DELICATE DISPLAY:
Origami birds roost at one of the craft booths featured at
the Fall for the Arts festival on Sunday. Record crowds came
to Germantown Avenue to enjoy music, arts and crafts, games,
food and fine weather. (Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)
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In The News...
Presser, Nugent homes
win historic designation
Status does not preclude demolition
by MICHAEL J. MISHAK
After hearing the emotional testimony of community
preservationists at meetings that drew an almost unprecedented
attendance, the Philadelphia Historical Commission granted historic
status to the second of two embattled Mt. Airy buildings last week.
On Oct. 8, the former Nugent Baptist Home joined
the former Presser Home for Retired Musicians, which won historic
designation on Sept. 27. Both buildings are part of a 5.6-acre
site on West Johnson Street slated for development under a proposal
by Blair Christian Academy, a pre-K through 12 school, and Impacting
Your World Ministries, a nondenominational Germantown church.
Both the Presser, most recently known as Mt. Airy
Commons, and the Nugent, known as Edgemont, homes became the subject
of controversy in August when the church announced its plans to
purchase the surrounding property and raze all but one of the site’s
three buildings. Though no formal plans have been released, the
church has said it intends to develop the site for a multi-use
facility, which includes a 2,000-seat auditorium, a school...
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In Sports...
CHA edges Spartans
in 6-2 tilt
by BRYAN ARMEN GRAHAM
Chestnut Hill Academy's bend-don't-break
defense withstood a last-minute Springfield threat to edge the host Spartans,
6-2, in an Independence Football League tilt Friday night.
Despite never leading, the
Spartans had an opportunity to win the game with 32 seconds remaining.
But Chestnut Hill's Jon Salem broke up Mike Malizia's fourth-down pass
play to Jon Wallace on the two-yard line, and the Blue Devils escaped
Spartan Stadium with their fourth consecutive victory.
With the win, the Blue Devils
(4-1, 2-0 IFL) are in the early driver's seat for a their third league
championship in four years.
Staunch defensive play helped
CHA overcome some dooming statistical discrepancies. Springfield had
16 first downs to Chestnut Hill's four, and gained 295 total yards to
CHA's 99.
But the Blue Devils were able
to stop the Spartans when it counted.
"Our defense has played
great all year," said CHA head coach Jack Plunkett. "This is
basically...
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In LocalLife...
Nicky Fischer’s
Restaurant and Bar
Fine dining, fine bargains from new kid on the
block
By Len Lear
For 15 years Alfio Gaglianese owned and operated
Alfio’s, an Italian restaurant at 17 Limekiln Pike in Glenside,
one mile from Arcadia University (formerly Beaver College) and
about five or 10 minutes from Chestnut Hill. Alfio, who once told
me he was able to take only one vacation in the entire 15 years
(and he had to close the restaurant for three weeks that one time
while he went to Italy), was best known for his tuxedo, his magic
tricks (he made everything disappear but your check), his peppery
banter with customers and the Caesar salad and specialty coffee
he prepared at tableside.
But you might say that Caesar, due to the slings
and arrows of outrageous fortune, had to withdraw his troops from
the battlefield. Alfio’s once-charming act had become as
old-fashioned as a rotary telephone, so he pulled the curtain down
more than two years ago. The property then sat as vacant as a kosher
delicatessen in Saudi Arabia.
But along came Nicky Fischer, 50, a native of Willow
Grove who had worked mostly as a bartender — at a hotel near
Sea World in Florida so long ago that Sea World had mostly guppies
in its pools; then at..
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