USA > Pennsylvania > Lackawanna County > History of the activities of the people of Lackawanna County in the world war : under the supervision of the Pennsylvania Council of National Defense and Committee of Public Safety > Part 1
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STATE LIBRARY OF PENNSYLVANIA main,stks 940.9F335 History of the activities of t
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LACKAWANNA COUNTY COMMITTEE OF PUBLIC SAFETY
FELLOWS
CLASS 940.4 BOOK F 335 VOLUME
PENNSYLVANIA STATE LIBRARY
£
To the Honorable william C. Sproul, Governor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,
This, One of Ten Original Copies is Presented.
& gene Hallows
History of the Activities of the People of Lackawanna County in the World War
Under the Supervision of the Pennsylvania Council of National Defense and Committee of Public Safety
By Eugene H. Fellows.
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2014
https://archive.org/details/historyofactivit00euge
PTAT
To the Man at the Helm, Louis Arthur Watres, This Work is Dedicated.
Sibramy
194816
Foreword.
That one may not be obliged to read all the way through this account of tho activities of the people who stayed at home and fought against the Central Powers of Europe, the work is divided into general topics; and chronology is not preserved excepting in the casos of separate movements. So that reforence may be easy, a thorough index is appended.
History is a narration of the actions of mon; and for this reason, and so that these pages may be a lasting record of those who served with hand and pen and speech and thinking mind, every effort has been made to strike the personal note in the telling of the story.
December 1, 1920.
£
Contents.
Chapter I -. Lackawanna County Page 1.
Introduction -- The war Spirit Organized -- The Abingvons -- Abington Commitee of Public safety == Eastern End of the County - Agricultural Districts of the County -- Lackawanna Valley -- Contributions of Lackawanna County to the war -- Agriculture -- Mam-
factures Coal -- Labor - Patriotism -- Council of National Defense and Committee of Public Safety -- German Residents -- Educational System of Lackavanna County -s Patriotism in our Schools -- Americanization -- Schools' Pourlation -- Educational Preparedness -- Propaganda through the Schools -- schools as a Practical Aid in war -- Graduates in Activo Service -- Dunmore -- Technical High School -- Saint Thomas Colloge -- Central High School -- The Foreign Born -- The Younger Generation The Foreign Born in War Leaders among the Foreign Born -- Contributions of the Foreign Born -- Gold Stars The Thirteenth Legiment -- One Hundred and Ninth Infantry, One Hundred and Third Engineers, an" One Hundred and Righth Machine Gun Battalion -- Volunteers and Drafted Mon -- Number of Men in Active Service.
Chapter II -- The Pennsylvania Council of National Defense and Committee of Public Safety Page 30.
Pennsylvania Committee of Public Safety Lackawanna Committee of Public safety -- The Rising of the People Abington Committee of Public Safety Members of Lackawanna County Committee of Public Safety -- Organi- zation -- The Central War Office -- The Executive Secretary.
Chapter III -- Kood Supplies ..... ........
.Page 43.
Farming in Lackawanna County -- Loans to Farmers -- Farm Labor -- School Boys on Farms -- Farm Production -- Parn Labor Manager Organization for Food Supply -- Tood
Administrator --
Prices -- Refused Shipments -- Investi- gations Bakeries Hog and Cattle Census -- Plans for the Future -- Far Spirit -- Fair Price Commission -- Department of Food Conservation -- Tar Gardens -- Curb Markets.
Chapter IV -- Industry and Labor ...
. . . Pago 72.
A Domestic Problem -- Civilian Service == har Industries Information -- Employment Bureau -- Crecutive Necro- tary -- Labor Scouts -- Superintendent of Employment --
Labor Questions -- Community Labor Board -- Vocational Education -- Public Service Reserve -- lian Power -- Registration -- Tar Consus -- Coal -- Iline Labor Miners' Exemptions -- Exclusion of Labor Scouts -- Exemption Order -- Soturn of Labor -- Americanisorion Demand for Coal ~~ Fuel Administrator -- Beonomy in Tucl Construction and Materials -- aste heclamation.
Chapter V. -- Way Finance in Lackawanna County ..... Page 103.
Liberty Loans - Organized Campaigns -- Public Meetings - Victory Loan -- Reconstruction in the ar Office -- Americanization -- Foreign Language Division - benool Systems Leaders -- War Savings Stamps - war Work Campaigns == Results -- Philanthropy.
