USA > Pennsylvania > Northampton County > History of Northampton County [Pennsylvania] and the grand valley of the Lehigh, Volume I > Part 46
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54
Dr. Coppée resigned the presidency in 1875, retaining the chair of the English Language and Literature. Dr. J. M. Leavitt was president from 1876 to 1880. During his administration the Lucy Packer Linderman Library was built. The third president, Dr. Robert A. Lamberton, served from 1880 to 1893. These years were marked by an enlargement in the scope of the School of Technology, including the establishing of separate chairs of Mining and Geology, Mechanical Engineering and Electrical Engineering, subjects which had formerly been given in other departments. The buildings erected in Dr. Lamberton's administration were a gymnasium completed in 1883, a chemical and metallurgical laboratory in 1884, and Packer Memorial Church, the gift of Mary Packer Cummings, daughter of Judge Packer, in 1887.
For eighteen months following the death of Dr. Lamberton in 1893, the duties of the president were carried by the senior professor and the first presi- dent of Lehigh, Dr. Coppée. Upon Dr. Coppée's death in March, 1895, Dr. W. H. Chandler, as senior professor, was acting president until the inaugura- tion, in June, 1895, of Dr. Thomas Messinger Drown. Ten years of service were devoted to Lehigh by Dr. Drown-years in which the university steadily advanced in reputation in the world of technology. "Dr. Drown's incumbency left," as has been said, "an abiding impress on the university of his refined, gentle, cultured personality." Williams Hall, devoted to the departments of mechanical engineering, geology and biology, was erected in 1902. It was named in honor of the donor, Dr. E. H. Williams, of the class of 1875, for many years Professor of Mining and Geology.
It was during the days of Lehigh's financial stress, in the nineties, that the alumni came forward with substantial aid and began the era of direct alumni participation in university affairs that found expression in the election to the presidency in 1905 of Henry Sturgis Drinker, a graduate of the School of Mines of the class of 1871. Bringing to his new work thirty years of experi- ence with men and affairs as an engineer, lawyer and business man, Dr. Drinker saw that the most pressing need of the university was better facilities for student life. The alumni programme for promoting the physical welfare and comfort of the student body resulted in Taylor Hall, the large dormitory (1907), later supplemented by a smaller dormitory, Price Hall; in the Commons, the student dining-hall (1907) ; in Drown Memorial Hall, the social home of the student body. Upon encouragement from the trustees, the fraternities are building their houses on the campus, so that the community phase of under- graduate life is being promoted.
An important feature of the programme has been the building of an athletic plant that makes effective Lehigh's scheme of physical education, by which every student in college secures regular exercise under supervision, with scholas- tic credit for the work. For the inception of the idea of this athletic lay-out and for the gift making it possible, the university is indebted to Charles L.
358
NORTHAMPTON COUNTY
Taylor, of Pittsburgh, a graduate in the class of 1876 and a trustee for many years, upon whom the university conferred the honorary degree of Doctor of Engineering in 1919. Dr. Taylor in 1913 gave a large gymnasium and swim- ming pool and also an equipped field-house. The construction of the remainder of the plant, a concrete stadium and an additional playing field for the students, was aided by funds donated by alumni and friends of the university.
During President Drinker's administration there has been a marked expan- sion in educational equipment. The gift to the university in 1910 of the Fritz Engineering Laboratory, endowed by the will of its donor, John Fritz, furnished the Civil Engineering department an exceptional plant. The Eckley B. Coxe Mining Laboratory (1910) became a conspicuous asset of the course in mining engineering. The remodeling of Coppee Hall in 1913 furnished quarters for classes in the College of Arts and Science, and the College of Business Adminis- tration. A $75,000 extension was made in 1919-20 to the Chemical Laboratory, furnishing the most up-to-date facilities to the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering.
A second development has been the activity of the university along public- service lines. The university's interest in the conservation of national resources and its services in behalf of certain vital measures of conservation have been widely recognized; the university was honored in the election for three suc- cessive terms of its president as president of the American Forestry Associa- tion, and in his appointment as an executive committee member of the National Conservation Association. Among other public-service activities of the univer- sity are its promotion and support of the War Department's military instruction camps for students. The students at these camps in 1913 elected Dr. Drinker president of the organization they formed, the National Reserve Corps, and upon the union of the corps with the Business Men's Training Camps body, he was made chairman of the Military Training Camps Association of the United States. Dr. Drinker is secretary of the Advisory Board of the University and College Presidents on the student camps.
