Of all things - and people

UPPER DARBY IS like the legend of the blind men and the elephant: The picture that you hold in your mind depends on where you stand.

For Philly rock fans, of course, the Delaware County township is most famously the home of the Tower Theater, the grande dame - in fishnets - of intimate local concert halls. (See Daily News music critic Jonathan Takiff's history on Page N-4.)

For pop-culture vultures, Upper Darby is the hometown of comedians Tina Fey, Cheri Oteri and Jamie Kennedy, along with music greats Todd Rundgren and the late Jim Croce. "I always say it's something in the water," jokes Upper Darby High School teacher Barbara Benglian, who taught Fey. Benglian says every school year seems to bring another crop of young performers with equal promise, like 17-year-old tenor Dan Matarazzo (see Page N-7). "They keep coming and coming."

For Keystone State social-studies geeks, Upper Darby is a facts-on-file lollapalooza. It's not only Pennsylvania's largest township - with a population of 79,356 in the 2006 U.S. Census - but also the state's sixth-largest municipality, after Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown, Erie and Reading.

Fun fact: Unassuming "little" Upper Darby has about 32,000 more people than Harrisburg (although the greater Harrisburg area's population dwarfs it).

For reporters William Bender, Stephanie Farr and Joe Santoliquito in the Daily News Delco bureau, Upper Darby is a tabloid buffet with a bottomless police blotter of offbeat crimes. Our recent favorite: the drug bust in the bar across the street from City Hall.

For reporters William Bender, Stephanie Farr and Joe Santoliquito in the Delco bureau, Upper Darby is a tabloid buffet with a bottomless police blotter of offbeat crimes. Our recent favorite: the drug bust in the bar across the street from City Hall.

But let's call that element the posterior end of the Upper Darby pachyderm and just move along, shall we? (Careful of the droppings.)

And, lo and behold, viewed from the other side - as seen today from all corners of the globe - Upper Darby is the land of milk and honey.

After 15 or 20 years of immigration, Upper Darby now has residents who speak 60 languages, says township administrative planner Joe Mylotte. The number gets close to 80 if you count all the dialects.

After 15 or 20 years of immigration, Upper Darby now has residents who speak 60 languages, says township administrative planner Joe Mylotte. The number gets close to 80 if you count all the dialects.

There's been such an influx from Ireland (we hereby dub them the Ikea Curtain Irish) that Upper Darby has its own Irish immigration center. "There are 32 counties in Ireland," says Joan Scanlon, a local bureaucrat who works with immigrant groups. "They call us the 33rd."

At Christ Lutheran Church, in the 7200 block of Walnut Street, the 250 members of the congregation - most of whom aren't Lutheran - come from 17 countries, including Albania, Jamaica, Hong Kong, and Bangladesh.

Pastor David Shaheen has erected in the vestibule a little flag from every land. "Our congregation is very proud of its diversity," he says. "India is my most recent flag."

Remarkably, the student body at Upper Darby's Beverly Hills Middle School is three times as diverse. A world map in the hallway is studded with pushpins marking 51 countries where Beverly Hills students were born. Among them: Australia, Afghanistan, Israel, the Congo, Cambodia and Eritrea. "And that isn't even updated for this year," notes office assistant Mary Vollmer.

For families from Delco and West Philly with children who go to bed a Size 8 and wake up a 12, Upper Darby's 69th Street shopping corridor is the place to re-stock the closet. We'll conclude our introductory tour of the elephant here. (In the pages that follow, we'll visit the underbelly, with insider tips and secret finds for the brave of stomach and spirit.)

For families from Delco and West Philly with children who go to bed a Size 8 and wake up a 12, Upper Darby's 69th Street shopping corridor is the place to re-stock the closet. We'll conclude our introductory tour of the elephant here. (In the pages that follow, we'll visit the underbelly, with insider tips and secret finds for the brave of stomach and spirit.)

These days, the shopping corridor at the foot of SEPTA's 69th Street Terminal boasts a quirky mix of urban retail - including chains like Modell's and Easy Pickins - intermixed with big-box stores you'd typically associate with suburban plazas, like Staples and a good-size Rite Aid (with a drive-through, no less).

A Golden Krust bakery, a fast-growing franchise specializing in Caribbean-spiced hot-pocket pastries, sits across the street from an old-school Sears with its own paint store and auto service. A turf club with off-track betting is just two blocks away from a Marshalls that's brimming with high-end Max Studio dresses and DKNY men's neckties.

With block-grant money flowing to spruce up the sidewalks, and some other plans afoot, township officials hope to raise the street's profile as a regional shopping destination. Planners are calling it the Market Street Gateway.

We wish them the best and beg them to leave the Old Country Buffet and Lane Bryant just as they are - right next door to each other. How's that for cause and effect?