Chapter VI -- The Women in the dar .Page 126. ..........
Women's Interests -- Registratious -- Liberty Loon Campaigns ** Women's Motor Corps -- Red Cross -- Canteon Service -- Entertainment of Soldiers -- Organiza ion of Women's Committee Activity of women's Organiza ion == Amalgamation of Committees -- Office of Women -- Activo women -- women in Active Service -- Gold stars -- Spirit of womanhood.
Chapter VII -- War Publicity ... Page 127.
Committee on Publicity and Education =- speakers' Bureau Public Moetings == Declaration of war Meeting - Memorial Day se Patriotism Food Conservation Meeting Memorial Day Fourth of July == Americanization Bastille Day Gerard Mooting -- Meetings sinco tho War The Armistice -- har History Commission == Memori- al Grove -- Four Himite Speakers -- Churches -- School System -- Newspaper Publicity -- Bureau of Information.
Chapter VIII -- Local Government -- The Epidemic ... . . Page 151.
Politics -- Provisional Regiment Homo Defense Police -- Police Authorities -- Draft Boards -- Influenza -- Scranton The Protection of the People -. far Office --- Borough Officials - Housing Problem.
Chapter IX -- Conclusion
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Chapter I.
Lackawanna County.
Introduction.
The gates of the Temple of Jenus wero kent open in time of war -- were closed when home was a boaco. In 29 B. C. Augustus closed chens They had been closed twice before, during a period of seven hundred and twenty five yearsy During the nineteen and a half centuries that have vinco rolles by there have been few moments when mon and nations, the world over, have been at peace. dar is not onnatural to mankind; and appreciation of its arts, its methods, its sacrifices, and its duties is born in every human breast.
High civilization has not yet taught the world that the horrors of war far outweigh the greatest advantages that might como to a victor . Civilization, particularly the civilization of mechanism and the creed of personal efficiency, seems to have tompted men into more frightful acts of barbarism then have sprung from tho crude intelligone of the most savage of the Vandals. It was necessary that the mighty engines of our civilisation of peace sho 10 bo tried out as engines of war.
The Twentieth Century opened with culture and en- lightenment, convenience and production, leaving forward == each year a decade in the speed of development. The Con- tury opened also as a century of war -- little wars, bigger
wars, here and there on the map of he world. The gre20 disaster was bound to come; and cone it did, and The American people could not be left out. It is not far from the real practical fact, that the American Loople entered into the war to stop it; before it was too late to find lo se ends of the world's proud civilisation to tie together.
The World Far of 1914-1918 leads one to believe that civilized warfare, with this war itself as the great example, is ore horrible, more destructive to the very civilization that made it possible and gave it impetus, more harmful to political insti utions, moro demoralizing to the personal character of men and women, than any uncivilized, barbarous or savage wars, raids, or forays, over conducted.
And a great comple. stragrlo like the one just endod demands more from the people of the nations combatant than does a more simple affair like the Spanish War of the Boer war. It is not only a matter of going out, finding the onomy and fighting him according to the rules of military strategy; for such a war goes right down to every pulsation of industry, into every con- munity, and invo every home and brain and heart. The war was won not only because two m'llion brave boys went into France, but because one hundred million men, women, children, fought the war with American intelligence, American progressiveness, and American individual enterprise. The Country over, the Americans at home did not have to be taught how to back the boys in Franco. In that the ordinary American citizen knew, even before wer was declared, what would be expected of him, and Low his poculiar individual efficiency could best be turned to the advantage of
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the Cause, is explained the wonder! I ra idily with which the United States, both in the field and at home, " solved itself into a marvellously effective polliporent. Throughont the United States Chore is lit 1- Mif- ference at heart and in spirit in the communi ios. True,
there is a vast difference in industrial interest; and thro oonla jons is a considerable difference in the personnel on
Some communities are made up almost entirely of citizens of American ancestry, while others, like this ono of Leckavanns County, have a large proportion of peorle of foroien birth and a larger proportion of those of foreign parentago. Then a community live Lackawanna Grun y, with its twentyseven lan- guages, and its trenty to thir y percent of neo le commonly speaking no English or little English, con make a perfect pioce of work of its practical patriotism in time of war, there is no ronson to foar for the continuation of real atriotis cho country over, whether in war or in peace .
