Mount Moriah Cemetery. (Photos from The Friends of Mount Moriah Facebook page)

From Betsy Ross to former Philadelphia Mayor George Connell and famous local architect Samuel Sloan, the soil of Mount Moriah Cemetery in Southwest Philly is steeped in history.

In Mount Moriah’s heyday, the 380-acre estate with its elaborate Romanesque entrance and gatehouse, served as the burial grounds for Philadelphia’s elite. But now, the largest cemetery in Philadelphia is suffering from neglect, overrun by weeds and foliage as a result of years of failed management and confusion about ownership.

While the private group, The Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery, is working to bring the cemetery back to a beautified state as legal issues over its ownership still go unresolved, the costs to maintain the grounds are steep. In an effort to help the West Philly Runners and the Fishtown Beer Runners have teamed up for a two-part fundraiser next week to support the Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery’s work.

The two running groups will hold their respective fundraisers in tandem, with West Philly Runners’ hosting its event on Wed. June 18 at City Tap House Philly (3925 Walnut Street), from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. The group is asking for a $10 donation, which will be pooled together and given to Friends of Mount Moriah.

“The Mount Moriah Cemetery has the potential to be a great outdoor space, but right now it’s in limbo,” West Philly Runners member Stacey Ritzen, who co-organized the event, told West Philly Local. “We really want to clean up the space and make it nice, how it used to be back in the day. It used to be a cemetery for pretty wealthy West Philadelphia residents, and people would go and have picnics, just really enjoyed the space. It would be great to see it restored to what it was.”

During next Wednesday’s event, attendees can enjoy beer specials courtesy of Southern Tier Brewing Company and possibly win prizes from Honest Tom’s, Little Baby’s, Greensgrow West, Philadelphia Runner and other local businesses by taking part in the raffle. Fishtown Beer Runners will run a similar event the next day, Thurs. June 19, at Llama Tooth, with a portion of the proceeds received that night going to Friends of Mount Moriah.

West Philly Runners is also hosting a clean up day at the cemetery on Sat. June 22 from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. “Hopefully through the efforts of these two fundraisers, we can get the word out and hopefully inspire people to come volunteer and put in the hours,” Ritzen said. “We really want to see it become a space everyone can use.”

–Annamarya Scaccia

Editor’s Note: Here’s a recent video, “In Memoriam,” made by Temple University. The history and current state of this massive, formerly abandoned cemetery are examined through interviews. The dramatic efforts by hundreds of volunteers to revitalize it are also addressed in the video.

Modern row houses, late 1930s. Illustration by Sylvia Barkan 1971. Image courtesy of UCHS.

Would you like to take a stroll around some West Philly neighborhoods and learn more about architectural styles of some oldest homes in the area? You can do it this Sunday thanks to University City Historical Society (UCHS) who is organizing the “House and Home” walking tour. Here’s more information from the UCHS website:

“In a variety of building styles spanning a century of West Philadelphia development, see the special ways homeowners have decorated, furnished, and adapted to make these houses ‘homes.’ The homeowners will be on hand to tell you more…

The houses on the tour will only be revealed the day of the event when you pick up your tickets…

This is a walking tour, involving many staircases — wear comfortable shoes!”

If this sounds like something you want to do on a Sunday afternoon, you can purchase tickets in advance at EventBrite.com for $20. Same day tickets are $25. Tickets bought in advance online can be picked up at 4501 Baltimore Ave., ZED’s Last Minute Gifts from 12:30 to 3 p.m.

The tour will take place from 1 to 5 p.m. For more details about the tour and UCHS, visit http://uchs.net.

Hawthorne Hall (Photo from grayareaphilly.org)

Down every street, and around every corner, we see Philadelphia’s history chronicled in the old brick roads, the abandoned trolley tracks, and every lot overrun by foliage.

Most of all, we see the city’s history in the timeworn foundations of its older buildings. Be it the imposing Provident Mutual Life Insurance building or the grandiose Divine Lorraine Hotel, Philadelphia’s antiquity is forever sealed in their unique brickwork and beguiling design.

But how we preserve the architecture of that history has become uninspired, if not non-existent. Instead, Philly’s historic buildings are bulldozed to make way for shopping centers and luxurious townhouses. Or they’re left abandoned—nothing more than waning icons relegated to the pronoun of “I wonder what that used to be.”

That’s where GRAY AREA comes in. Supported by the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, GRAY AREA is an experimental project launched by the University of the Arts and DesignPhiladelphia of the Center for Architecture that looks at “historic preservation in the modern city.” Currently in its third phase, GRAY AREA aims to engage both design and development experts and the public at large in envisaging creative ways to maintain and repurpose the city’s older buildings so they’re moments of revitalization in their communities.