The service of Lehigh men in the World War will be commemorated in the Lehigh Alumni Memorial Hall, a building donated to the university by the alumni, as a memorial and also for use for administration offices. Of 5,700 Lehigh men whose addresses are known, 1,800 were in active service in the Army, Navy and Marine Corps, in grades ranging from private to brigadier- general, and from seaman to lieutenant-commander. Forty-five Lehigh men gave their lives for their country. In national service as manufacturers of products essential to the success of the war, Lehigh alumni were conspicuous.
Upon the entrance of the United States into the war, the trustees and faculty of Lehigh University tendered to the government the facilities of the university and the services of the teaching staff. In response to this offer, the War Department and other departments made use of the Fritz Engineering Laboratory and the Chemical Laboratory. In the Fritz Laboratory the govern- ment made extensive tests on reinforced concrete to determine its suitability for ship construction; these tests were continued for many months after the signing of the armistice. Members of the faculty and teaching force engaged in important war organization work, and seventeen served as commissioned officers in the Army and Navy.
359
HIGHER INSTITUTIONS OF LEARNING
From May 9 to December 4, 1918, courses of instruction were given at Lehigh University to 1,151 vocational students in Army service. The courses included work in electrical trades, locomotive engineering and firing, railroad track work, road construction, telegraphy, battery repair mechanics, etc. These classes were conducted by the university in co-operation with the Bethlehem Steel Company, the Philadelphia & Reading Railway Company, and the Lehigh Valley Railroad Company.
A unit of the Student Army Training Corps was in operation at Lehigh University from September to December, 1918. The total number of students at Lehigh in the military and naval service of the United States was 539. The remainder of the university's total enrollment of 742 were practically all ineli- gible for induction on account of age, physical disability or foreign birth.
Lehigh opened its fifty-fourth year in September, 1919, with an enrollment of 1,050 undergraduates. A voluntary unit of the Reserve Officers Training Corps was then instituted, with a membership of more than 300 students.
CHAPTER XXXIII
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH By Rev. JOHN EDWARD MCCANN
Catholicity has been both a fact and a factor in Northampton county, whether as originally constituted in 1752 or as circumscribed by the last division of 1843. Even while yet a part of Bucks county, and as early as 1737, Catholics were known to be within its confines, for Thomas and Richard Penn sold five hundred acres of land at the eastern base of Haycock Mountain to Nicholas, Thomas and Edward McCarthy, who came from southern Ireland with the influx of Irish mentioned by Logan in his report. John, a grandson of Edward McCarthy, donated the site for the Catholic church and cemetery at Haycock, where for years Catholics of the lower end of Northampton county worshipped, were baptized, married, and buried, up to 1836, when St. Bernard's at Easton was dedicated and a cemetery opened beside it. There were, however, Catholics in Pennsylvania even before the coming of William Penn, who refers to "John Gray, ye Catholic Gentleman," residing in Bucks county in his day. Prior to 1752 all Catholics of the lower section of our county used to assemble on Sundays at stated times in the home of the Mc- Carthys at Haycock and Nockamixon, Bucks county.
Scarcely any body of emigrants every left Europe without its Catholic representative. The groups chronicled as exclusively Scotch-Irish Presbyte- rians who came into Bath, Bangor, Mount Bethel and other interior towns of the county, all had a few Catholics with every contingent; they did not all remain faithful, due to the lack of religious facilities, and the absence of religious guides and leaders, and to causes that are wont to influence weak human nature; however, the bulk did persevere. Of those who did not, many converts have in the meantime been received from among their de- scendants, for, "a drop of blood goes far."
