Enormously proud of hospital staff

On behalf of the Chestnut Hill Hospital Board of Trustees, I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude for all the staff, doctors, and nurses have done for our community in recent months with the COVID-19 pandemic. They are all heroes working beyond normal limits with courage and professionalism. Challenged with unknown demand of a malignant virus and threats of inadequate capacity, they have met the enemy and held the line.                  

I am enormously proud of our hospital and the entire Tower Health team for their resilience and collaborative spirit during this health crisis. We were never alone in our mission and the community’s donations served as an additional reminder that together, we are a formidable force. Thank you for your demonstration of compassion for our institution and our staff. 

The hospital has started to reopen services to support our neighbors in need of tests and procedures that are deemed medically necessary and time sensitive. Our hospital, imaging facilities, and physician offices are safe. Guided by standards set by the Centers for Disease Control and the Department of Health the hospital has implemented rigorous cleaning processes and procedures that meet and exceed standards.  

Soon, more healthcare services will be restored, and greater access for patients will be available. For now, please join me in saluting our hospital and its amazing staff for managing this crisis with exceptional skill and compassion. We have learned a great deal. Our work is not over, and we will continue to meet our community’s needs. I wish you all good health and eternal gratitude.  

Ramsey Thorp, MD
Chestnut Hill Hospital
Board of Directors

Profound gratitude

I want to express profound gratitude to the Local for the splendid obituary article on my husband, Reinhold Edelschein (“Acclaimed Mount Airy artist, 94, dies of coronavirus,” May 7), and the earlier article on me. I also want to express my deeply felt appreciation to the Chestnut Hill Local for your human stories and significant subject matter.

Henrietta (“Heni”) Reinhold
Wyncote

'Incredible jerk'

I enjoyed the May 14 Local article about your recollections of Ira Einhorn (“Long-ago memories of a just-deceased Mt. Airy killer”). I, too, knew Ira; we were all part of the regulars who hung out at La Terrasse on the Penn campus. Ira was fat, slovenly and smelly and would sit on his favorite stool in the area connecting the bar to the restaurant.

As a self-styled "guru,” his persona required a continual scowl, and it was apparently important that he not be seen engaging in light conversation with others. Although none of us would have thought him to be a killer — little did we know — we uniformly believed him to be a fraud and incredible jerk. Regarding the picture accompanying your story, that picture was taken on Belmont Plateau, not Center City, as the caption claims. Also, despite Ira's claims, he was not a "co-founder" of Earth Day. Ian McHarg, Penn professor of landscape architecture, and several of his grad students conceived of the event and led its planners.

At Spring Garden College (then located on Mermaid Lane), where I was Dean of the Management curriculum, professors John Clauser and Bill Fox were largely responsible for arranging an Earth Day "teach-in". We then, blankets and wine skins in hand, drove to the plateau on a gorgeous day, enjoyed Leon Redbone performing and listened to speeches by Mc Harg, Senator Ed Muskie and, yes, Ira. 

Jim Johnston, Ed.D.

Made dinners for Ira Einhorn

Regarding your article on Ira Einhorn (“Long-ago memories of a just-deceased Mt. Airy killer,” May 14), I knew him very well and also lived and taught in Powelton Village. Holly (Maddux, whom Einhorn was convicted of killing) and Ira came to my large apartment for dinners many times. I lived on Hamilton and then Baring Street.

I never liked Ira, yet I appreciated some of the activist things he did. But he did not charm me, as he did many others. Holly, on the other hand, was my friend. To say the least, I was devastated about her killing. My husband and I signed petitions to put Ira in jail and keep him there!

I taught art at Powel School all the years I lived in Powelton. My first teaching assignment was in Temple University Hospital in 1968. And Ira came to visit me with a bubble machine and some of his sidekicks. I wanted to rest, but Ira insisted his camaraderie and bubbles would help me heal. He way overstayed his welcome, although I hadn't even invited him. I threw him out!

Alice Farber
Roxborough

Could have met the same fate

I thought that Len Lear’s article on Ira Einhorn (“Long-ago memories of a just-deceased Mt. Airy killer,” May 14) was so well done. As a reader who had followed the Ira Einhorn case a while ago, the piece gave an interesting retrospective of his life and just the kind of detail to help recall what we know from newspaper articles. Also, the anecdote of Len being bruised up by Ira, the high school bully, was so telling. Then, at the end, I realized that it was an obituary of sorts since Ira died last month.

I lived in West Philadelphia in the 1960s, though I never met Ira. He was quite the topic of conversation among women of my age for a number of years. Even into the 1970s he was someone my colleagues “knew of.” Several friends dated him and then had OMG afterthoughts, thinking they were fortunate not to have met the same end as Holly.

Ira is intriguing because of his brilliance and charisma. He was able to convince scientists to pay him for his work. As one of the first environmental activists, it is said he helped found the first Earth Day. He gained entrance to the Harvard University Institute of Politics. Of course, then there’s the pathology. When I get a chance, I'm going to do more research on his life: I want to know how he was able to hide and support himself for 16 years in Europe before he was finally tracked down by U.S. authorities.

Emilie C. Harting
Gwynedd

Ed. note: The Emilie Harting is an author and retired English professor who lived in Mt. Airy for 48 years.

Ira's apartment 'smelled of death'

Thank you for your article on Ira Einhorn. I was a friend of Ira when he was at the University of Pennsylvania. I wondered at the time how he could live in an apartment where the walls literally crawled with cockroaches. That was my key to living in an apartment that smelled of death.

You know he published a book, which I disposed of years ago. He was quite close with the professor of English, Morse Peckham, whose most well-known book was “Beyond the Tragic Vision.” A decent book, if having an ironic title in this setting.

Mark E. Blum
Professor of History
University of Louisville