On the 6th September 1869 a fire in the shaft of the Avondale Mine set the breaker immediately above it alight. Like all mines at the time Avondale had no second exit, and those below ground suffered an agonising death from gas and suffocation. Of the 108 victims nearly all of them were Welsh, many of them newly arrived. Around 60 of them were buried in the Washburn Cemetery in Hyde Park (Scranton) and many of the gravestones-some of granite especially imported from Pembrokeshire- are inscribed in the Welsh language. It was described at the time as a ‘Welsh’ tragedy. Perhaps it’s surprising why so many Welsh miners were involved considering the number of different ethnic groups that had emigrated to the Pennsylvania coalfield.

A singular feature of Welsh settlement in the latter part of the 19th century was the concentration in Pennsylvania and in particular around two areas, Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. In 1900 38 per cent of first generation Welsh out of 93, 586 lived in three counties in Pennsylvania. The Welsh in Scranton were to influence life in two very important ways. They transported Welsh culture so that Hyde Park virtually became a part of Wales transplanted in Pennsylvania. and, importantly, they brought with them mining skills, and their dominance and influence of the Scranton anthracite industry is difficult to overestimate. Not only were the vast majority employed as miners (and lads as young as six were employed in the breakers) but they held various managerial positions in the industry such as superintendants, inside and outside foremen, and fire bosses. Thus it was mutually beneficial to both the Welsh miners and the mine owners (didn’t go down a bundle with the Irish and Germans) and perhaps not quite so surprising that so many Welsh miners perished in the disaster. This is, perforce, a very simplistic look at a complex subject but before leaving it an interesting footnote.

The genesis of Welsh involvement with industrial Scranton involved the iron and not the anthracite industry. In 1840 the Scranton brothers built an iron furnace and nail works. One had been an operator at the Oxford Furnace, New Jersey http://www.aditnow.co.uk/mines/Oxford-Smelt-Mill/?gowhere=%2fmines%2f%3fpid%3d1%26ac%3dA%26ad%3d50 . They failed to blow it after three attempts and as things were getting desperate they sent for John F. Davis, a native of Tredegar. Davis was well versed in the hot-blast process of smelting iron ore, a technique that had originated in south Wales. His expertise succeeded and finally managed to put the furnace to blast. The rest is history.

Coal breaker at Scranton. After the disaster legislation no longer allowed the breaker to be immediately above the shaft.
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Boys working in a Scranton breaker.
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