As part of its third phase, known as GRAY AREA 3, a multi-disciplinary cohort of experts and community partners spent most of last year studying two historic buildings: Hawthorne Hall (3849 Lancaster Avenue) in Powelton Village/Mantua, and the Max Levy building (212-220 Roberts Avenue) in Germantown. Armed with a series of questions raised during GRAY AREA’s first two phases—a panel discussion and a facilitated conversation, respectively—the team researched the buildings’ history and their cultural significance in an effort to cultivate ideas for “eventual interpretation, reuse and design.”

This Wed, May 28, the GRAY AREA 3 team will gather at the Catalyst for Change Church (3727 Baring Street) to share their findings on Hawthorne Hall with the West Philly community. The event, which begins at 6 p.m., will serve as the third phase’s final community meeting in which they will test a preservation toolkit developed for “encouraging meaningful dialogue, making unexpected and new connections, and generating ideas,” GRAY AREA Project Director Elise Vider told West Philly Local.
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This weekend there’s an awesome chance to learn more about the city’s commercial corridors on the rise, hidden neighborhood histories and stroll around some great public spaces – all thanks to Jane’s Walk, a free series of neighborhood walks presented by PlanPhilly.

There will be seven walks all together taking place on Friday through Sunday, May 2-4 (learn more about each walk here). But of particular interest to West Philly folks may be a walk organized on Friday on Lancaster Avenue, “Uncovering Historic Buildings on Lancaster Avenue.” Two people from the People’s Emergency Center, James Wright and Stephanie Wall, will be leading this tour of a few blocks of Lancaster Ave to talk about work to improve and reuse significant historic properties along the corridor.

Jane’s Walk is a global movement of free, locally-led walking tours inspired by the urbanist and writer Jane Jacobs. The walks are roving conversations geared at getting people engaged with their city and connecting with one another. This is the first year Philadelphia has formally participated in the festival, which takes place in more than 100 cities.

The Lancaster Avenue walk begins at 4 p.m.

Do you visit The Woodlands whether it is for jogging, dog walking, nature or leisurely walks or other activities? Now you can be part of the Woodlands planning and have an impact on the future of this beautiful historical site.

The people involved with preservation and development of the Woodlands cemetery and mansion would like to hear from you. They have prepared a community survey asking about your use of The Woodlands as well as about your favorite places there. The information gathered will help make improvements to the site “that align with how our community enjoys the space.”

To fill out the survey, click here.

This summer, on June 5, The Woodlands is hosting the 3rd Annual Benefit, with cocktails, hors d’oeuvres, music and more. The benefit guests will get a chance to kick off the fully-funded $1 million project to preserve the Cryptoporticus (a covered gallery) and North Terrace, and peek into the basement servant’s quarters. For more information, visit The Woodlands website.

Say goodbye to Toviah Thrift Store (Photo by Annamarya Scaccia / West Philly Local)

After four decades of service, Toviah Thrift Store at 4211 Chestnut Street has shuttered its doors for good this month, and will soon be the new home of its neighbor, Dana Mandi International Foods and Spices.

When we stopped by Tuesday evening, workers from Dana Mandi at 4205 Chestnut Street were in the process of cleaning out Toviah Thrift. Its front room was mostly emptied of its low-priced products and furniture, with remnants scattered unevenly across the space. The next morning, when we returned in hopes of speaking with Dana Mandi’s owner, Toviah Thrift was cleaned out even further— a shell of its former glory.

(Photo by Annamarya Scaccia / West Philly Local)

According to local blogger Mark Krull, the owners of Dana Mandi recently bought the property from Reverend Larry Falcon, founder of Toviah Thrift, and will soon move into the shop. A worker named Suny confirmed this information to West Philly Local over the phone, but noted he didn’t have a confirmed date for the move. He did say, though, that it wouldn’t happen prior to May.

City of Philadelphia records show that Dana Mandi, under the name Asian Spice Food Inc, owns both 4205 and 4211 Chestnut Streets, which totals to over 3,000 square feet.

Toviah Thrift is a significant part of West Philly history. Around since the late 1970s, the Christian nonprofit acted as a self-declared “safe haven” for community children while funding Rev. Falcon’s Covenant Community Church through its second-hand store. The small, welcoming ministry was housed in one half of the building, while out of the back operated The Jubilee School—Toviah’s inexpensive private elementary school serving kids in West and Southwest Philly.

Opened between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m., for the last three decades, locals could stop in and purchase a mishmash of donated items that were priced inexpensively. It wasn’t a perfectly coifed space—often a disorderly grouping of products—but Rev. Falcon’s agenda of “love never fails” was apparent in its messy bones.

Much like the shop—and Rev. Falcon himself—reviews for Toviah Thrift are nothing if not interesting. One Yelper gave it one star in 2011, writing, “It looks dirty as a butt 3 days into a hippy music festival.” In 2013, another Yelper, who gave it two stars, compared the space to “an episode of Hoarders,” but noted Rev. Falcon was “nice and knowledgeable.”

Most of the other reviews echoed the same response, with one Yelper writing, “What makes this place outstanding is Larry, also known simply as Papa … Come in to meet this historian if nothing else; he’ll be happy to chat with you as you browse.”

–Annamarya Scaccia