The bar Spirit Organized.
At the beginning of he war the great desire in Northeastern Penns Ivania was "to do some thing about it." It was not at first necessary to reach people with propaganda. Every third man was a propagendist himself. So n ch began "to be done anout it", so many individuals star ed in to fight the enemy, so multifarious beca e the org mizations, the drill squads, the self-appointed committees of public safety and committees of vigilance, the volunteer watchmen ovor nos- sible alien sympathize's, tha on the vory day Congress de-
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clared war, these informal committees began to assume an organization on a somewhat solid basis. This organization soon became the Lackawanna County Committee of Public Safety; and during the whole war, under the Pennsylvania Council of National Defense and Committee of Public Safety, it was the most powerful agent in the County, really taking precedence, through their courtesy and patriotism, over all governmental agencies. It shows the mutual regard in which the govern- mental agencies and the Committee held each other, that there was never a clash of authority or a conflict of prerogative during all the time of the activity of the Committee.
The Abingtons.
The area of Lackawanna County is 451 square miles. The County is divided by two parallel mountain ranges into three divisions. These divisions, primarily geographical, are also industrial, commercial, and social. To the north and west of the wostern range is a wide agricultural district, known as the country "north of the mountains". Por Northe
eastern Pennsylvania it is quite fertile and contains some
val able farms . within the County in this district are two flourishing towns and several Hamlets. The towns are Clark's Summit and Dalton. There are six boroughs and eight townships in this district, a part of which is generally known as the Abingtons. Many people in business in Scranton live in the towns along the Lackawanna Railroad and the trolley line; and country residences of Scranton people dot the hills. The per- manent population of this wide stretch of country, about half the area of the County, is only 9,488.
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Abington Committee of Public Safety.
Nevertheless, it is this country north of the main- tains in Lackawanna County that claims the first org nization of a committee of public safety, asserts that much of the con- structive work of fighting the var here at home emanated from its organization, and it boasts of the first independent home guard for the preliminary drilling of futuro soldiers, perhaps in the United States. Much eredit for the early activities of this district is due to its residents who were engaged in busi- ness in Scranton. The Abington Committee of Public Safety, acting under the Lackawanna County Committee of Public Safety, later, will be referred to in due course. It is remarkable, though characteristic, that a valuable exemple in organization sprang from a district inhabited by fewer than ten thousand people.
Eastern End of the County.
South and east of the eastern mountain range, or Moosic Mountains, lies another country district, much poorer, much more rugged, and far more sparsely settled than the agri- cultural district to the north. Three boroughs and seven townships lie in the eastern end of the County; and the popu-
lation there is vut 3, 768.
There is one thriving town, Loscow,
and a smaller one, Elmhurst. At the beginning of the war this side of the County organized later than did the Abingtons, less completely, and under the direct instructions of the County Committee of Public Safety.
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Agricultural Districts of the County.
In both the agricultural districts chero was the strongest spirit of effective patrio .isn Throughout The whole
war: as was so be expected from a population almost entirely American born, of American parentage, and generally of Ameri- can ancestry. Besides The companies of minute men, whose
organization had the practical effect of giving he boys a little advance instruction before they enlisted or ere drafted, and had the moral effect of placing some thing patriotic before the eye; the real work of the farming communities wes just what it was the country over -- to produce -- produce -- produce. Many a lawn was turned into a potato patch.
Lackawanna Valley.
Between the parallel mountain ranges lies a narrow valley, from one to five miles wide. Within Jackavanno County
it is thirty miles long. In Lackawanna Valley live 271,571 people . It is in this valley that coal deposits exist; and in the Valley are all the manufacturing ind stries of the County The population is decidedly mixed, people from every European country and descendants of all European races living almost side by side in every one of its eighteon municipalities. Thousands never speak the English language; and in two of the towns it is said that as many as eighty percent of the people speak a foreign language within their own households and in their own circle of acquaintances.
Naturally, since ninety five percent of the popu- lation of the County, almost all its commercial oalth, all i s
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mining and manufacturing, are located in this long narrow valley, the real war strength and the real war activity of the community was in the Valley. Ideas and orramplo and rapidity of action camo down to Seranton from the Abing ons; but with the city of Seranton as the center, the real war 2 strength of Lackawanna County was in this populous and wealthy valley.
