New Kensington History
New Kensington was founded in 1891. In 1890, the Burrell Improvement Company considered the advantages of the level land south of its home in Lower Burrell. (At the time, the land was secured parts of the Stephen Young and the late Rev. Alex Young farms.) New Kensington was incorporated as a borough November 26, 1892. Named just "Kensington" at first, it was later changed to New Kensington due to another city of the same name on the eastern side of Pennsylvania.In an attempt to make New Kensington comparable to Pittsburgh, the streets were named with numbers. Avenues ran parallel to the river, while streets were perpendicular. Fourth and 5th were the main commercial streets.Once the land was surveyed, a public sale was held on June 10th, 1891. Thousands of people flooded the area and investors began bringing industry with them. The first large company was the Pittsburgh Reduction Company (which later became Alcoa). They acquired a 3.5 acre (14,000 m²) that allowed the company to exploit the closeness to the riverfront. Eventually, such other companies as Adams Drilling, Goldsmith and Lowerburg, New Kensington Milling, New Kensington Brewing, Logan Lumber, Keystone Dairy and many more were built late in the Nineteenth Century and continuing into the early Twentieth Century. Early achievements included a railroad station,the 9th Street bridge, a passenger boat that navigated the Allegheny River, a street car line that ran to Natrona Heights, the "Kensington Dispatch" newspaper, a fire department, hotel, opera house, and a local chapter of the YMCA. By 1906, 25,000 people occupied an area of seven miles. Schools and churches flourished at the turn of the century leading the way to the modern era we are now a part of.In 1941 New Kensington became the site of a modern workers' housing project designed by Marcel Breuer and Walter Gropius, which set new standards for federal housing design. Intended for Alcoa employees (it was called Aluminum City Terrace), it was subsequently used to rehouse displaced residents from other parts of the city.
The following religious denominations are represented here, and many have fine church edifices, in which to worship after their own peculiar faith, while others are in the mission stage of their history. The first in the field was the Lutheran congregation, as a mission, with Rev. Carl Zinmeister, pastor, in October 1891. Then came the following: St. Joseph's Reformed, First Methodist Episcopal, First Baptist, Zion's German Lutheran, Trinity Reformed, Episcopal, First Presbyterian, Evangelical Lutheran, St. Mary's Polish Catholic, St. Peter's Italian Catholic, First Church of Christ, African Methodist Episcopal, German Baptist, and Colored Baptist.
ARNOLD History can be found at:
http://www.arnoldpa.org/index.php?name=News&file=article
&sid=7
http://www.inwestmoreland.com/Towns/Arnold/Arnold.htm
Everyone with a tie to the city of New Kensington.
New Kensington Maffia History
Years ago, New Kensington, Pennsylvania was a Mob town, a little Chicago if you will. Often referred to as Gun Town by locals. Organized crime had deep roots in Western Pennsylvania and was run by a few "Families" with ties to New York, Chicago and even Havana.
New Kensington was the aluminum capitol of the world, ALCOA built a sprawling research center and aluminum mill here. Just up river along the Allegheny was Brayburn Steel and a little farther up across the river was Allegheny Ludlum Steel, there were other mills in the area too, producing all sorts of products, there were oil refineries, coal mines, construction companies, you name it, it was here. There was the Pennsylvania Railroad too, the first oil tanker railroad car was developed here. This part of the Allegheny Valley was a booming place and New Kensington was the center of it all.
In New Kensington, the boss was Gabriel "Kelly" Mannarino. Mannarino ran a tight ship and many old timers will tell you that when Kelly ran this town we didn't have half the problems we have today. True enough too, Mannarino was well liked and respected by mobsters, police and politicians alike. Nobody crossed him. Back in the day, when Mannarino was running the show, New Kensington had a thriving business district with stores, shops, car dealerships, theaters, as well as bars, night clubs, after hours clubs where gambling and other assorted nefarious vices could be found. If you were looking for a good time, you could most likely find it here in New Ken and if you were looking for a bad time, well you could find that here as well.
Now, I'm not trying to glamorize organized crime or anything like that, but the truth be known and the facts are facts... we didn't have half the problems in New Kensington when Kelly Mannarino was king. R.I.P. Kelly.
New Kensington Ten
NEW KEN is a place that others outside the community have faintly ever heard about. It is a place where you have those once in a lifetime experiences that linger in your mind for the rest of your life. To know NEW KEN, you have to live NEW KEN. To live NEW KEN, you have to be rugged and have a sense of imagination. I could explain, but it would take the time of seven winters. So what I'll do is wrap it up into 10 examples that will illustrate to you the "NEW KEN" experience.
1. Every sporting event in NEW KEN includes a jobless man named RAPPIN ROB who vigoursly has seizures while rhyming every word he says between sips from his big squeeze full of Jack Daniels.
2. JD? Who is JD? He is a slightly deranged midget that roams the streets of NEW KEN slanging funk and threatening people with his be be gun. If you run across this freak, look for three tattooed tear drops on his left eye and calves the size of tree trunks. Don't let him full you, he's wearing shorts.
3. SID DIGGS. If you stop him, he will flow.
4. PHONE GUY! A man that has more hair on his neck then TREMMY aka QUAMMY has on his carhart fleece! With his snuff can goatee, he roams the streets of NEW KEN stopping at every pay phone to speak the language of the wildebeest while doing the "PHONE GUY HOP"! During this display, he says "Phar-Mor buying power 389, 389 and sleepy sleepy sleepy." He wears a Reebok Jean jacket with a Gucci Suede Vest. Watch out for him, because he likes to rape little kids in the bathroom.
5. FRANK'S MARKET. This destroyed landmark would sell any product it had to anyone with money, no matter what age. This included cigarettes, snuff, blunts, papers, lighter fluid, legal drugs, razors and other age specific products. Two corrupted youths(who most likely bought their fix there) burnt down the store with smoke bombs and a piece of Bazooka Joe.
6. LANCE ROMANCE. This man walks the streets with a weight lifting belt and a Racket ball. One day while bouncing the infamous racket ball down Freeport road, he slipped on a used jimmy cap. Neighboring houses called for help. The Paramedics tried to cut his tight red sweats and he frantically tried to stop them from getting to his broken femur. It didn't work. They cut his sweats reveling a fucking monstrous salami strapped to his inner thigh with duct tape.
7. SEVEN. This is the number of people in this little town who's name is associated with POOP. Names like POOPY, POOHBEAR, POOPBUTT, POOH... etc... possibly more.
8. In NEW KEN, it's harder to get a cold Dr. Pepper than a nice fat sac of skunk. This is also a city where more blunts are split and smoked than papers are wrote.
9. NEW KEN is a town that holds more talent than the NFL and NBA combined, but it is swallowed by the persistent use of narcotics and alcoholic beverages starting at the age of 13.
10. NEW KEN is in the Guinness Book of World Records for the most alcoholic establishments per population density. NEW KEN also has the only bars that have 8-Ball and St. Ides on tap with free Jungle Juice.