On Thanksgiving Day 1938, with the Great Depression still hanging over Schuylkill County, Pottsville flipped the switch on Christmas – Centre Street draped in spruce and laurel, banks sending out thousands in Christmas Club checks, and downtown shops “dolled up” for the season. This piece walks through the decorations, displays, and small luxuries that brought a little light to a hard year in the Coal Region. Read the full story.
In the 1950s, Mauch Chunk was fading - until newspaperman Joe Boyle met Jim Thorpe’s widow and a wild reinvention began. Our rebranded podcast with new co-host Molly Keilty follows the town’s rise and fall and rise again, Thorpe’s story, and the Nickel-A-Week publicity push in the 1950s. This is the wild story of how Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania came into being. Listen to the episode.
In 1938, Tower City residents opened the Herald newspaper to despair: The Brookside Colliery - lifeblood of their town - was shut down as “unsafe and unprofitable.” Pillars robbed, tunnels flooded, 1,200 jobs vanished; families turned to relief, WPA, and bootleg mining. The mining era in Williams Valley's history was coming to an end. Read the full story.
The Great Depression hit Pennsylvania’s Coal Region hard. Collieries shuttered, jobs vanished, and families scraped by with bootleg mining, relief drives, and New Deal work. In my latest RealClear Pennsylvania column, I trace the collapse from Black Tuesday to efforts in towns like Williamstown and Lykens to survive the depression—and what lingers today. Read the full story.
Two striking images reveal the anthracite industry’s decline in Lorraine, near St. Clair, Pennsylvania. By 1938, the once-thriving patch town had nearly vanished, leaving only two homes standing. Discover what happened to this lost community, echoing the fate of many others in the Coal Region. Read the full story.
Discover historic footage by Benjamin Harrison Hay at Buck Run Colliery, showing mineworkers and narrow‑gauge locomotives during the Great Depression. These clips bring Schuylkill County’s coal industry to life. Read the full story.
An aerial survey of Pennsylvania by airplane in 1938 shows us the mining operation just a few years before it closed forever.
In 1933, mineworkers in Dauphin County fought to save their jobs as the Great Depression threatened to close the Short Mountain Colliery.
A 1940 newspaper article details the efforts in Central Pennsylvania to prevent and put out forest fires in the region.
Three mineworkers were killed in their makeshift coal mine when the roof caved in during a 1934 mine accident.