One of our favorite hangouts in high school and college days in the early ’70s was The Flats in Mill Creek Park, seen in the distance of this picture, on the east side of Mill Creek through the trees. Valley Drive alongside The Flats was lined with cars, some of which were being waxed by their owners. You could see couples on blankets making out, a group gathered around a guitar player, guys and girls in cutoffs running around, throwing a frisbee, people smoking, whether cigarettes or something less legal. All of us enjoyed this open meadow just east of the Silver Bridge. A sunny, clear autumn day and you could barely get to the place.
I never knew it by any other name than “The Flats” but at one time, the area was known as Hiawatha Flats. John Melnick, MD, in The Green Cathedral, suggests that the name comes from a production of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “Hiawatha” by a group of Iroquois Indians in 1916, or possibly as early as 1912 or 1913 when a group was encamped there. Mill Creek was temporarily dammed to allow Hiawatha to float down the river on a canoe.
At various times, the area was know as the “Cricket Field” (yes, they apparently played cricket in Youngstown at one time!) or Orchard Meadows. It was a favorite picnic area and included a number of picnic tables and grills.
In the early days, Volney Rogers used the area as a deer park reserve, with a wooden building erected as a deer shelter. It was rare we ever saw deer there or anywhere else during the years I was growing up. I know deer in the park is a point of controversy with groups that want to save the deer and others to remove them. I’m not a local so I won’t even touch this one!
Back in 1976, parking was limited to pull in spaces in two areas. Today, park maps show a picnic area and “comfort station” in the area with part of the east Mill Creek gorge trail running through it. But it has no name on park maps that I can see. I’d love to know how it is being used these days. But “back then” it was the place to hang out on a sunny, spring, summer, or fall afternoon. Little did we know of the long history nor the other names by which this place was known. To us, it was always “The Flats.”
To read other posts in the Growing Up in Working Class Youngstown series, just click “On Youngstown.” Enjoy!
Thank you for your posts on Growing Up inYoungstown. In one of your early posts you said that your high school girl friend lived on Midlothian Boulevard. I grew up five blocks south on Wakefield Ave. so many if the places you mention are very familiar to me. I graduated from Wilson in 1960 so that makes me a few years older than you but we share some of the same memories . Keep the memories coming.
Thanks for reading!
My Memorie of the Flats is weekend football games in the fall.
My high school class of 1967 from South High School used the flats a lot. We loved to go there on beautiful days for football or picnics.
They ruined it when no parking became the rule. You barely see anyone here anymore. The 70s were a lot of fun.
signs , signs everywhere! They planted no parking signs EVERYWHERE. I agree whole heartily about the parking rules killed the use and fun we had. Frisby was big then and the flats was perfect for it.
You bring back so many memories. Ski Hill was near by, a great sledding hill with a bump at the end. It was the start of a jogging trail to Pioneer Park and back. I moved away from Youngstown in the late 60’s. What a gem Mill Creek Park was.
Nice article, Bob. My first encounter with The Flats was in the summer of 1975. I had just finished 5th grade and had started jogging, and decided to join my dad on his run in Mill Creek Park, which I did with him all summer. We would park at Pioneer Pavilion and work our way around Lake Cohasset. First time I experienced The Flats was when we crossed the Iron Bridge and I saw the quiet park turn into a wild party. My dad was never the judgmental type, he just called things as he saw them. I asked him what was going on and he said matter-of-factly “those are the hippies” and told me to be careful because cars and motorcycles were darting in and out and we had to run past it all. A few summers later I joined him again and it was all gone. I asked what happened and he said they didn’t allow parking anymore. For us it was no longer a gauntlet but instead a nice place to run through. I guess perception and perspective go hand-in-hand.