[PRCo] Re: Coatesville Arson

Sun Feb 22 23:05:26 EST 2009

Look 20 minutes to either side of your home, John.  None of this  
world is what it was 40/50 years ago.   It isn't where your mum came  
from either.   I noticed in Sheffield, England, ten years ago that  
the hoodlums from the council homes (reads projects in American) were  
removing the streetcar fare vending machines from the posts and  
taking them home to smash them and get the money.   Then you find the  
broken and empty ticket machines in the dumpster.   I remember a  
distinct feeling that I was being trailed in Manchester, England,  
once.   My solution was to walk into a McDonalds, walk through and  
out the other door.   It solved the problem.   The guy disappeared.    
Funny ... never had that feeling in Germany, Austria, Switzerland or  
even India.

I used to kid (heckle?) the business write of the Reading Eagle /  
Reading Times, before I retired, that the front page of his newspaper  
was the murder of week page.   Lancaster was still rather sedate.    
The drug culture has reached Lancaster County with a vengeance and  
now we see it here too ... hardly a week or two goes by that we don't  
have another murder somewhere in the county ... mostly in the city  
but, as I recall reading in a Minnesota paper two years ago, that  
those who sell illicit drugs love the country and small towns because  
the police are not as efficient.

If we go back much more than half a century, murders in this county  
were so rare than when one happened (about 1950 or 1951), it was  
narrated on a prime-time TV show called "The Big Story."  They did  
not normally happen here.  This was a God fearing county where you  
knew your neighbors and no one would have thought of stepping over  
the line. And the last place you wanted to do something was a little  
town like Columbia where the police knew everyone; you could be sure  
50 years ago to be arrested there within minutes if you did something  
wrong because the town cop knew every bad egg.   People in Lancaster  
County left their doors unlocked 50 years ago ... city or county.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Story_(radio/TV)

My township hired it's first policeman in 1953 or 1954.   We had  
7,000 inhabitants then and one cop.   Today we 33,000 people and more  
policemen, detectives, etc., than the city of Lancaster did in  
1953.   Then the big offense was the guy who forgot to stop for a  
stopped school bus or, in 1957, the speed trap they set up on the  
Lititz Pike to get the high school kids in a 35 mph zone at after  
school.   This month the went into the high school with a team of  
police and dogs and arrested three seniors as coccaine and heroine  
dealers and put them in jail.   They knew who they were after before  
they went in.

I was having dinner the other day.  Some how I got into a  
conversation with the waitress who was taking a semester of work at  
University of Pittsburgh on-line because she had to come home and  
take care of a sick mother.   I asked where she planned to go after  
she got her degree.   There was no doubt in her mind.   She likes  
Pittsburgh.  Her field is criminology and police work.   And she said  
there is no shortage of demand for her field in Pittsburgh today.   
(When I worked out there 25 years ago, it was a very safe place.)    
Like Bob Dietrich's daughter and the rest of us, there is a certain  
allure to the people in that part of the state.   But sad that we  
have to admit that there is no shortage of demand for police.

But we know the problem exists in Montana and Philadelphia, Maine and  
and Portland, probably Lancaster SC as well as Lancaster PA.

And there is at least one person on this list who sees the results of  
drugs first hand every day ... a doctor working in a hospital in a  
ghetto in North Philadelphia.

fws

On Feb 22, 2009, at 10:11 PM, John Swindler wrote:

>
> Hi Phil
>
>
>
> I am reminded of the admonition:  "be careful what you wish for -  
> you just might get it".
>
>
>
> So when people 'wish' for and undefined 'change', they just might  
> get something far different.
>
>
>
> As for Coatesville and Wampum, those are singular instances.  It's  
> the murders in Homewood and North Philadelphia that go on almost  
> daily.  The Post Gazette is available on line, and while checking  
> for PAT news, one is struck by realization that this is not the  
> Pittsburgh I remember from 40/50 years ago.  Certain neighborhoods  
> are much more violent today.
>
>
>
> The trouble with history is that, with few exceptions, there really  
> isn't much new under the sun.
>
>
>
> Cheers
>
> John
>
>
>
>
>
>
>> Date: Sun, 22 Feb 2009 10:54:06 -0800
>> From: pcc_sr at yahoo.com
>> Subject: [PRCo] Re: Coatesville Arson
>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>>
>> Mr.Swindler;
>>
>>
>> There are more than exceptions available aren't there. As we  
>> observed elsewhere
>> we are expecting great change with our new president but official  
>> historians say
>> we are still struggling with the same social ills of President  
>> Lincoln. Actually,
>> many of those 'ills' are millenia old aren't they. Same for crime.
>>
>> King Solomon said: "There is nothing new under the sun." While the  
>> specific
>> reference is to human creative ability (actually, lack thereof) it  
>> can also be
>> 'applied' to the destructive ability of 'humans.' Murder started  
>> with Cain and
>> Abel and has been with us ever since at all ages. However, it is
>> always startling when the murderer is young isn't it. You will  
>> find the same
>> with every generation since time began; it's not new is it.
>>
>>
>> Phil
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> ----- Original Message ----
>>> From: Phillip Clark Campbell <pcc_sr at yahoo.com>
>>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>>> Sent: Friday, February 20, 2009 11:35:48 AM
>>> Subject: Re: Coatesville Arson
>>>
>>> This made national news as well.
>>>
>>>
>>> Phil
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message ----
>>>> From: John Swindler
>>>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>>>> Sent: Friday, February 20, 2009 6:46:13 AM
>>>> Subject: [PRCo] Re: [PRCo]
>>>>
>>>> Motive? Didn't have a life, and way too much free time on his  
>>>> hands.
>>>> There's a lot of that going around. Our society has become way  
>>>> too wealthy.
>>>>
>>>> It was some 35+ years ago that Geissenheimer commented "didn't know
>>>> any young railfans that got themselves into trouble". Of course the
>>>> nit-pickers will come up with exceptions, but what Harold was  
>>>> trying
>>>> to say was that hobbies and sports, etc can help keep kids out  
>>>> of trouble.
>>>> I doubt if there are any ax murderers or arsonist on THIS list.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Cheers
>>>>
>>>> John
>>>
>>>>
>>>>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>>>>> From: fwschneider at comcast.net
>>>>> Subject: [PRCo]
>>>>> Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2009 22:13:29 -0500
>>>>>
>>>>> Since this was on this website, I'll ask John Swindler openly  
>>>>> if he
>>>>> saw the news today ...
>>>>>
>>>>> This didn't break in time to make the Lancaster papers but it  
>>>>> is on
>>>>> Comcast's home page late tonight ...
>>>>>
>>>>> Roger Barlow, age 19, was arrest for setting 7 arson fires in
>>>>> Coatesville in the last year. He is considered a "pyromaniac  
>>>>> who set
>>>>> the fires so he could watch the homes burn." He is in jail in lieu
>>>>> of $9,000,000 bail. That's a lot of zeros. No motive given.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
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