Carman Street

CARMAN STREET apparently is named after William Carman, who owned a home at the Southwest Corner of Broadway and Federal Street. The house stood on an elevation fifteen or 20 feet above street grade. Erected in 1830, the house was leveled in 1902 to make way for the Munger and Long Department Store, which in the 1920s became the Stecker Department Store and in turn a J.C. Penney Department Store. In 1965 the building was torn down, and the Commerce Building, an eight-story office building with stores on the first floor, was erected on the site.

Carman Street originally was one block south of Federal Street, and ran from Broadway to South 8th Street. Carman Street picked up on the other side of the Cooper River, in what was originally Stockton Township, and eventually ran from 15th through to 31st Street, where it ends at Woodrow Wilson High School. The section of Carman Street east of South 27th Street, laid out prior to Camden’s annexation of Stockton Township, was originally known as Dover Street, as illustrated in a map of the area from 1914.

Various projects over the years in downtown Camden have erased Carman Street from the map in that part of town. The last of Carman Street in downtown Camden went with the demolition of the Midway Theater and the construction of the Walter Rand Transportation Center. This long-gone section of Carman Street was by and large residential. Of the few businesses in this, the “Center City” length of Carman Street, the most notable was Roy Steele’s Tavern at 560 Carman, which was in business from the 1930s through the 1960s.

In East Camden, Carman Street ran through an area that was primarily industrial. The Stelwagon Manufacturing Company at 1600 Carman was in the business of roofing materials, and the Bell & Evans Company had a large poultry processing facility at 1610–1644 Carman for decades. Other factories with addresses on Federal Street and the cross streets had frontage on Carman Street in this area including the Iowa Soap Company between 16th and 17th Streets, known since the 1960s as the Concord Chemical factory. Carman Street turned residential at 19th Street, and remains so for the rest of its length, with the exception of three or four small businesses.

The most interesting building, from a historical and architectural standpoint, sits at the corner of South 27th & Carman Streets. 60 South 27th was for many years a funeral home, run by a James R. Sudler. A boy who grew up in the neighborhood at 3038 Stevens Street, Clarence J. Eichel, later became a partner, and eventually the owner of this business. The Eichel Funeral Home later moved to Pennsauken NJ, and remains in business as of 2004.

My family moved from “little” Cooper Street in East Camden to 624 Carman Street; about two blocks from Broadway.

On the corner of Broadway and Carman was the Broadway Theater. Looking across the street one could see the speed-line. Down a little ways was the popular Grand movie theater. One might say that the location was right in the heart of Camden. We were a couple of blocks from Market Street where both the Stanley and Savar movies were located.

The Court House and the City Hall is what separated Federal and Market streets. Later on in years the Court House was demolished and Lit Brothers replaced it on that spot. J.C. Penney’s was the best department store around back in 1940 and 1941 when I lived in that part of town.

It was difficult for me to accept leaving Cooper Street. To me, that was our house. Therefore I stayed at my girlfriend Cass’s house until I had to go home. Eventually, however, I would have to get registered for school. I got acquainted quickly with the neighborhood kids. They all went to Broadway School. Leaving St. Joe’s and the nuns I loved was devastating for me.

Mrs. Garrison was my home room teacher for grade 6. She was very neat, wore pretty earrings and lipstick, which made me more homesick for St. Joe’s. I had Mrs. Mauger for math, Mrs. Bastian for English, and Mrs. Stuart for history and art. I will never forget how kind and compassionate Mrs. Stuart was to me. She learned of my mother being very ill and in the hospital. She took me aside and tried to comfort me. I told her she should have been a nun. She told me she wasn’t Catholic.

A big day in my life. I knew the President was to be motoring down Broadway and I had to see him. Before going down the street I ran upstairs and put our flag out the window. Off I went. I stood in front of the speed-line as far out on the curb as I could get. The President was right in front of me. He was known for his beautiful friendly smile and it was directed right at me, as he waved. Probably everyone standing there with me thought the same thing in regards to their self.

FDR was running for his third term. His opponent was Wendell Wilkie. Us kids trotted along to school in a sing-song manner repeating over and over again:

Roosevelt in the White House waiting to be elected,
Wilkie in the trash can, waiting to be collected.

We didn’t go down Broadway to school, we went the back way, by Haddon Avenue. We passed the Cooper Hospital where I liked seeing the nurses coming out all dressed in white from head to toe. They were immaculate! On cool days they would wear a navy blue cape trimmed with red piping. They looked so professional, it made you think about becoming a nurse.

Across the street from the hospital was a Methodist Church. We went there a few times with the neighbor’s kids. They were good to our family. At Xmas and Thanksgiving they delivered baskets to our house. We also passed the armory on our way to school.

