Ladder

Part of the original exterior design of the University of Pennsylvania's venerable Palestra are vertical bands of rusticated limestone that offset the building's brick facade. The stonework, obviously intended to be ornamental, can look like a ladder of sorts, with exaggerated joints between the stones, just deep enough to stick a shoe in. Since this is Philadelphia, if it looks like a ladder, it will be used as a ladder. Getting into sports events and concerts, or just into a gym to play ball, is a fine Philly tradition.

Little League Coach Chuck Perri and his Cherry Hill Nationals team celebrate Friday night after an 8-3 win over Somers Point, sending the Cherry Hill nine to the state Section 4 Championships in Sayreville tonight.

A heartfelt tribute to those who heroically risk their lives to save others, Ladder 49 fails as drama but succeeds as a "when bad things happen to good firemen" procedural. It's sensitivity training for civilians. Director Jay Russell drops us smack into the firefighter furnace. We feel the flesh-melting heat, lung-searing smoke, and eye-scorching flames. We agonize over triage decisions and ponder the cosmic irony of a job in which a worker saves families while he risks destroying his own. Despite this, Ladder 49 is a series of Hallmark-card platitudes, not a human portrait.

John Barr, an Audubon High graduate, has been reunited with an old friend in San Diego, and in the process has continued to move up the major-league baseball executive ladder. Barr, 33, was named the assistant general manager of the San Diego Padres late last week, continuing his rapid advancement in professional baseball. Barr went to San Diego after serving for two years as the Baltimore Orioles' scouting director. When he was named the Padres' assistant GM, Barr was reunited with an old friend, Joe McIlvaine, who was named San Diego's general manager early this month.

Firefighters have launched a $75,000 campaign to restore Ladder 36, the township's first tiller-ladder fire engine. In 1975, when hotels and other taller buildings were being built in the township, the Masonville Fire Company, now a part of Mount Laurel Fire Department, bought the truck and its 75-foot ladder from the Mount Holly Fire Company. The truck remained in service until the fire company bought an engine with a 102-foot platform ladder in 1988, said Rosemarie Grabowski, president of the Masonville Fire Company for the last 11 years.

Over at the Consumer Product Safety Commission, it's getting hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys. Last month the commission's three conservative members voted for enlarging a questionnaire. The two liberals voted against the expansion, and one of them, Saundra Brown Armstrong, had something close to a conniption fit. The story behind this particular brouhaha goes back about 10 years, to the time the commission created its National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS)

Center City's Engine Company 4 handled hundreds of hot situations before the city shut it down in 1984. Nowadays, fires are blazing in the kitchen and in two fireplaces at the new pub Ladder 15 (1528 Sansom St., 215-964-9755). The owners, who have the more downscale Mad River locations in Old City and Manayunk, have added a balcony to the 35-foot ceilings and given the place an industrial look, with two fireplaces (more fire), lots of steel, and stone-and-mesh walls. A private room is due on the third floor.

What is up with this game? Last year, it was nowhere, save for RV parks and an occasional Citizens Bank Park tailgate. This year, it's everybody's beach game. "Ladder ball is the 2009 mushers," Jenna Gallo, 22, says cryptically, standing on the beach on the Ventnor side of Fredericksburg Avenue up by the boardwalk, the 20-odd pieces of PVC tubing having been assembled into two three-rung ladders 15 paces apart, the six sets of two balls joined by a string ready to be tossed.

A difference of 25 feet has sparked a hot debate in the township. As the Board of Supervisors voted last week to authorize bidding to buy a second 100-foot aerial-ladder firetruck, two supervisors asked why a 75-foot model would not suffice. "I'm not persuaded that the township needs a second 100-foot aerial-ladder truck that costs over half a million dollars," said Supervisor Bob Clifton, who voted against the bid authorization. "We are not a city alone in the wilderness.