The Catholic pioneers who came into Pennsylvania were men of ability and education. John Gray, alias Tatham, is described by Penn as "a scholar"; and Paul Miller, of Easton, is described by Parsons as "the most prudent, understanding man in Easton, whether English or Dutch." The early schoolmasters in Allentown and other Northampton county towns of earlier times depended on Irish schoolmasters for whatever education they could procure, with very primitive equipment. They were patriotic, peace- ful and progressive, yet they were deliberately snubbed, frequently maligned and at best tolerated. "There was," as an early historian states, "great opposition to the Catholics in early times." They dismiss them with this comment and the mere mention that "in 1836 they became strong enough to build a church in Easton." Heller, in his "Historic Easton from the Window of a Trolley Car," is just as silent; but he explained to the writer of this chapter that Catholics themselves were to blame, as they took no steps to compel the chronicling of their doings. It must be recalled, however, that in earlier times the Penal Code was in force, and to be "a professed and open Catho- lic." like Paul Miller, for instance, meant discrimination ; and Catholics naturally
362
NORTHAMPTON COUNTY
did not stand in the limelight; and their observances were, of necessity, under cover, and they themselves were forced into retirement.
The first Catholic born and baptized in these parts was John McCarthy, while our county was still a part of Bucks. He was the son of Edward McCarthy, to whom Thomas and Richard Penn sold land in Haycock, March II, 1737. He was baptized at Haycock, May 27, 1742, ten years before the new county of Northampton was carved out of Bucks. The baptismal record appears in the register preserved at the Blessed Sacrament Church, Goshenhoppen, now Bally, Berks county, from which place all northeastern Pennsylvania was cared for spiritually by Rev. Theodore Schneider, S. J., from 1741 until his death in 1764; and where the birth and baptismal records of all Catholics born within the confines of Northampton county and bap- tized may be found up to 1828. For in that year priests from Milton came, and in 1833 all Northampton, then including the present Monroe and Car- bon, was constituted one parish, with Bucks; and all future records were regis- tered at St. John the Baptist Church, at Haycock. St. Bernard's, Easton, was dedicated in 1836, and private records were kept by priests serving it, and the county. As separate parishes were organized, a new set of records were opened. Those preserved at St. Bernard's, Easton, date back only to 1847, and the ones from March, 1888, to January, 1893, are missing entirely. The Goshenhoppen record is entitled by Father Schneider, "A Book of Those Baptized, Married and Buried at Philadelphia, Maxetani, Magunshi and Tupelhuken, Begun A. D. 1741." From Father Schneider's Register we learn that Magunshi and Maxetani were among the first Catholic settle- ments in these parts (they are now in Lehigh county). We read that "Magunshi and Maxetani are in the most populated section in Northampton county," hence we are not surprised to find the following petition addressed by the Catholics of that section to Lieut .- Gov. John Penn, September 25, 1767, for permission and a license to collect money towards the building of a church at Northampton Town, now Allentown, where the material for its erection was already provided :
1767 A. D. Petitions of Roman Catholics of Northampton County to the Honorable John Penn, Esq., Lt .- Gov. of the Prov. of Pa. Eca.
The Petitions of the Congregation of Roman Catholics of the town of Northampton and other places adjacent, Humbly showeth: That your peti- tioners are about to build a church for worship in the Town of Northampton, and have already provided materials for putting the design in execution. But we fear the inability of your petitioners is likely to render their good inten- tions fruitless, unless they are at liberty to ask assistance from charitable and piously disposed people. They therefore humbly intreat your honor to grant them a license for the said purpose; whereby they may have the peaceful and quiet enjoyment of their religion according to the laws of the Province, and reap the Benefit of those privileges granted them by your honor's Benevolent ancestors. And your petitioners as in Duty bound. will ever pray for your Honor's and Family's Welfare.
JOHN RITTER, J. G. KNAP, & others.
