NOTE: The 1920s in Delco was a time of real estate development in Delaware County. Media Boro east was the area getting all the attention. Many small country towns where changing. Swarthmore Boro was just one example.
Operators of This City Figure in the Borough’s Development
Swarthmore is on the peak of a realty boom. Until very recently the trading in real estate in that borough has been more or less along conservative lines. While the market characterized a steady, active movement, it never jumped, as in other sections of the county. And it seems Chester operators are to figure prominently in the future development of Swarthmore insofar as its building development is concerned.
It is said the Chester Realty Company has purchased the Leiper tract of eight acres. This property is located on the west side of Chester Road and runs down to Crum Creek. The tract, while not within the limits of Swarthmore Borough proper, is next door neighbor in Springfield Township. Credited rumor insists the company intends to begin the erection of several dwellings on the tract immediately.
Still another deal is the one in which S. E. Simmons is the principal promoter. Mr. Simmons has purchased a tract of eleven acres fronting on Park Avenue, extending back to the Frederick Calvert holdings. Robert Green, the civil engineer, is now surveying and plotting the tract. Mr. Simmons is a resident of Swarthmore, but has not heretofore figured in real estate operations. It is said the purchaser intends to do no building on the tract, but proposes to sell it off in building lots, either to individual home seekers or to speculative bidders. Vassar and Dickinson Avenues, which cease functioning as thoroughfares at present where they run to a blind end against the property, are to be extended through so as to open up the central portions of the tract. Charles A. Smith is acting as resident selling agent for Mr. Simmons.
During the past week curiosity has been aroused among the Swarthmore realty brokers as to the real significance of the presence in the borough of four lawyers from Roanoke, Va. They were registered at the Strathhaven Inn for several days and frankly admitted they were in Swarthmore looking over certain real estate matters. From the number and prominence of the attorneys, the natural presumption arose that it must be a large and important deal to require the services of four lawyers to put it over, R. F. C. Plank, J. M. Plank, J. H. Hage and H. C. Birchfield. While innumerable guesses are ventured as to the property involved in the supposed deal, nothing authoritative is known, and the Southerners were careful not to drop nor leave behind leads of any character.