“The Not So Good Old Days”: Disease and the Struggle for Public Health in Pennsylvania

Posted by on Oct 15, 2020 in | Comments Off on “The Not So Good Old Days”: Disease and the Struggle for Public Health in Pennsylvania In 1930 A. J. Bohl was proud to work in the Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH). After 25 years there, he wrote an article in Pennsylvania’s Health in which he recalled growing up in the 1880s, when disease and illness ravaged the state. “There wasn’t much attention paid to the communicable diseases. Everybody, as a matter of course, had measles, chicken pox, whooping cough and mumps, and...
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A Tragic Day in Echo: The Southern Cambria Railway Trolley Accident

Posted by on Mar 13, 2017 in | Comments Off on A Tragic Day in Echo: The Southern Cambria Railway Trolley Accident There are few hot days during the summer in Johnstown, Cambria County, but this day, Saturday, August 12, 1916, would be one of them. It was a good time to live in this bustling mill town nestled in the foothills of the Allegheny Mountains. Newspapers were reporting appalling numbers of soldiers killed and wounded in the Battle of the Somme, an ocean away, but the war was not yet a local...
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Romani in Pennsylvania

Posted by on Mar 13, 2017 in | Comments Off on Romani in Pennsylvania This fascinating early 20th-century postcard of a scene from Williamsport, Lycoming County, provides a view of life in Pennsylvania that is seldom represented in formal historic records or in preservation efforts. Cultures that exist outside the mainstream and especially those not linked to specific places pose a special challenge to historians. The word “Gypsy,” which appears on...
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Somerset County: Paths through the Roof Garden

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on Somerset County: Paths through the Roof Garden Referring to the high elevation and the scenic quality of the region, Gov. Martin G. Brumbaugh called Somerset County “the Roof Garden of Pennsylvania” at an annual Farmers’ Day picnic in 1916. Since then. the description has become a familiar and respected title; the words “Roof Garden” have been in­corporated in the names of various businesses, and the complete...
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The Dream of Security: Johnstown and Flood Control

Posted by on Nov 30, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Dream of Security: Johnstown and Flood Control They don’t take rain for granted in Johnstown anymore. Walking down Market Street or cruising Route 56, pedestrians may pause and drivers may slow as the first drops land. Anxious glances skyward reveal the unspoken thought: will it happen again? They are re­calling the terrible night in July 1977 when the rain fell and fell and the dream of a flood-free Johnstown shattered for­ever. That...
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Cambria County: Coming Full Circle

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Cambria County: Coming Full Circle Located in the highlands of west­-central Pennsylvania and amidst forbidding mountains – the Allegheny escarpment and the Laurel Ridge standing sentinel on its eastern and western borders­ – the territory that would become Cambria County was not easily accessible to early Pennsylvanians. Migrants bound westward during the second half of the eighteenth century avoided its...
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To Organize the Unorganized

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on To Organize the Unorganized The year 1919 was marked by an explosion of activity in the American labor movement. Discontent surged among industrial workers as promises of wage increases and improved working conditions, made by employers during World War One, failed to materialize. Telegraph operators, theater ushers and textile workers joined firemen, policemen and dock workers to oppose some of the country’s most...
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The Proud Romanians of Pennsylvania

Posted by on Nov 28, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Proud Romanians of Pennsylvania Search through the smoky steel towns nestled in the hills of central and western Pennsylvania and you will find the scattered descendants of once-numerous communities of Romanian immigrants. While Romanians settled throughout the state wherever mining and ‘industrial work was present, the largest concentrations remaining to­day are in Erie, Mercer. Lawrence, Beaver, Allegheny, Cambria and...
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That Magnificent Fight for Unionism: The Somerset County Strike of 1922

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on That Magnificent Fight for Unionism: The Somerset County Strike of 1922 During 1920 and 1921, western Pennsylvania’s coal mine operators campaigned vigorously to slash wages of the miners they employed. Because demand for coal declined after World War One the operators were forced to reduce production, resulting in stack, or in some cases, the complete shutdown of operations. Many miners drifted to factory jobs in nearby cities, or simply clung to hope -and...
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Shorts

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Shorts Fort Hunter Day, a celebra­tion of autumn, will be hosted on Sunday, September 19 [1993], from 10 A. M. to 5 P. M. by Fort Hunter Mansion and Park. The event, free and open to the public, will feature crafts show and demonstrations, carriage rides, period entertainment, and numerous activities designed especially for children. Also featured throughout the day will be demonstrations of...
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