1942 would find me back at St. Joe’s. My mother had passed away. May 1941.

Driver Identified by Woman Victim Denies Being at Scene of Crash

Benjamin Mifflin, 594 Carman street, was found not guilty by a jury in the Camden County Criminal Court before Judge Clifford A. Baldwin yesterday, after he hinted the case against him was “to get money.” Mifflin was charged with assault and battery by automobile.

Mrs. Hazel E. King, of 441 Stevens street, testified that last September 23, Mifflin’s car struck and injured her in front of her home and then drove away as she was unloading some packages from her own car.

She identified Mifflin several days later. Several persons who saw the crash from a distance failed to identify him.

Mifflin denied the charge, saying he was not near the King home at the time of the accident. Asked by Prosecutor Patrick H. Harding on cross-examination: “Why do you think Mrs. King identified you?” Mifflin replied: “She may have had a malicious intent. She may have thought I had money.”

Mifflin formerly operated a Broadway shooting gallery. Detective William Robinson, who found Mifflin’s car after the accident, said there were no scratches on it, although Mrs. King testified the car tore off the door of her own car.

Franklin Pierce Alloway and his wife, the former Sarah Lavinia Griffee resided at 645 Willard Street when their first child, my mother, was born on November 24, 1919. Her name was Sarah Lavinia Alloway. They resided at 815 Market Street when their second child, Eleanor Jennie Alloway, was born on December 10, 1921. They lived at 718 Federal Street when their third child, Florence Mae was born on February 23, 1923. They next resided at 513 South 6th Street when their fourth child, Franklin Charles “Bud” Alloway was born on November 7, 1924. They lived at 608 Carman Street when their fifth child, William Robert Alloway was born, December 31, 1926. The family had moved to 436 Benson Street, when their sixth child, Anna Louse Alloway came on August 5, 1928. When the seventh and last child, Mary Elizabeth was born on August 30, 1930, the family was living at 422 Main Street. The reason given for the continual moving was because of the increase in the family size requiring larger accommodations.

Jim Powell
February 2013

The Heimlich Family, my parents John and Ruth and my siblings, John, Diane and Barbara, lived at 2631 Carman Street from 1939 to 1967 (28 years). To the immediate left of the 4 row houses together with 2631 sat the bank (still there), to our immediate right were the Westfield Apartment Garages (gone) and at one time an Acme Market. We sat right behind Federal Street. On Federal Street, to our back door was a bar (Mike Love’s Tavern at one time, bar still there), the original M&M Tailor Shop, before Marty and Jim moved it across the street to the Westfield Avenue side, next to the old Sugar Bowl and two other stores.

Directly in front of our home, facing towards Baird Boulevard, were the double garages that had bays on both Carman and Bank Streets. If you walked out our front door and made a left, in one short block you were on Baird Boulevard right where it hits the island across from the old Dentists office (Dr. Saul’s I think) and joins 27th Street.

We remember the days of street hucksters, ice deliveries for the real “ice box,” the milk man the bread man, Horn and Hardardt’s right around the corner. The Camden Police Station had a branch right out our back door where Federal and Westfield Avenues split. The building is still there today.

We have nothing but fond memories of a great childhood in East Camden on Carman Street. It seemed to us that there was very little crime, we rarely locked our doors. We walked to all our schools including Garfield, Cramer and Woodrow Wilson, where I graduated in 1960.

Among our childhood friends and all living in a 3 or 4 block area were the Molineaux’s from 24th street, the Devenney’s also on Carman, the DePasquale’s on 26th Street, the Catlings, on 26th, the Auletto’s on 24th, the Griffith’s on 24th, the Shipman’s on 26th, etc.

Richard Heimlich
June 2006

7 Arrested in Bingo Numbers Racket; 4 Seized in Betting Place

Ten men and a woman were arrested in gambling raids over the weekend by Camden city and county authorities.

Seven were arrested for operating a “bingo numbers” racket. A warrant also was issued for Frank Palese, 400 Spruce street, a member of a widely known South Camden family, as the “big shot” of the racket, according to Chief Lawrence T. Doran, of county detectives. Doran said last night Palese is still a fugitive.

In another raid by Camden police, three men and a woman were arrested in an alleged horse racing betting establishment at 1149 Lansdowne avenue. The place was on the second floor over a grocery store, according to Sergeant Gus Koerner, City Detective Thomas Murphy, Jr., and Patrolman James McLaughlin, who made the raid.

