PARK: We recently asked if readers could tell us anything about a Kennedy Park that was in Bradford.
A caller said he remembered a small park with picnic tables across from Kennedy Springs on U.S. Route 219.
“It’s been gone for 30 years or more,” he said.
McKEAN FAIR: Speaking of reader input, Jerry Kleisath of Preble, N.Y., wrote after reading a recent column that talked about the Pennsylvania Fair Guide.
Jerry told us, “During the war in the ’40s the McKean County Fair was suspended because of the war and shortages.
“In the early ’50s my father Alfred Kleisath attended every Grange meeting in McKean County and even the Pomona Grange in an effort to restart the fair. He worked for 2-3 years on this effort and in 1953 or 1954 after a lot of work the fair was started again. We spent many hours reroofing the barns, fixing the race track and getting the grounds ready.
“John Pitcher of Rew was president, dad was the vice president and Mulvihill was secretary. Many of the older people in the county have said that if it wasn’t for Alfred Kleisath working diligently on it there would never had been a new fair.”
We’re Jerry’s father did put the work into it. We can’t imagine what August would have been like as a child without the McKean County Fair to look forward to.
This year’s fair will be held from Aug. 13-19.
We’d love to hear any memories our readers have of the local fairs from over the years. We bet many of you participated through 4-H or marching band, or maybe someone has a juicy story of shenanigans with friends there.
