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242 Langley Street in front near
street.
242-1/2 Langley Street in back
of house.
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History
of Langley Street, Lot #216
Niles Firebrick Company Office and Pattern Shop
— 1902-1912
Sons of Italy Lodge Pattern Shop — 1913-1926
Vacant Pattern Shop — 1927-1935
Bagnoli Irpino Club Purchased for $2000.00 — 1936-1946
Michael Patrone purchased
whole property for $4000.00
Bachelor’s Home — 1946-1980
Warehouse — 1980-1994
Historical Research Center — 1974-1994
House of Antiques — 1993-1994
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Michael Patrone
is pictured standing(L) on the porch of 242 Langley when it was
used as a House of Antiques.
Michael Patrone points to historical
memorabilia hanging on the front railing of his Historical Research
Center at 242 Langley Street.
Patrone was often referred to as 'The
Mayor of Langley' due to his gardens, buildings and taking care
of the neighborhood. |
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242-1/2 Langley Street is in back
of the Niles Firebrick office building and was known as 'The
Bachelor Home which Patrone owned from 1946 - 1980.
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Front Entrance.
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Back entrance and fire escape stairway. |
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The Bachelor Home provided living quarters for
single men. The first floor was used for storage while there were
rooms and a kitchen on both of the top two floors in the building.
Access to the top floors was through a metal
stairway in the back of the building .
During this time period, post World War II, it
was not uncommon for a single male worker to rent a room and walk
to one of the nearby factories. Most of the renters were of Italian
heritage having grown up in the East End of Niles. |
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Interior Stairway of Bachelor's Home
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Interior Room of Bachelor's Home
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Interior Hallway of Bachelor's Home
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Interior Stairway of Bachelor's Home
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Interior Doors of Bachelor's Home
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Bicentennial Exhibit of Industrial Technology
Outdoor Bachelor's Home Sign
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House
with colorful past is doomed.
3/12/86 Tribune
Diane Laney Fitzpatrick
A. Ciminero’s Saloon
Michael Patrone beside 217 Langley
Street.
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A house
on the city’s east side that is at least 100 years old will
come down later this week, and with it a houseful of nostalgia from
the Prohibition days. The house, at 217 Langley Street, was built
in the late 1800s. The house was a popular saloon in the early 1900s
and the location for a well-known bootleg operation in the 1920s.
Michael Patrone, the owner of the house for the past 40
years, will have the house demolished within the next few days,
but with mixed feelings. “Yeah, I hate to see it go, but in
a way it had to go,” Patrone said. The house caught fire last
fall-the second fire to damage the home-and it is no longer habitable.
Patrone, a local history buff who has researched many areas of the
city’s history for the Niles Area Historical Society, has
collected some history about the old house that shows it was a well-known
liquor establishment until well after Prohibition began.
The home’s earliest known history shows that it was a bar
called “A. Ciminero’s Saloon’ where beer sold
for a nickel a glass. Langley Street was then called Railroad Street,
because it ran along the Erie Railroad tracks, which now belong
to Conrail. “In 1910 the Carano family moved in, converting
it into a house”, Patrone said. Later it was a meeting place
for the Beneficiary League Club”, he said.
“When Prohibition began in 1920, the house apparently was
used to make bootleg beer and liquor”, Patrone said. While
cleaning out the attic of the house, Patrone found old liquor and
beer bottles “that could fill two dump trucks,” and
a pipe that led from the attic to the cellar and into the sewer
system. “When they would have a raid, they would start pouring
the liquor down the pipe and into the sewer. And there was no way
you could tell what had been going on,” Patrone said. The
attic had a “trap door” that was hard for law enforcement
officials to find. “by the time they got up there, they had
it all poured into the sewer,” Patrone said.
The house caught fire in 1945 and was left damaged and vacant until
1946, when Patrone, a handyman who lives a few doors away, bought
the house and remodeled it. He turned the house into four apartments,
two three-room and two two-room apartments and charged $10 per month
per apartment. “I helped a lot of poor families then,”
Patrone said.
Patrone still remembers the families that rented his apartments
and the small house in the rear of the property. In fact, he keeps
a list of every renter who lived in the house and the number of
years they stayed. He remembers, too, the two men who helped him
dig out the basement of the house-Michael O’Leary
and Sykes Nicholson- two unemployed east side men who lived
on the property while the small basement was expanded.
On Tuesday, Patrone signed a permit with the city allowing the house
to be demolished. The last fire, which officials said was arson,
destroyed much of the house and caused $25,000 in damages. The house
has been boarded up since then. Patrone hopes the city can use the
land to expand Murphy Park, a small park adjacent to the house.
The two-acre park, named in memory of a local newspaper correspondent,
was developed in the late 1960s after community members initiated
the project, city Park and Recreation Director Carmen Vivolo
said. The park was dedicated in 1972 with the help of Patrone, who
was then a member of the Niles Task Force on Youth.
Patrone and the task force helped the city install a basketball
court and playground equipment. At one time, Patrone had plans to
expand the park to Pratt Street, making room for another entrance
and new picnic tables, benches and flower gardens. Now he wants
the park expanded to give the city’s east side youth something
to do in their spare time. “I’d like to see a soccer
field go in ther,” Patrone said.
“The basketball courts are the draw now at the park. Some
of Niles High School’s best players got their start at Murphy
Park,” said Patrone.
Vivolo said he will look into the possibility of expanding
the park. |
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Langley and East Park Avenue.
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Langley and East Park Avenue. |
Basketball Court at Murphy Park. |
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Railroad Crossing at Langley Street.
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Railroad Crossing at Langley Street.
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Bike Trail Crossing at Langley and East Park.
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