Under date of September 25, 1767, Justices of the Peace James Allen, John Jennings, and Lewis Kloiz recommended the granting of this petition. The John Ritter who signed this petition is probably Father John Baptist de
363
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
Ritter, the Belgian missionary who succeeded Father Schneider. We have authentic documents to show that he celebrated Mass both at Allentown and Easton in 1767, 1769, and 1771, at the home of John Houcki in the latter, and at that of Francis V. Cooper in the former place. He continued to visit these places till his death in 1787, and was the missionary of the Revo- tionary period of our country's history. It is well established, therefore, that the first Catholic settlement of any consequence within the confines of Northampton county was within the district now comprised in Lehigh county and principally around Northampton town, the present Allentown, and contigu- ous territory, Magunshi, Maxetani, and Hockendauqua; and the first log church built was the one mentioned in the petition; somewhere in the territory covered by the old Northampton town of pre-Revolutionary times. We are certain that two of the original inhabitants of Easton were Catholics, Paul Miller and John Fricki. Both felt the sting of discrimination and persecution. Miller con- ducted a stocking weaving establishment in Easton in 1754. He was an inti- mate friend of Parsons, with whom he made many business deals, though "they quarreled finally and Miller moved back to Philadelphia." He lived on Northampton street near Fourth (Hamilton), and owned the site of the Central Hotel; which ground he leased to Adam Yohe for his hotel. Not- withstanding his eminent fitness, he was disqualified, solely on account of his religious belief and profession. Parsons wrote thus to Thomas Penn in reference to the school position: "It seems to me quite necessary that there should be school masters. . Paul Miller, it appears to me, in all his conduct here, is the most prudent, understanding man in Easton, whether English or Dutch, but he is a professed Roman Catholic, which is, I imagine, an insuperable objection to him." On June 16, 1752, Miller procured one of the first hotel licenses issued in the county, but the following year John Fricki met with a remonstrance and was denied a license because he was a Catholic. The following is the petition presented against Fricki :
To the Worshipped, the Justice, the Justice of the Court of General Quarter Sessions of the Peace, held at Easton, for the County of Northamp- ton, June 18, 1755. The petition of divers inhabitants of said town and others humbly showeth: that your petitioners are very apprehensive, your worships have been greatly imposed upon in granting recommendation to his honor, the governor, for sundry Roman Catholics out of allegiance of his present majesty, our most gracious sovereign, for keeping public houses in this town, when those who profess the Protestant religion have been rejected; that your petitioners humbly conceive this practice may have per- nicious consequences at this time, when an open rupture is now daily expected between a Roman Catholic powerful and perfidious prince and the crown of Great Britain ; as the Romans have hereby a better opportunity of becoming acquainted with our designs against them and are hereby enabled better to discover those designs and render them abortive. Your petitioners there- fore pray that your honors make proper inquiry into this matter and grant such redress as the circumstances may require and your petitioners will ever pray, etc."
Jasper Schull, whose hotel was diagonally across from Miller and Ander- son's hotel, was one of the petitioners against Fricki. In consequence of this petition, Fricki was refused the recommendation. The petition is thus endorsed : "John Fricki is not allowed a recommendation, etc., being a
364
NORTHAMPTON COUNTY
Roman Catholic." In spite of this discrimination against them, Miller and Fricki showed their broadness by contributing on July 30, 1755, to the com- bination school and church (where they were likewise taboo), the sum of £1 6s. each, notwithstanding that it was expressly stipulated that this school was for the education of "English Protestant youth and that it could be used by any Protestant minister."
About this time occurred the defeat of Braddock, and in 1757 came an official investigation of the number of Catholics in the province. In answer to Laud's inquiry, Father Theodore Schneider, who had charge of all the Catholics of Northampton county, reported that altogether there were exactly one hundred and fifty-nine of them in this county, which was as yet intact, as originally in 1752. There were in reality almost double this number, for then, as now, children under twelve years of age were not considered by the civil authorities as members of the church. Of those reported, one hundred and thirty were Germans and twenty-nine were Irish, about evenly divided as to sex. After Braddock's defeat, the country lay from 1755 to 1757 at the mercy of the Indians, and with the impending hostilities between France and Britain an alliance of the Catholics with France was greatly feared, hence they were forbidden to bear arms, but were taxed for their "exemption" ( !), from service. To this fear was added the fact that many of the Indians were Catholics, having been converted by the French missionaries. Naturally the English Penal Code, which was ruthlessly enforced against them, was not calculated to make the Catholics very enthusiastic about the continuance of England's power in the new world. However, Laud's inquiry showed a gross exaggeration of the Catholic strength, and, as usual, proved the report about the storage of arms in the Catholic churches of the county and elsewhere to be a base calumny often since repeated and by some firmly believed. During the Revolution, the Germans took little interest in the fight, solely because the politics of the controversy were not clear to their mind, but not one of these Germans or Irish Catholics nor one of the Cath- olic priests became a refugee or sought English protection, and none became a Tory.
