The air raid siren at City Hall that was successfully tested in October at Mayor Wally Scott\u2019s behest is indeed a relic.<\/p>\n
But just how rare is it to find an intact Civil Defense siren like Reading\u2019s?<\/p>\n
Extremely rare, according to a self-described siren enthusiast who recently emailed me.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s one of the few that are still up,\u201d wrote Aidan Beaulne. \u201cIt is a Federal Signal Thunderbolt 1000A but not an ordinary one.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said he could tell by a photo in the Reading Eagle that the siren used to have the telltale yellow and black stripes of a \u201cJailbar\u201d Thunderbolt.<\/p>\n
The Jailbar, he explained, refers to the metal crossbars in the front of the horn, which was sold from 1952 to 1955. The yellow and black stripes were the only color scheme for Thunderbolts in 1952, and it became an option in 1953.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter 1955, there weren\u2019t any Jailbars made, only Thunderbolts with yellow only, and a mesh screen,\u201d Beaulne said.<\/p>\n
The reason the siren casts such a high-pitched sound has to do with a setting in the control panel, a cabinet of switches that powers the components, including a blower, rotator and chopper. The latter gives the siren a choppy sound.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo you guys should keep that siren up,\u201d Beaulne continued. \u201cIt is super rare, and a lot of people would love to record it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perhaps the mayor\u2019s interest in preserving a Cold War-era relic is right on key.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Steven Henshaw, reporter<\/p>\n
Finding hope when \u2018your world ends\u2019<\/p>\n
When a child has cancer, daily life is a tremendous ordeal for a family.<\/p>\n
To help ease the hardships of treatment and care, Cheri Burkert started Heroes Hop, an annual event to raise money for St. Jude Children\u2019s Hospital and the Greater Reading Mental Health Alliance.<\/p>\n
The event also recognizes one child and family battling cancer and helps brighten their holiday season with gifts.<\/p>\n
At the 2014 Heroes Hop, Jacob McCue of Exeter Township was the guest of honor. His mother, Danielle, recently spoke about the impact that event had on their family.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour world ends,\u201d when you find out your child has cancer, she said.<\/p>\n
But Danielle noted that she never could have imagined all the good that results from efforts of people like Burkert.<\/p>\n
Jacob\u2019s cancer now has been in remission for five years.<\/p>\n
\u201cThank you doesn\u2019t even begin to cover it,\u201d Danielle said.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Matt Nanci, reporter<\/p>\n
After years of pain, she walks with relief<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, Bonnie Sandridge showed off her walking skills during a rehab session at Penn State Health St. Joseph Spring Ridge.<\/p>\n
Through a GoFundMe campaign, the Spring Township woman raised nearly $9,000 to help pay for a device that could give her relief after years of challenges with her left ankle.<\/p>\n
Sandridge said she hoped the device, called the ExoSym, could take away about half her pain. But her steps are now pain-free when she wears the device.<\/p>\n
As she took steps at rehab, she said she wanted to thank all the people who helped her. Many of them were anonymous.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want to wake up from this dream because it feels too good to be true,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Matthew Nojiri, reporter<\/p>\n
For now, amazing story will remain untold<\/p>\n
There are some amazing stories in Reading.<\/p>\n
I am awed by the complex, unique and astonishing lives lived by the people in the city.<\/p>\n
As a writer, I want to chronicle their stories in the most truthful and entertaining way possible.<\/p>\n
But the stories often depend on how much information people are willing to share about themselves. Just a few days ago, I spent time talking with someone whose day-to-day life would make for an enthralling coming-of-age story.<\/p>\n
But the person did not want to appear in the newspaper or deal with the reactions that would surely come his way.<\/p>\n
As someone who appears in commercials and has his face on billboards, I understand wanting to protect your privacy and anonymity. But as a reporter, I am dying to convince the person I spoke with to go on the record and give the public, as he gave me, a peek into his life.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Anthony Orozco, reporter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The air raid siren at City Hall that was successfully tested in October at Mayor Wally Scott\u2019s behest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":325502,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[139,128,130,129],"class_list":["post-325501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-news","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=325501"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325501\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/325502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=325501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=325501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=325501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}