Steel Mill Life For The New
Immigrants
A strike in 1891 by the
skilled workers challenged the power of the
Pennsylvania Steel company but was
quickly put down. In the aftermath of the
strike the company encouraged massive
immigration from southern and eastern Europe
including the Austro-Hungarian Empire and did so
through recruiting agents. These men were often
local freelance operators living among their own
people and who were also working for the
steamship companies receiving their fees from
both on the basis of the numbers of immigrants
they enlisted. The arrival of thousands of
these Croats, Serbs, Italians, Bulgarians,
Slovaks, Hungarians and the so-called Banaters
(as the first arriving Danube Swabians were
known locally) forever changed the character and
composition of the population of Steelton.
There was a segregation
policy in effect within the company in the face
of this social diversity so that the skilled
high paying jobs and leadership positions in all
departments remained in the hands of Anglo
Saxons, primarily the Irish and the blast
furnace jobs were assigned to the new south east
European immigrants with little opportunity for
them to advance into any kind of leadership role
or train for a skilled position. It was a given
that the new work force recognized and simply
accepted which was also true of the community at
large. As a consequence, the immigrants
gathered together in ethnic enclaves,
neighbourhoods and residential areas both due to
external pressures and by personal intent. The
reasons for this were associated with the
resentment they experienced from the "old stock"
residents as well as their need for social
contact with individuals who shared a similar
background, language, life style, customs,
traditions and religious faith. In effect they
became locked into their ethnic community both
due to prejudice on the outside and their inner
need to find and build a sense of community.
The ethnic diversity of the
community had its beginnings in 1885 and would
last for a quarter of a century with the south
eastern Europeans arriving en masse in the
1890s. Most of the immigrants in the 1880s and
1890s returned back to their homes in Europe
within two or three years of coming to the
United States. It was never their intention to
make it a permanent move. Those who remained
were those who brought their families with
them. Very often these families established
boarding houses to serve their relatives,
friends and countrymen and provided extra income
and allowed the women to assist with the family
income. All of the immigrants had a similar
background; they were agricultural workers,
landless and unskilled. There were basically
three types of immigrants who arrived in
Steelton. First, there were men with their
families seeking a new life and a permanent
home. Secondly, there were highly transient
young single men in search of good wages.
Thirdly, there were middle-aged men seeking a
temporary source of income and were usually also
supporting a family back home in Europe. It was
the third group in particular that was most
representative of the men from the
Austro-Hungarian Empire. In most cases they
became what the community referred to as “the
boarders” because they congregated in the
numerous ethnic boarding houses. They probably
counted for nine out of every ten of the men in
the steel mill. Most of them had been married
for less than ten years. They were not dreamers
or romantics in search of adventure. They were
men on a mission and serious about it in order
to establish themselves economically for their
future life back home. Few of them planned to
stay. Very few of them did.
The Attraction to
Steelton
What attracted the immigrants
to Steelton was the “high wages” the steel
industry paid. An unskilled worker was
paid up to twelve cents an hour. He could
work for twelve hours a day and earn $1.44!
An added incentive when it came to families was
a large cigar factory that also employed 800
women at seven cents an hour! Agricultural work
back home could never match that. The
worker’s own expenses seemed minimal in
comparison. The single and married men
living in boarding houses paid $2.50 a month for
their room that they usually shared with up to
four other men. Their meals were extra.
They could provide their own or eat with the
family. Most chose the latter option.
Most of the
boarding houses were owned by the company and were row houses
with up to five bedrooms for a rental of $8.50 a month and were
located on the west side of town close to the river and were
often flooded and damaged as a result. It was a filthy and
unhealthy environment compounded by its proximity to the steel
works and the pollution it produced and with which they had to
deal in their workday world as well.
To give an
indication of the growth and expansion of the steel works and
its work force in the period from 1886 to 1906 it increased from
2,500 to over 9,000 men.
In addition
to the recruiters overseas the company also paid fees to
boarding house operators, saloon owners and store owners who
were immigrants themselves to write to friends, relatives and
countrymen back home to encourage them to come to Steelton and
offered their addresses as the place of their destination on
arriving at Ellis Island. They received a fee for everyone who
did. They also did the same with the patrons of their
businesses and became the major source of recruitment in the
years ahead. There was a steady stream of immigrants coming and
going. In many ways Steelton had a floating population. They
were always in search of jobs and jobs paying more money.
Banaters in Steelton
Danube Swabian immigrants from the Banat are
mentioned officially for the first time in 1900 when they began
to hold mass in a rented hall after previously worshipping at
St. James Roman Catholic Church which was an overwhelmingly
Irish parish. The reason behind their action was because of the
social distinctions inherent in the total life of the community
and they felt out of place or were made to feel so. Many of
these original families came from Weisskirchen and its environs
and had arrived during the previous decade. There were also
families from Karlsdorf and Deutsch Pereg in Arad County.
