Ashley, Pennsylvania - Joe Palooka Monument

Here is the true story of the current Joe Palooka Monument:

The original plaque, bronze on a stone base, was stolen in or around the early or the mid 1970's. I was Assistant Manager and new director of a radio station licensed to the city of Nanticoke which was know as WMJW-FM at that time.

I aired an editorial calling for the replacement of the old monument because the character was created locally and because that character stood for an all-American hero who always did the right thing. A local newspaper, the Sunday Independent, picked up the idea and formed a committee to raise funds for a new monument. I was one of four individuals selected for the committee because of my editorial. We decided to have a stone memorial to avoid future theft problems. The comic strip was still in circulation at that time and the artist actually wrote the committee members into one story line as judges for a beauty contest. He joined us when the new memorial was dedicated and left a space in the official photo in which he drew Joe Palooka! The photo appeared in the Sunday Independent. I believe the original still hangs on the wall of a bar not far from Myers High School in Wilkes-Barre.

The monument itself has held up well, although there is some deterioration of the base stone. I believe a boy scout group originally agreed to police the grounds. I'm not sure if anyone has officially assumed those duties these days.

The original committee (for the existing monument) included Samuel Greenberg, Fred Ney, the late John Cicero and myself, David DeCosmo (WYOU TV Ret.) [David DeCosmo, 05/11/2009]

Mount Palooka site does have a photo relief of the boxer on the monument. It was sponsored by the Wilkes-Barre Jaycees. I, then a Jaycee, photographed the dedication ceremonies and I am sure it is in the Wilkes-Barre Times-Leader newspaper archives. Ham Fisher, a W-B native, was the creator of the comic strip and was at the dedication. Palooka's manager, Knobby Walsh, was allegedly based on the T-L's sports editor. I wish I had a copy of the picture I took to send you but alas that was back in the late '40s or early '50s. [Dick Paul, 01/26/2009]

Mount Joe Palooka monument, a carved stone slab along the westbound side of Route 309 between mountaintop and Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Shows a carved relief portrait of Joe Palooka, the comic-strip character created by a writer born in Wilkes-Barre. The mountain behind it was renamed in the character's honor. There is a pull-off area, but watch the downhill traffic coming from behind when you exit... [Robert Waldbauer, 09/16/2006]

On Rt 309 on the way to Mt. Top is the Joe Palooka monument. Palooka was a comic-strip fighter from Wilkes-Barre PA and somewhat of a local celebrity, who was nationally syndicated in many newspapers. The monument is about two miles from another attraction I spotted while on your site, the GIANT COW in Wilkes-Barre Twp. It's now muticolored and looks really stupid, but it's been there as long as I can remember. [Steve Skovira, 02/09/1999]

[RA: Steve reports back that the Palooka monument is a plaque on granite, not a statue. So a death match between it and the statue in Oolitic, IN, doesn't seem fair...]