Matchbook
Object number2015.20.11
Manufacturer
Superior Match Company
OriginChicago, IL
MediumPaper/Ink/Metal
Credit LineGift of Mary Antol
DescriptionHelpy's Tavern matchbook. Paperboard cover is off-white with black text and decoration. Front has tavern name and address above a strip of rough material for striking the matches against. Back has an illustration of a plate of food and a glass of beer with surrounding text describing the food. Top edge has a phone number. Inside is off-white and has seventeen (17) matches with red heads; three matches are missing with stubs remaining. A metal staple holds the matches in place at bottom center.Dimensions2 x 1.563 x 0.375 in. (5.1 x 4 x 1 cm)InscriptionsFront has printed black text "HELPY'S / TAVERN / 118 CENTER AVENUE / PITCAIRN, PENNA. / CLOSE COVER [union label] 51 FOR SAFETY".
Back has an illustration of a plate of food and a glass of beer with surrounding black printed text "GOOD / BEER / TASTY / SANDWICHES".
Top edge has black printed text "Phone DRexel 2-9862".
MarksBottom edge has maker's mark printed in black "SUPERIOR MATCH CO., CHICAGO, U.S.A."
Historical NotesFrank Helpy (born Francesco Apa) immigrated to McKees Rocks in 1897 at the age of five and he attended the Irish Catholic grade school where the nuns changed his last name from "Apa" to "Helpy." He went back and forth between the United States and Italy as a young man; during one of his return visits to San Donato, he married Filomena Capolupo. Helpy operated a cobbler shop in Pitcairn to support his wife and four children in Italy. When the political situation in Europe became tense in the 1930s and Fascism was on the rise in Italy, Frank decided his family should relocate to live with him in Pitcairn. Frank eventually closed his cobbler shop and opened Helpy's Tavern and operated it until his death in 1966, after which his daughter Rosalie and her husband, Joseph Cordasco, took over the bar until it's closing in 1993.
Previous owner
Frank Helpy
(died 1966)
Related institution
Frank Helpy's Tavern
On View
Not on view
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