German Evangelical Lutherans
from Tolna,
Somogy & Baranya in Hungary to Steelton
The published church
history of Trinity German Evangelical
Lutheran Church indicates that in 1900 three
families from “Western Hungary” had become
members of the parish. The heads of
households that were listed in the
publication included: Georg Frey, Johann
Schultheiss and Tobias Bitz. The three
families came from Swabian Turkey which is a
region that covers the Counties of Tolna,
Somogy and Baranya in Hungary. In the
annual report in 1910 the pastor indicates
that sixty-seven families from Western
Hungary were now part of the parish and in
fact had become the majority leading to the
exodus of some of “the more German
families.” In addition to these families
from Hungary there were also several
families from Semlak and Liebling in the
Banat with whom they shared common origins.
Congregational life and
church activities became the focal point of
the social life of this portion of the
Danube Swabian population in addition to the
Bitz grocery store operated by Henry Bitz
the son of Tobias who had been a youngster
when the family arrived in Steelton from
Döröschke in the hill country of Somogy
County in Hungary. The store was located on
Mohn Street named after a German family who
had lived there in the past and where many
of the Danube Swabian families resided. His
store and butcher shop became a meeting
place where the language was familiar, the
products were designed to meet their needs,
where news from “home” was shared and
marriages were often hatched and the
sausages he made were reputed to be just
like back home.
These original Lutheran
families came from the following villages
located in Baranya County: Csikostöttös,
Bikal, Mekenyes and Nagy Hajmas. From
Tolna County there were families from:
Varsád, Udvári, Gyönk, Szárázd and Izmény.
The following villages were represented
among the numerous families from Somogy
County: Miklosi, Szil, Hacs, Szabadi,
Döröschke, Bonnya and Ecsény. In addition
there were families from the colonies
established in Slavonia by families from
Swabian Turkey: Hrastovac, Klein Bastei,
Pasjan, Antunovac, Sartovac and
Kaptanovpolje.
The major social problem
in Steelton was drunkenness and the
immigrant population bore the brunt of the
blame and in many instances were guilty as
charged. With such a large number of
“unattached” men in the community the
saloons and houses run by bootleggers became
the venue for social intercourse and its
consequences. The local newspapers
constantly inveighed against the immigrant’s
propensity to fall victim to the wiles of
alcohol and its attendant results. One
incident in particular sheds some light on
the issue. Two men, one named John
Gittinger and the other John Fisher were
arrested for assaulting a woman in a saloon
and were identified as ‘drunk German
immigrants’ in the newspaper headline. The
name of John Fisher has obviously been
Anglicized from the correct spelling:
Fischer. The next week the same newspaper
reported that Trinity German Evangelical
Lutheran Church had held a special meeting
with regard to the incident and issued a
protest to the newspaper to the effect that
the two individuals were not Germans at all
but Hungarians! Even then the Danube Swains
were prone to vacillate about their identity
or perhaps the more German element in
the congregation needed to have their say to
protect their reputation.
(Check back for future findings)
If you
have additional information to share about Swabian
Turkey Donauschwaben in Steelton, please contact the
Archivist.
Settling Down or
Moving On
In many ways, the majority of
the Danube Swabians who arrived in Steelton as
their destination on coming to the United States
were simply passing through and left few traces
behind of their sojourn there, except for the
descendents of those who remained, many of whom
in the future would have no knowledge or
recollection of their Danube Swabian heritage
beyond knowing their families were of German
origin.
There was a
major depression in 1908 which saw large numbers of the
immigrants from the Austro-Hungarian Empire either returning
home when the work was slack in 1909 or migrating elsewhere.
For many of the Danube Swabians that would mean Milwaukee,
Wisconsin in particular.
The men and
family groups in the various ethnic groups sought social contact
with one another and did so in various ways but primarily
through their churches, grocery stores and butcher shops
operated by their own and saloons whose proprietors catered to
them.
In July of 1917
the Pennsylvania Steel Company announced that it had sold the
steel mills in Steelton to Bethlehem Steel. In the 1920s the
population sank to about 13,000 and remained at that level
during the Great Depression.
The Danube
Swabian population also appears to have gone into decline
primarily due to migration to other communities in search of
employment, while other families moved out of Steelton into the
surrounding communities to escape from the industrial pollution
and grime created by the steel mills. The 100th
Anniversary 1888-1988 booklet of Trinity Evangelical Lutheran
Church in Steelton provides an overview of its history but it is
notable that only a few familiar Danube Swabian family names
appear among the current membership that is listed. That could
either be a result of intermarriage or the “Americanization” of
family names, i.e. the März family is now apparently Marts.
Only a few family names are recognizable such as Faul, Marts,
Koller, Weiss, Shenfelt (Schönfeldt), Stark, Enders, Arndt,
Krahling, Schneicker, Scheib and Dorman (Dürrmann) But during
the 1930s especially large numbers of the original families
resided in nearby Enhaut and Sharon or moved into Harrisburg
where a large Danube Swabian community flourished at that
time.
In many ways,
the majority of the Danube Swabians who arrived in Steelton as
their destination on coming to the United States were simply
passing through and left few traces behind of their sojourn
there, except for the descendents of those who remained, many of
whom in the future would have no knowledge or recollection of
their Danube Swabian heritage beyond knowing their families were
of German origin.
Local Genealogical Research Aids
Steelton, Dauphin Co., &
Pennsylvania State Records
Steelton, Pennsylvania 1930 City Directory
- Surname Index &
search
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