MEMORIES: A. Buck Tantalo concludes his story on Bradford area
swimming holes:

“Big Rock Pool — this pool is on the road to Westline off of
Route 219. You can’t miss it. Years ago, it was quite active. Also,
I might add, years ago when I walked from Kushequa to Tally Ho pump
station on the Westline Road, the tannery in Mount Jewett was
active, and the runoff from the tannery would create mounds of foam
in the creek. Some were 12 feet high.

“Years ago, pools were just about any place there was a stream,
and one thing we must take under consideration years gone by, no
sewerage disposal. Yes, you could see most anything come floating
down the creek, anything.

“As I look back, I believe Droney Creek was the cleanest of
all.”

SPECIAL ‘POOL’: Meanwhile, Dick Bova of Port Allegany, who was
raised in Oil Valley, north of Duke Center, has a unique swimming
“pool” to tell us about:

“Our swimming hole was the cooling water tank at a powerhouse
owned by a Mr. Chet Wommer. The one lunger engines used to provide
power to pump wells was cooled with water, which circulated from a
tank through the cooling jacket of the engine and back to the
tank.

“Some tanks were wooden staves and others, like this one, were
steel. During the ’30s and early ’40s, the kids in Oil Valley were
the Harvey boys, Harry, Jim and Chuck; the Bly brothers, Warren
(Bud), Ralph and Bobby; Ramon and Carl Brown, my brother Don and
me.

“This tank was about 7-feet-tall and 10-feet across. You
couldn’t really swim in it, but we’d dog paddle around and have a
great time. We had no idea what the green stuff (algae) all over
the inside was, so we called it ‘frog spit.’

“When we saw Mr. Wommer messing around one of his nearby wells,
we got out, grabbed our clothes and took off. As kids, we thought
we had pulled one over on him, but looking back, I realize that Mr.
Wommer was intentionally giving us the opportunity to leave so he
didn’t have to yell as us and kick us out. Every time we were
swimming in his tank, he did the same thing. He was a really nice
man, but we didn’t appreciate it at the time.”