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Rotary Club of Struthers installs new neighborhood signs
STRUTHERS
When residents of downtown Struthers saw the boys from beyond Yellow Creek sporting blue jackets emblazoned with a rising sun, some feared a new gang was forming in a relatively isolated neighborhood in the city called Nebo.
Pat Bundy, a Struthers Police Department captain and a longtime Nebo resident, recalled the scene from his childhood with a laugh.
“We weren’t really in a gang. We just were really proud of our neighborhood,” he said. “We used to call ourselves ‘Nebo boys’ and ‘Nebo girls.’”
On Tuesday, the little neighborhood on the city’s east end that inspired pride in Bundy and his neighbors was commemorated with the installation of three large signs displaying a rising sun and “NEBO” in big, bold letters.
The signs – white letters on a red background with a rising sun cresting a hill set at the top – were an effort of the Rotary Club of Struthers Community Corps, a group of Rotarians who plan and carry out projects in the city. The Community Corps funded three of the signs, totaling $1,500. The group is raising funds for a fourth sign.
The signs are installed at the entrances to the neighborhood – two on Lowellville Road and one on Struthers-Clingan Road. The final sign will be installed on Wetmore Drive.
“I think it helps to instill a little bit of pride in these old neighborhoods that people have kind of forgotten about,” Bundy said. “Back when I was a kid, we all used to talk about how we were from one neighborhood or another. We still identify that way even today.”
Bundy said the Nebo signs would be the first of many neighborhood signs to be installed over the coming year.
Also in the works are signs for Struthers neighborhoods such as Coke Alley, a line of streets near the old coke factory near downtown Struthers; Lyons Flat and North Hill.
Juanita Ware, 88, has lived in the North Hill neighborhood for 60 years, where she reared four children with her husband.
As something of a de facto community leader, Ware, like Bundy, has a deep-rooted pride in her neighborhood. She said the neighbors work together to ensure the North Hill homes are maintained and share information to keep one another protected.
For Ware, the signs are a collective expression of pride for the work the neighbors put in to keep their neighborhoods safe and orderly. The North Hill signs are expected to be installed six months from now.
The signs, designed by Red Tail Sign and Graphics in neighboring Lowellville, are similar in design to the current “Welcome to Struthers” signs located at the city’s main entrances.
Bundy said the group originally was inspired to create the signs after seeing similar signs in Youngstown, like the one outside the Idora neighborhood on the city’s South Side.
While the Nebo signs bear resemblance and take inspiration from other area signs, there is one bit of flair included that is exclusive to Nebo: the rising sun.
Bundy said the symbol called back to an old point of pride for the people of Nebo. They reasoned since their neighborhood was the most easterly in the city, they were the first to see the sun in the morning.