While the coal industry has come and gone, Slavic churches have remained a backbone of the community for over a century. They offer tranquility and craftsmanship in a world that is increasingly devoid of both.
By Gavin Moulton
Six onion domes tower over the borough of Coaldale in northeastern Pennsylvania’s anthracite region. Set against the dark grey of the coal strip mined across the valley, their hue intensifies into a brilliant shade of cyan. The domes belong to St. Mary’s Orthodox church, a Russian-style masterpiece built in 1917 by Slavic migrants from the Carpathian Mountains of Eastern Europe. In the anthracite region, coal and religion have long gone hand and hand. A century ago, many coal corporations donated land for church construction and in nearby Nesquehoning an icon of Christ written (the preferred term for icon creation, reflecting visualization of Scripture) in 1975 features a coal breaker in the background.
Beginning in the 1870s, the world’s largest reserves of anthracite coal drew tens of thousands of Slavic workers to northeastern Pennsylvania. As communities grew, miners and their families established over 100 churches through hard work and meticulous saving. The region’s ubiquitous onion domed churches are the striking architectural legacy of Ruthenian migrants from the Galician and Carpathian regions of what was then the Austro-Hungarian and Russian Empires. Deprived of the opportunity to develop their language and culture in their native land by imperial powers, newfound freedom in the United States enabled migrants to shape new diasporic cultures brick by brick.
The most distinctive feature of the coal region’s churches are onion domes crowned with three-barred Greek Catholic or Slavonic crosses. Most of the churches were built between 1900-1930, during the height of mass migration from Eastern Europe. While churches were built in earlier decades, few have survived as they were often constructed of wood and quickly outgrown by congregations that proceeded to build larger brick and stone structures.
Most Ruthenians originally belonged to the Greek Catholic Church—an eastern religious rite under the authority of the Pope in Rome—but owing to linguistic, labor, and religious conflict in the coalfields, many left for several Orthodox denominations and developed national identities as Carpatho-Rusyns, Russians, and Ukrainians. Each religious rift required construction of a new church, creating a densely woven religious network. The Greek Catholic Church itself eventually divided into two jurisdictions: the Byzantine Catholic Church and Ukrainian Catholic Church. Due to these divisions, it was not uncommon for a single coal town neighborhood to have anywhere from three to five Slavic churches. Congregations’ new architectural commissions reflected competing identities: Orthodox churches often drew from traditional Russian styles, while Greek Catholic churches frequently referenced the design of the Holy Cross Cathedral in Uzhhorod, a church symbolic of the union with Rome located in what is modern day Ukraine.
While the coal industry has come and gone, Slavic churches have remained a backbone of the community for over a century. They offer tranquility and craftsmanship in a world that is increasingly devoid of both. On Sunday morning, visitors can slip into a space scented by the burning of beeswax candles and immerse themselves into a sea of icons. Filled with gold and silver, church interiors are glimpses of heaven. Dedicated parishioners will rightly tell you that their church is the most beautiful place they have ever seen.
Major religious transformations are quietly taking place up and down the line. As the population of mining towns has decreased, so too has the need for multiple churches in a single neighborhood. Although I’ll note here that at least one church leader confessed that dedication to football over religion has done more to shrink Sunday morning attendance than outmigration. Whatever the cause, the closure of historically significant churches looms. This fall, the Orthodox Cathedral of Wilkes-Barre abruptly shut its doors. Established in 1900 by St. Alexis Toth, the leader of the return to Orthodoxy movement, the church was a religious center for the region. Yet, the closure of churches has generated new possibilities unthinkable in the past. Daughter parishes have returned to their mother churches and in places where a single church remains communities have bridged religious and ethnic divides that were once insurmountable.
St. Mary Orthodox Church, Coaldale, PA (1914)
Peter and Paul Orthodox Church, Minersville, PA (1937)
St. John the Baptist Orthodox Church, Nesquehoning, PA (1935-36)
St. Michael Orthodox Church, Jermyn, PA (1919)
Transfiguration Ukrainian Catholic Church, Shamokin, PA (1905)
St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church, Mahanoy City, PA (1923) (closed)
St. Basil Orthodox Church, Simpson, PA (1937)
St. John the Baptist, Nanticoke, PA (1911)
St. Michael Orthodox Church, Mount Carmel, PA (1908)
Cyril and Methodius Ukrainian Catholic Church, Olyphant, PA (1908-1910)
Peter and Paul Byzantine Catholic Church, Palmerton, PA (1918) (closed)
St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Church, Lansford, PA (1910)
Peter and Paul Ukrainian Catholic Church, Simpson, PA (1905)
St. Mary Byzantine Catholic Church, Wilkes-Barre, PA (1907)
Gavin Moulton is a cultural historian with a research focus on the impact of industrial capitalism and migration on twentieth century architectural and religious traditions. He holds an M.A in History from the University of Notre Dame and a B.A. in History of Art and Architecture and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University. His doctoral dissertation, Revolver on the Altar: Fighting for Church and Factory in the Slavic Industrial Belt, 1877-1941 reveals how diasporic church construction helped transform Slavic migrants into labor activists.