To prevent problems from piling up in this coming winter's harsh weather, take a good look at your rain gutters now while the weather makes it possible. A little preventive maintenance can save you a lot of money and hassle later. For example, are your gutters clean and clear? If you don't feel like getting up on a ladder, check them by using a garden hose to spray water on your roof above the gutters. If the water doesn't seem to flow well (or at all), you probably have a blockage.

Part of the original exterior design of the University of Pennsylvania's venerable Palestra are vertical bands of rusticated limestone that offset the building's brick facade. The stonework, obviously intended to be ornamental, can look like a ladder of sorts, with exaggerated joints between the stones, just deep enough to stick a shoe in. Since this is Philadelphia, if it looks like a ladder, it will be used as a ladder. Getting into sports events and concerts, or just into a gym to play ball, is a fine Philly tradition.

A COMMUNITY cloaked in grief held a prayer vigil Sunday night to honor two fallen firefighters near the charred Kensington ruins where the pair sacrificed their lives one week ago. In the end, the Day of Honor and Remembrance for Capt. Robert Neary and Lt. Daniel Sweeney - who were promoted posthumously at their funerals - simply said "thank you" to the firefighters. "Thank you to those men, to all the others, men and women, who woke up in the middle of the night [and]

Moorestown girls' lacrosse coach Deanna Knobloch had a much different view of her latest accomplishment in a career that is shaping up as one of the best in South Jersey history, regardless of sport. Knobloch improved to 400-29-4 with Saturday's 8-3, season-opening win over visiting Strath Haven of Delaware County in a nonleague matchup played under raw, damp conditions. Instead of looking at it as her 400th win, Knobloch saw it as the first this season, a year in which the only goal remains the same: to be the last New Jersey team standing at the end. "This is a new season, and this is just the first rung up the ladder," she said.

Moorestown girls' lacrosse coach Deanna Knobloch had a much different view of her latest accomplishment in a career that is shaping up as one of the best in South Jersey history, regardless of sport. Knobloch improved to 400-29-4 with Saturday's 8-3, season-opening win over visiting Strath Haven of Delaware County in a nonleague matchup played under raw, damp conditions. Instead of looking at it as her 400th win, Knobloch saw it as the first this season, a year in which the only goal remains the same: to be the last New Jersey team standing at the end. "This is a new season, and this is just the first rung up the ladder," she said.

By David Holahan When I was a child, my family shared an aluminum extension ladder with the Harmon clan and another neighbor in Long Island. Sometimes finding it was a kind of shell game: Which garage, shed, or porch is the ladder under now? The money saved by not buying our own ladders couldn't have been much, but the Harmons had 10 kids, and I had four brothers, so every little bit helped. And how often did any of us need a ladder? The boundary between us and the Harmons was vague.

BRIGANTINE, N.J. - Experts said Monday that they did not know whether the recent deaths of three dolphins found along the Jersey Shore were related. Officials with the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine were notified Sunday afternoon about a common dolphin that was trapped between the rungs of a ladder underneath a dock in the Ocean City lagoon. Robert Schoelkopf, director of the center, said it appeared that the dolphin got caught in the ladder, the Atlantic City Press reported.

Here is a translation of the transcript of the conversation between Capt. Francesco Schettino, commander of the grounded Costa Concordia, and Capt. Gregorio De Falco of the Italian coast guard in Livorno. In the conversation, De Falco repeatedly orders Schettino to return to the ship to oversee the evacuation, while Schettino resists. The audio was first made available on the website of the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, and the Italian coast guard confirmed its authenticity Tuesday.

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ARIES (March 21-April 19). You know immediately when you're clicking with someone because you've experienced excellent rapport before. TAURUS (April 20-May 20). Whilst trying to make your way up a social or political ladder, you will stop and realize there is no ladder. No one is on top. GEMINI (May 21-June 21). Hindsight is unrealistic. Then again, it's a more rounded perspective than what you get in the actual situation. CANCER (June 22-July 22). You could get caught up in a conversation that seems to wind on forever, despite a lack of real content.