With a couple of breaks, the t irty miles of volley is one long town. The municipalities merge one into the other along the county road with scarcely an indication that you are out of one town and into the next. Beginning at the north there are Vandling Borough (1, 258), Fell Township (5,24Z) , whose town is Simpson, Carbondale City (18,645) , Carbondale Township (1,653), Mayfield Borough (3,832) , Jermyn Borough (3, 526) , Archbald Borough (8,603), Winton Borough ( 7, 583), whose town is
Jessup, Blakely Borough (6,554), whose towns are Blakely and Peckville, Olyphant Borough (10,236), Dickson City Borough (11, 051), Throop Borough, (5,671) , Dunmore Borough (20,250), City of Scranton (187,901), Lackawanna Township (3,053), whose town is Minooka, Taylor Borough (9,884), Moosic Borough (4,565), and Old Forge Borough (12,264) . The population figures are those of the census of 1920.
Contributions of Lackawanna County to the War.
What had Lackawanna County to offer the Cause of its Country in time of war? Just as had hundreds of other communi- tios, we had to offer the products of manufacturing and agri- culture, a high moral and practical patriotism, and our share of fighting mens Different from al' but a few other counties in
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the United States, Lackawanna County could and did contri- bute anthracite coal.
Agriculture
The agricultural products of Lackawanna County are not sufficient to supply the local market. It is robible that, even with the shortage of labor during the war, the pro-
duction was increased over twenty porcent. The farmers and
the war-gardeners did their duty; and they were helned in the performance of their duty by the Lackawanna County Co nittee of Public Safety,
Manufacturing.
The manufacturing industries of the County are de-
cidedly varied. During the last two score years this valley has ceased to be only a series of mining towns. A far greater number of individuals are engaged in industry, in total, than in mining. Although coal temoted the industries hore, the industries will exist long after the coal fields will have been ezhausbed. Each one of the cities and borough, too, has its commercial business, just like other towns of similar size the country over. Because one may travel the length of Lackawanna Valley without being at any moment unable to see a coal breaker. and because so many of our peo le are immigrants or the sons of immigrants, should not deceive those at a distance into the belief that Lackawanna County is a crudo mining co muni y. Its industrial, business, and social organizations are merely average, plus the presence of anthracite coal deposits.
Some of the manufactures of Lackawanna Valley are
clothing, caskets, silk, bricks, hats and caps, brewing, underwear,
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cut stone, chemicals, bedding, buttons, iron and steel produc c of almost all kinds, glass and glasswear, lace, pumps, sill machinery, cloth of several kinds, tobacco, steam furnaces and fixtures, typewriters, candy, ice cream, and bakery products, of course, wood fixtures, shoes, wagons, overalls, nine supplies, phonograph records, pianos, white read, brass, lead, gloves, flour and feed, knit goods, optical supplies, leather goods, embroidery, automobile trucks, furnaces, cigars, cabinet products, rugs, harness, paint, paper boxes, jewelry, window shades, boilers, grates, locomotives, railroad cars, drills, waists, stovos, cemont, bobbins, powder, dynamite.
Until recent years the most important of the mam- facturing industries was in the various sorts of iron and steel products; and it may be that the value, in total, of these products is still the greatest. But the industry at present the most remarkable in the County, and the one other than mining having the greatest number of plants, is the silk industry. There are over sixby silk mills in Lackawanna County, employing some fifteen thousand women when working at full capacity, and several hundred ten and children. Next to Paterson, le Jescoy, the vicinity of Serenton is the largest silk producing district in the United States.
Coal .
There were white settlements in Lackawanna County before the Revolutionary War. Land was cleared, and this part of the State became a sparsely set led agricultural and lumbering country. The discovery of anthracite coal and the development of mining caused the County to leap forward with tremendous increases in population between 1850 and 1900.
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Coal mining brought here not only the population, but wealth, business, manufacturing, banking, and a particularly well patronized market. The County, even though it no longer shows a big increase in population, seems almost always to be enjoying a business boom. Perhaps the spending rower of its inhabitants had no little effect upon certain phases, such as buying bonds and contributing to war work funds, of their effectiveness when war came.