Several racing forms and four telephones with two direct wires to tracks now in operation were seized. The police first arrested Roland Flynn, 36, of 589 Carman street; Neil Zeidman, 43, of 1064 Langham avenue, and James O’Donal, 27, of 1119 Empire avenue, and held them in $1000 bail for violating the State crimes act.

West Jersey / Cooper

James Foster, 2, 757 Division St., laceration of head. Ralph Williams, 28, 413 North 29th St., laceration of knee. Lillian Smith, 17, 1093 Trent road, abrasion of eye. Elwood Brisco, 31, 1133 South 2nd St., laceration of leg.

Dorothy Gorman, 2, 507 Division St., contusion and sprain of shoulder. Richard Clark, 17, 327 Vine street, dog bite of leg. James Kenney, 3, 718 Carman St., laceration of scalp. Frank Caratole, 12, 210 Senate St., splinter in finger. James Moy, 14, 641 Line St., fractured wrist, abrasion of knee and hand. Ernest Vincent, 14, 534 South 2nd St., puncture wound of knee. Ralph Springer, 7, 509 Ferry Ave., laceration of scalp. Clement Jones, 4, 1013 Lawrence St., laceration of chin. Thomas Wright, 7, 319 Grant St., fractured shoulder. Hilda Fitzgerald, 28, 311 North 3rd St., laceration of hand. John Schulz, 52, 228 North 7th St., chest injuries.

My great-great-grandmother, “Grandmom” Bertha E. Carlin (1887–1979) lived at 720 Carman St., Camden (according to the 1940 census), with her second husband (my step-great-great-grandfather) William H. Carlin (1883–1965); “Grandpop” Carlin owned his own business, selling fruit and produce, according to his WWII draft card.

Bertha was the daughter of Rebecca A. Van Leer by her first husband C. William Fox and was born in Deerfield, NJ. Bertha was first married to Jesse B. Cossaboon (1884–1945), with whom she had a daughter, Ida M. Cossaboon (1903–1991). Bertha and Jesse divorced and she remarried to Bill Carlin, settled in Camden, and with him adopted a son they named Karl Carlin (1918–1962).

Bertha Carlin lived in Camden until around 1970, when she moved to Fulton, NY, to live with her daughter and son-in-law Ida and Les Marley. Though she died in Fulton, NY, she was buried in Bridgeton, NJ, next to her husband and near her mother.

Ben Marley
August 21, 2012

‘Model’ Youth Who Engineered 21 Lone Wolf Mobs’ Goes to Rahway

A youth who accompanied a schoolboy Raffles on the last of 22 suburban robberies was sentenced to from 18 months to three years in State Prison yesterday.

The “model” youth who played “lone wolf” in all but one of the robberies and attempted thefts in which he was implicated was sent to Rahway Reformatory.

A third youth who accompanied the other two on one of the “jobs” received a suspended sentence to Rahway.

Charles Lynch, 17, of 748 Carman street, who police said confessed to 22 robberies was sentenced by Judge Baldwin to the reformatory because he had no previous record. James Scavetta, 20, of 209 Cypress avenue, Woodlynne, was sentenced to prison for participation in one robbery because, police said, he had been before the court before.

Lads, 11 and 10, Charged by East Camden Woman With Taking Purse and $725 Diamond

Charged with the theft of a $725 diamond ring, two small boys were ordered held for Juvenile Court by Police Judge Pancoast yesterday. One of the boys, William McGinnis, 11, of 2639 Carman Street, had been released from the county detention home last Thursday on probation by Judge Shay. He had been one of six boys held in connection with a series of nine robberies in East Camden.

The other boy is John Auletto, 10, of 2824 Howell Street.

Mrs. Catherine Tydeman testified the pair had come to her apartment at Twenty-eighth Street and Westfield Avenue Thursday afternoon and told her she was wanted on the phone. Returning, she saw the two boys leaving her apartment, and a short time later she discovered that her pocketbook containing a $725 diamond ring was missing. District Detective William Hurlock arrested the pair at the Garfield School. He said he found the ring in their possession.

Parents of the McGinnis boy pleaded for him before Judge Shay last Thursday and said he was “backward” because of a fractured skull he had suffered in an accident.

I was born and raised at 3007 Carman Street in East Camden. I attended Cramer Elementary School and then Woodrow Wilson High School. Upon marrying, my husband and I bought the home down the street from my parents at 3081 Carman Street, just doors from Woodrow Wilson.

It was a nice place to grow up and I have many happy memories of friends and neighbors there. I loved Dudley Grange park and remember the library well. It’s sad that the politicians let it all go… what a loss.

3007 Carman Street was built and purchased by my grandfather, Milton A. Kelly. He lived there with his wife Charlotte until he passed away sometime around 1934. She sold the house to my father, Milton E. Kelly.

