ROOTS: Former Bradford resident Jim Burns is in town for his 65th class reunion and for Festa Italiana, and he contacted us to chat about his connection to the town.
When Jim left Bradford in 1962, the city had a population around 18,500 — more than twice the current population. His job transferred him to San Diego, Calif.
Jim has strong family roots in the Bradford community.
He tells us his great-grandfather is attributed for starting Festa Italiana — a celebration of St. Rocco’s Day, and his grandfather, Jimmy Rich, open the Option House in 1935. His Uncle Rocco used to own a barber shop next to the old Grand Theatre, which his uncle later sold to Mike Ross. His dad worked as a driller when he was younger, then he was manager at Bradford Pipe & Supply, back when it was located on Main Street.
When they were young, Jim and his brother delivered The Bradford Era, as well as the afternoon paper, The Bradford Star.
“Our route was Interstate Parkway,” he said.
Jim recalled one strange finding when working in the newspaper delivery business.
One morning he threw a paper on a porch, then realized he’d thrown it on the wrong porch. When he went to retrieve the paper, he found a baby outside in the cold.
Sure enough, we found this article in the Friday, Oct. 5, 1951, edition of The Era: “Carrier Finds Baby on Porch.”
The article read, “A copy of yesterday’s Bradford Era, flipped onto the porch of the wrong house by a sleepy newspaper delivery boy, resulted in the discovery, about 5 a.m. yesterday, of an unidentified new-born baby boy who had been abandoned after birth on Brook St.
“Jimmy Burns, son of Mr. and Mrs. G.R. Burns, 16 Storey Place, was making deliveries on his newspaper route when he discovered the child.”
Hospital authorities believed the 9 pound 11 ounce boy was born around 11:30 p.m. the day before — only 5 ½ hours before Jimmy found him. The baby was wearing a baby shirt, diapers and a bathrobe, and he was wrapped in two blankets.
Jim woke the home’s tenants, and the police were called. Officers Mike Tancar and Jack Arbuckle took the baby to Bradford hospital.
Police Chief Edward Edmonds reported that he had taken between 10 and 15 calls the day the baby was found from people who wanted to adopt the baby.
