Mount Carmel Coal Region Photos Preserve Memories

By: Lisa Z. Leighton
Previously printed in Lancaster Farming; reprinted with permission by the author.

LEWISBURG, Pa. — Growing up in the coal region of Mount Carmel, Mike Molesevich witnessed many historic buildings and industrial sites fall into disrepair.

In the late 1970s and 1980s, he tried to preserve memories of such sites with a 35-millimeter manual camera.

A board member of the Union County Historical Society and the Shamokin Creek Restoration Alliance, Molesevich recently presented his collection of nearly 100 black and white photographs at the West End Fire Company in conjunction with Anthracite Heritage Mining Month.

“This is a part of history. Most of what I had taken back then, the structures no longer exist,” he said.

Molesevich fondly recalls a childhood in Mount Carmel that was filled with the freedom to explore and play outside until the street lights came on. He and his friends crawled through mining areas, finding accident records and books.

“We were 10 years old and looking at names and records, because they just abandoned (the books),” he said. “They just left and then slowly started tearing (the mining operations) down.”

From left, Ed Sheganoski and Jim Bierowski stand in an abandoned electric coal car switcher at Locust Summit Colliery circa 1977. Photo provided by Mike Molesevich.

The abandoned Locust Summit Breaker. Photo courtesy of Mike Molesevich

Some of the photos are staged, like an image of his two friends on the Locust Summit Electric Engine.

“They would do anything I told them to,” he said, laughing. “I think it’s one of the best photos.”

The photo included an electric engine that moved coal cars around that were brought in from the surrounding area to be backed into the rotary coal car dumper.

Molesevich explained the coal cars were rotated to dump the “mine run” coal onto a conveyor below to move it into the breaker building to be processed for sale.

One of his photographs of Centralia included steam rising up from the ground on a dreary day, a “Road Closed” sign, and a nearby religious statue.

Another photograph shows rowhomes numbered for demolition, a church adorned with a Christmas decoration and a baseball scoreboard with “Centralia Youth Organization” across the top.

Molesevich left Mount Carmel in 1973 for Juniata College, earning a bachelor’s degree in environmental science. He came back home during breaks, and returned again after graduating in 1977 to photograph areas he had grown to love.

The negatives of those photos were stored in a shoebox for decades. But recently, Molesevich had them printed and framed at Hoyer’s Photo in Williamsport. The images were digitized so they could be stored electronically, shared and displayed with a projector.

Beautifully-composed black and white photographs of Centralia, the Shamokin Glen Burn Breaker, Locust Summit Colliery, Mount Carmel, Kulpmont, the geological formation in Coal Township known as the Whaleback, and abandoned buildings and mines were captured when Molesevich was by himself or with two friends from his high school days.

Route 61 is closed near Saint Ignatius Church due to the Centralia Mine Fire circa 1980. Photo courtesy of Mike Molesevich.

“The homes were already vacated,” Molesevich said. “The people had already probably settled on their contract to move. If you look closely, each home was numbered.”

Another picture features steel pipes inserted into the landscape at the edge of town. Molesevich said fumes, such as carbon monoxide and coal gas, were coming into the homes as the fire was burning.

Steel pipes were drilled down into the fire or right above the fire to allow the fumes to escape and relieve the pressure building up under the surface. Since the pipes got hot, they had screens around them to prevent people from touching them.

Molesevich moved to Lewisburg in 1979, shortly after the infamous Three Mile Island incident and during the height of the 1979 energy crisis.

He eventually earned a master’s degree from Bucknell University in an interdisciplinary field of study that combined economics, management and geography. However, much of his focus was on energy and environmental policy.

“(At the time) I didn’t know anything about nuclear energy or about oil, but I did know something about coal,” he said.

Homes in Centralia are vacated, boarded and awaiting demolition circa 1980. Photo courtesy of Mike Molesevich.

A jogger runs past the abandoned Glen Burn Breaker in Shamokin circa 1980. Photo courtesy of Mike Molesevich.

Spring snow on coal refuse land near Atlas, Mt. Carmel Township circa 1980. Photo courtesy of Mike Molesevich.

Molesevich recently closed his environmental consulting business, ending a 40-year career providing energy and environmental services.

In addition to photographs, Molesevich uses Sanborn Maps to research the industrial history of towns such as Lewisburg, Milton, Shamokin, Tamaqua, Selinsgrove, Sunbury, Northumberland, Milton and Mount Carmel.

He also offers public presentations on Sanborn Fire Insurance maps and his black and white photographs of the Anthracite region.

Molesevich plans to gift his photographs to the Mount Carmel Historical Society or the Shamokin Creek Restoration Alliance so they can be enjoyed by others in perpetuity.