell put his
pick through the skull of a buried Indian.
He was buried on his back with his knees
up.
"Willy kept the tomahawk and a string
of beads that slightly crumpled when he
touched them," he said. "I kept the 12-inch
diameter copper kettle which was buried
between the Indian's legs. Unfortunately it
was filled with arrowheads,'not money."
Mr. Bedell kept the kettle, but lent it to
his brother-in-law, the late Allen Bevier, of
Niagara Falls.
Mr. Bedell thinks it is the one on display
at the French Castle at Fort Niagara.
ANOTHER INTERESTING ITEM Mr.
Bedell still owns is a cane in his home
which his great-grandfather, William
Bedell, whittled out of solid mahogany
when he was taken prisoner during the
War of 1812. It features a bullet shell at its
tip and a knob at the top with a carved
figure in between. His dad used to walk
with it.
"After assisting Dad with carpentry, the
late George Winston of Youngstown andl
operated the first garage in the Village -
formerly a big barn on Main Street - and
sold the first Model T's to Youngstown and
area residents," Mr. Bedell boasts.
When it folded, he worked at General
Motors in Baltimore, Md., for 21 years.
Mr. Bedell retired 19 years ago at 68, not
65, because the union voted that he stay
longer because he was popular and a
competent worker.
"As soon as I retired, though, I came
home to Youngstown."
LEANING BACK in an easy chair, Mr.
Bedell sighed, "Youngstown isn't as much
fun as it used to be."
"From Lockport to Second to Main
streets was all fruit trees, and Falkner's
Park has replaced a large apple orchard,"
he recalled. "Lockport Street used to
feature a wagon shop, two blacksmith
shops, a foundry for melting iron for
casters, a bake shop and a meat market."
Main Street's major attractions were
four saloons, three grocery stores, a
sawmill, an ice cream parlor, Leech's pool
room, and the El Dorado Hotel which was
built in 1890 and located on the Niagara
River. With deep verandas three stories
^high that faced to the north and east, the
structure teemed with tourists in the
summertime. The whole edifice was ornately
decorated with lattice work,
spindles and curlicues patterned^fterihe
florid style of architecture in the '90s. The
building was torn down in 1935.
All the original proprietors of the shops
have since died or retiFed, and most of the
buildings were knocked down and rebuilt.
Youngstown's Main Street today consists
of six apartment buildings, about 20
homes, three restaurants,.three.taverns,
two churches, two barber shops, two gas
stations, a liquor store, a beauty shop and
a grocery store and two separate buildings
Svhere town and public accountant offices
are located.
"Lockport Street has a gas station, a
drug store, a grocery store, funeral home,
dry cleaners, laundromat, bank, post
office, library, an insurance office, a
Pierce Marine building and several
homes," Mr. Bedell said. "Second Street
has basically a church, an apartment
building, about 30 homes and a fire hall.
"There was an old mill yard on Second
Street where the'firehall is today," Mr.
Bedell said. "Lumber headings used to be
piled up to dry in the yard, and men used to
float much timber down the Niagara River
from Lewiston." He remembers, too, when
the weekly Youngstown News was
published in an old stone structure at the
bottom of the hill on Water Street. Edited
by G. Oliver Frick for years, it folded up 67
years ago.
Just as the village newspaper is gone, so
are the fish which used to abound in the
Niagara River.
"TODAY THERE'S NOT a fish in the
river to catch. Years ago I saw fishermen
bring in tons of all kinds," he remembers.
"Once I made a mile motor boat run up a
section of the river and caught 168 pounds
of pike with 125 hooks', an anchor and a
large netting. That's what I call fishin,'
and I think water pollution and smelt
eating the fish eggs is responsible tor
killing the fish within the last 20 years."
A past noble grand of the Old Fort
Niagara Lodge of Odd Fellows to which he
belonged for 55 years, Mr. Bedell doesn't
belong to any clubs now. But he does enjoy
gardening, as shown by his weedless
flower garden and two huge, healty tomato
plants.
"I planted the tomatoes in June and
have gotten a bushel off each so far, which
is pretty good."
Mr. Bedell's wife, the late former Sarah
Wagoner, and his two children, the late
Douglas Bedell and Dorothy Phillips of
Baltimore, Md:, are all natives of
Youngstown. He has five granchildren and
13 great-grandchildren.
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1886 - 1982 (95 years)