In the City of Scranton alone there are twenty-sevon coal breakers and washeries, and altogether thirty three openings into the mines. Contiguous to Lackawanna County on the north is Forest City, the northern limits of the coal field. Includ- ing those in Forest City there are one hundred and ten coal breakers, or separate coal operations -- separate mining "plants" w in Lackawanna Valley. Each one produces a number of cars of coal a day, varying, of course, according to the size of the operation. Some few of the shafts, or openings into the mines, tap as many as ten veins of coal, one lying under the other . Tho capital invested in these operations aggregates hundreds of millions, the smaller proportion of it invested by local fin- anciers.
The anthracite coal mined before the war in Lackawanna County supplied the local domestic market, supplied the Immense local industrial market, and still left at least eight tines as much coal to be shipped away as was used in both these markets. Before the war all the local and distant markets were so easily supplied that the mines rarely worked full time. Since the beginning of the war in Europe it has been with in- creasing difficulty that enough coal could be mined. The demand
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during the w.r and since the war bas econ far gre ter, mining has been more rapid, and the coal in many mines, through ex- tonsive mining, has been harder so got at and harder to nine. From the point of view of providing mechanical sup- plies for the war, Leckawanne County's predominant duty vas to furnish anthracite coal . It did so, unler ever increasing difficulties; the main difficulty being with labor.
Laboz .
In the first place, eleven thousand young con went into active service. Mauy of thom were niners.
The tendency has been for men as their American intel- ligence increased, to get out of the mines into cleaner, safer, more desirable employments. This is not a rule, for there are many men who would not fron preference work any where but in the mines; but it is the case in enough instances to affee nine
labor in times of crises. Originally, the miners were Welsh
and Irish immigrants. To-day most of the miners aro lite af- rivals -- Italians, Magyars, vlavs, Poles, nussians, lovako. There are fathers in the mines who will not let their sons become miners.
The eleven thousand men who first and Inot went into Service left vacancies in other industries that brought some non up out of the "ines and made it hard to find new labor to go down into the mines.
It is also estimated that five thousand mon left Scranton, permanently or temporarily, to cook employment at ship yards and war-industrial plants. There were three of four thousand more throughout Lackawanna County, who were tempted away by the loud call of high wages. This exo us
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left another sot of vacancies in the mines, and ano vor in the industries; and the resulting labor shortage in the mines
was a most serious worry. Every time there was a doperturo to the army or the ship yards, the shortage oll ultimately on ho mines and the farm,
The war industries of Lackawanna County vore of some importance to the Cause; farming, just as it was ovozywhere, too, was of great importance, although the fera products of Lacka- wenna County are not really a drop in the bucket; but the one vital necessity in time of war, that we could produce and must produce, because of the limited area from which it could be 10- duced, was anthracite coal. It was one thing we had the oct
othor people had not. The many problems arising from the thort- age of labor were met, coped with, and solved by the Committee of Public Safety, as will be seen, co-operating constantly with coal operator, labor organization, and the Government. It is a rather of pride, and nos well mnown because the immense difficultior are not generally appreciated, that the emergency war organize ion of Lackawanna County performed one of its grostest services in chat Lackawanna County did not fail in its shipments of cool. It is quite reasonable to believe that the great war industries world have been badly .- fatally -- crippled with a lersening of the supply of anthracite coal; and it must be understood that mining operation at a fever heat as well as every other wer operation depended largely upon war organization and a high public opinion fostered by this war organization.
Patriotism.
Mechanical appliances, food, bunnlies, cl thing, the
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prodwot of the farm, the mill, the mine; Chego ore cocontial to the conduct of war. But with all the c, if the white and ardor of personal patriotism fail, there highs bottes bo no attempt at any offensive agains. Kaiser and Kaisorigo of any sort or kind in Europe -- there ight better have been no de- fense against him had he trod Franco and Uneland under fois and sailed the Atlantic to lovy upon us the expenses of the war against Truth and Right. After all, human soffit, in the field and at home, won our bat les for us in this day, just as ition for the ten thousand Athenians os Marathon mn than for distant days
It would be preposterous for any comm nity in the United States to claim ore-eminence in patriotism. True, some localities have enjoyed a "bad eminence" as boing centers of pro Ger anism, anti-var socialiom, or other obstructi mism. Almost every city, town, county, hamlet, and country gide did iss duty as the inhabitants sam their duty -- at times with ardent noise, at times in storn silenco.
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