I was born in 1938 and was raised in a very loving home there. When I married in 1957 and moved to 3081 Carman Street my parents moved to Haddonfield and sold the house to my brother, William R. Kelly. In the late 1960s he moved to New York and sold the house.

The deck in front of 3007 was added after we left there.

As a child, I never knew Mr. Letts. Mrs. Letts was a widow and would let me climb through our adjacent porches to go to her house. She sold her house to Frank Small and his wife, I am not sure when. The Smalls and my parents, together, made big changes to the front of those properties.

Doreen Kelly Schwingler
February 2008

Daniel J. Cooperson and Barry Abrams met at Cramer School in East Camden in 1956

By Kevin Riordan, Courier-Post Columnist

The two eighth-graders had some things in common — they were both Jewish and obsessed with baseball, for instance — but they were more different than alike. And not just because Dan was a Brooklyn Dodgers fan and Barry loved the Yankees.

Dan, who lived near 32nd and Westfield, was shy, nervous and struggling with a disorder similar to Tourette’s Syndrome.

Barry was smooth and sociable and even had his own phone (“which was unheard of,” he recalls) in his home on Carman Street between 31st and Dudley.

“I thought, ‘This guy’s popular and has everything,’” Dan says.

“Dan was so much smarter than the average bear,” Barry says. “We bonded immediately.”

That bond — now nearly a half-century old — is the focus of the new book Barry and Dan. A quirky, discursive and heartfelt mix of memoir, meditation, Camden history and sports trivia, it was written by Dan and is available through the online subsidy publisher Xlibris (www.xlibris.com).

A retired social worker who turns 60 in July, Dan now lives in Cinnaminson with his wife, Donna. They are the parents of two grown children.

Barry, who turns 61 next week, is a financial adviser familiar to KYW Newsradio listeners as “The Bond Guy.” He and his wife, Rebecca, have three children and live in Marlton.

When Dan first told Barry that he planned to write Barry and Dan, “I told him, ‘Knock yourself out,’” Barry says. “I thought, ‘What’s so interesting about the two of us?’”

Reading the book, Barry says he was struck by the fact that “I didn’t know some of the ways he felt about me — or that he held me in such esteem.”

Says Dan, “Barry was the big brother I never had.”

Interviewing the Barry and Dan of Barry and Dan is a bit like sitting down to chat with a veteran comedy team. The timing is quick, the quips fly and some of the routines feel as lived-in as a favorite chair.

And an interviewer quickly learns that, in addition to sports, one of their favorite subjects is the Camden they and so many older South Jerseyans remember so fondly, fiercely and vividly.

“We lived across the street from Dudley Grange Park,” Barry says. “There was a library there, in a mansion that later burned down. I lived in that library.

“We could walk down to the Arlo Theater and see a movie for 15 cents,” he continues. “We used to play pimple ball, and when the pimple ball broke we used it to play half ball.”

The two chums went through Woodrow Wilson High School together. Although they played different sports, both were basketball managers — because the other had done so. Barry tended to move in different social circles, but their connection endured.

It endured the years when they went to college and served in the armed forces and didn’t see each other, sometimes for years. And while they attended each other’s weddings, there were times in the 1970s and ’80s when Barry and Dan weren’t much in touch.

But they reconnected at the 35th reunion of the Woodrow Wilson Class of ’61.

“Now we’re as close as we’ve ever been,” Barry says.

“Closer even,” says Dan.

A suspect, released a week ago in connection with the $11,000 Camden Radio Condenser Company holdup, was rearrested Saturday and held in $3000 bail on a charge of robbing an East Camden bar.

The accused is Stanley Powell, 26, of 1256 Whitman Avenue, alleged to have stolen, with the help of two other men of unknown identity, a marble machine and 100 cigars from Marty’s Olde Tappe Room, operated at 1990 Federal Street by Marty Segal.

Powell pleaded not guilty.

City Detective George Zeitz testified that he learned that Powell’s new expensive car had been seen near the taproom early on Thursday, when the robbery occurred. Zeitz said he obtained this information after Powell had been quizzed and released in the radio firm holdup.

Upon further investigation, Zeitz asserted, he found a witness, Daniel Danter, 1985 Carman Street, who allegedly saw Powell and two other men carrying “something” from the store and loading it in the car. Zeitz, according to Zeitz, identified Powell. Elwood Cox, of 1981 Carman Street, is alleged by Zeitz to have seen Powell’s car in that neighborhood on the morning of the robbery, but didn’t know any of the men in it.

Acting Police Judge James Smith fixed the amount of bail.