As the English-speaking peoples in Northampton county were com- paratively few in the days of the Revolution, and as English and Irish Cath- olics were fewer, their contribution to the fighting forces of the Continental army was necessarily small; and the Germans, irrespective of their faith, not understanding the controversy, played only a minor part in Northampton county. How different in 1861 and in 1917! In 1812 the war was practically all over before anybody in the county had a chance to join in the issue. But in the Revolution, General Stephen Moylan, Commodore Jack Barry, the Carrolls, Thomas Fitzsimmons, and other Catholics, were there.
The first priest to visit Pennsylvania was Rev. John Pierron, who in 1693 found persons thirty years old who had never received baptism. Rev. Thomas Harvey (assumed the name of Smith to escape the Penal Code) was, before the formation of our county or even of Bucks, chaplain to the Catholic governor of New York, Dongan. In remotest times Catholics had to depend on the Jesuits of Bohemia Manor, Maryland, for their religious consolation. These may have visited Northampton county, for they knew
365
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
of the presence of Catholics here, while the county was yet unborn. It is recorded that they wrote to their English provincial, to implore the German provincial of the Jesuits, to send them German-speaking priests for New Jersey and Pennsylvania, where they "had learned the number, condition and residence of the Catholics." These Maryland priests, then, were in touch with our Pennsylvania Catholics of these regions as early as 1740.
In 1742 our first local missionaries came and settled in Goshenhoppen, now Bally. They were Rev. William Wapeler, S.J., and Rev. Theodore Schneider, S.J. The latter became the first regular visitant of these North- ampton regions and of all Eastern Pennsylvania, for twenty years; and his successor, Rev. John' Baptist de Ritter, for twenty-four years more. For the next fifty years these Goshenhoppen Jesuits, Revs. Peter and Charles Hel- bron, Rev. Paul Erntzen, Rev. Edward J. McCarthy, and Rev. Bernard Corvin, attended the Northampton county missions. From 1828 to 1833 the secular clergy from Milton, Northumberland county, over one hundred miles distant, cared for our Catholics. In July, 1833, Northampton county was made a part of the Haycock, Bucks county, parish, and was the first organized parish here- abouts. In 1836, Bishop Kenrick authorized the erection of a parish church at Easton, the first in the county. Some claim, however, that there are tradi- tions of a church in Beaver Meadows in 1820. In 1837, Rev. James Maloney took up his residence as pastor, remaining in Easton till 1844.
In 1808, all the territory of the original county was included within the boundary of the Philadelphia diocese, which embraced all Pennsylvania. Divisions of the diocese occurred, but the Northampton sections remained under Philadelphia until the Scranton diocese was formed in 1868, when Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties were cut off; but Lehigh, Carbon, and the reduced Northampton remained in the Philadelphia jurisdiction. Prior to 1808 the county was a part of the diocese of Baltimore, which embraced the entire country, and Bishop John Carroll, born in this country and a patriot of the Revolution, had jurisdiction. Prior to the Revolution, the colonies were under the Catholic Vicar Apostolic of the London district. Still earlier the spiritual jurisdiction of the New World followed the flag of the country claiming possession. Successively, therefore, the bishops of Spain, France and England had American jurisdiction, gave the missioners their faculties, sent them financial and other assistance, and received their reports of local conditions and spiritual needs and dangers.
Father Schneider procured his faculties from the Vicar Apostolic of London. He was thirty-eight years old at the time, having been born at Heidelburg, Germany, April 7, 1703, where he was probably president of its university and later professor of philosophy and polemics at Liege-"a man," wrote Carroll to Rome, "of much learning and unbounded zeal a person of great dexterity in business, consummate prudence and undaunted magnanimity." He records that he began his register of baptisms, mar- riages and burials in 1741. A school was one of his first concerns, and he erected a combination rectory, chapel and school in February, 1743. He repeated this process when he founded the mission at Haycock in May, 1743, when he celebrated Mass in the home of Thomas Garden, and later in that of Nicholas McCarthy. He had some medical knowledge, and traveled in the
366
NORTHAMPTON COUNTY
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.