LOOK UP: Our first report this season of overhead geese comes
from Art Slike of Bradford who heard the honking on Sunday after he
came out of church. It was a flock of some 30 birds, he reports,
but they were winging their way north! We will consider this a
reprieve.

THE RAGMAN: More today on the ragman -or we should say,
“ragmen.”

Louie “Corky” Galloway of Tucson, Ariz., writes, “On many area
oil leases in the ’30s there were ‘ragmen’ and ‘waste salesmen’ who
came to the leases to sell their products to the oilfield workers
to clean their oily hands after working with the wells, jacks,
powerhouses, pulling and drilling outfits.”

“The ‘waste’ was actually spinning and weaving mills’ tangles,
as I recall.

“The old fellow who sold to Sloan and Zook would get his bales
of ‘waste’ from mills in New England and down south. A lot of scrap
material and waste was used in the oil fields and in the machine
shops that dotted the countryside.

“It was a badge of the brotherhood when a lease kid, like
myself, had a wad of waste in his hip pocket as we played on the
leases.”

Tony Grillo of New Philadelphia, Ohio, writes: “Growing up in
the 5th ward (Rochester Street) in the late ’40s and early ’50s, I
remember the ‘ragman’ as we knew him. Our ragman would pass through
the 5th ward with a horse-drawn wagon and would pick up rags as
well as scrap metal and other junk.”

“My memory of this ragman has to do with us as kids, and when
the ragman would pass down our street we would jump on the side of
his wagon and hang on and ride while hanging on to the side.

“I remember this as if it was yesterday because one of our
friends by the name of Jim Gentile lost his grip on the wagon and
fell to the street, and the right rear wagon wheel passed over his
legs. He jumped up and ran home crying and yelling and the ragman
never looked back.

“I remember this clearly as I was right beside him when he fell.
I do not believe his injuries were serious as he was back out the
next day. That is how I remember the ragman and my wonder years in
good old Bradford, Pa.”