HUNTER SMITH/THE EXPRESS A new mural, painted at 123. S. Allegheny St. in downtown Bellefonte by New York City based artist duo KEY DETAIL, is pictured.

PHOTO PROVIDED
This image shows a map of the Transcontinental Air Mail route in 1924, of which Bellefonte was a crucial link.

BELLEFONTE — Downtown Bellefonte immortalized their place in the history of U.S. airmail Friday with a jubilant block party celebrating the dedication of the Borough’s latest public art installation.

The mural, painted at 123. S. Allegheny St. in downtown Bellefonte by New York City based artist duo KEY DETAIL, celebrates the role of the Bellefonte airfields as a key refueling stop for transcontinental airmail service.

“Public art is a wonderful mechanism for storytelling and capturing our history. Celebrating a community’s history and heritage can play an important role in continuing traditions and remembering legacies. It is exciting to see a mural project that highlights Bellefonte’s role in U.S. transcontinental mail,” said Alexandra Hall, public art consultant with AH Public Spaces, LLC who helped curate the project.

The 1000-square-foot mural, designed to evoke the look of an envelope, features a pilot in early 20th century aviation regalia standing in front of the U.S. Airmail insignia and a Havilland DH-4s airplane — one of the most commonly flown models during Bellefonte’s time as a major airfield.

In the top right, mimicking the look of a stamp, is an image of the Match Factory, another cornerstone of the Borough’s history. As the former location of the Pennsylvania Match Company, the factory was one of the largest match producers in the United States before closing in 1947. Now it is home to The American Philatelic Society, the world’s largest nonprofit organization dedicated to stamp collecting.

The mural unveiling and dedication was held during Downtown Bellefonte Inc.’s (DBI) Friday in the ‘Fonte monthly summer series. The event featured nearly two dozen vendors and organizations; free live music sponsored by the Bellefonte Historical and Cultural Association with performances by Lance Turner Burgess, Elijah Snyder, The Stevedores and Ken Baxter; and activities for the whole family, including a showing of “Frozen” in Talleyrand Park.

“One of Downtown Bellefonte Inc.’s initiatives is public art because public art represents a thriving community,” said DBI Community and Programming manager Kathleen Ammon.

In her view, murals like this one communicate to visitors of Bellefonte that this is a community that values its personality, charm and history — signals that encourage people to move to the community or start businesses there.

“Usually Friday in the ‘Fonte is spread out all around Bellefonte, but because of the mural that was installed last month, we wanted to bring more awareness to it and more people to the space,” said Ammon.

Community member Misty Woods who attended Friday in the ‘Fonte praised the installation.

“I think the mural is really beautiful and I love how it captures a little piece of Bellefonte history,” she said.

The mural, funded through a grant from the PA Wilds Center for Entrepreneurship’s “Wilds Are Working: Remote Lifestyle Experience” initiative, has been years in the making.

“The mural was a labor of love. It took about two years to go from an idea to paint on the wall and being here for everyone to enjoy it,” she said.

Over those past two years, DBI consulted with community members to develop a creative brief that captured the spirit and history of Bellefonte for an open artist call. Several artists submitted proposals, but it was the internationally acclaimed husband-wife team, Andrey and Julia Yu-Baba, whose design was chosen. Having both been involved in public art for over 20 years, the family has traveled throughout Europe, Asia and North America installing murals in their distinctive illustrative style.

In the fall of 2023, after securing the necessary permits from the Bellefonte Borough and receiving approval from the Historic Architectural Review Board, DBI moved forward with installing the mural design. Painting began May 13 and was completed by the end of the month.

“Because these are all within the Historic District, we wanted to maintain that ambiance and that programming. By requiring that the murals have some historic basis in Bellefonte, we therefore have a program that tells the public, whether they’re local or from New York City, California, Europe or Africa that this is a bit of what we’re about,” said Bellefonte Borough Council member Joanne Tosti-Vasey.

As a significant chapter in the history of Bellefonte, choosing to highlight the legacy of airmail was obvious.

In 1918, less than 15 years after the Wright brothers made history flying the world’s first powered flight, the U.S. Post Office Department, the predecessor to the U.S. Postal Service, began testing the viability of domestic airmail.

One of the early planned major routes connected New York City to Chicago, but because of the 821 mile distance, a single plane could not make the entire journey without stopping to refuel. For flights coming from New York, Central Pennsylvania was the region where fuel tanks would need to be refilled to complete the full trip.

The Post Office Department’s airmail service sent a contingent lead by pilot Max Miller to Lock Haven in the opening wave of the path-finding flights to Chicago, a preparatory step in establishing regular airmail service to the city.

According to an account shared by the Centre County Historical Society, it was the charm of the people of Bellefonte that ultimately beat out Lock Haven, winning the town it’s airfield.

“The people made sure that his plane was gassed up, that he had food, water and everything that he needed, and he went back and reported that the welcome reception that he got convinced him that this was a fine location for the first stop,” said Romayne Naylor, former president of the historical society.

Bellefonte’s location aided its case as well, as it was drier than other nearby towns like Lock Haven, which because of its elevation frequently flooded.

Mail was flown for the first time from the airfield on December 18, 1918.

Unfortunately, the mountainous geography of Bellefonte made the area prone to thick, low-lying fog and thermal updrafts which were extremely hazardous to the primitive aircrafts.

According to the Centre County Historical Society, “In 1919, during two weeks of rain and fog on the East Coast, fifteen crashes of airmail planes were reported, damaging over a dozen planes and killing one pilot.” Sixteen pilots who were stationed of flew through Bellefonte died in the line of duty between 1918 and 1927.

Within a decade, aviation technology advanced to the point where planes no longer needed to refuel for transcontinental flights. According to the historical society, by 1928, Bellefonte’s airfield had transitioned to being an intermediate landing zone for coast-to-coast mail routes.

The airfield is now the site of the Bellefonte High School on E. Bishop St.

In a sense, the DBI’s public art initiative mirrors the mission of the contingent of men who once convinced Miller to establish the airfield originally.

“By having a public art initiative bringing murals to life and having them installed in the community, we are also creating an avenue for new people to come in, to visit the area and see the beauty, quirkiness, history and vibrancy of Bellefonte,” said Ammon.