Snow won’t stop this..
“Lucky enough people are stepping up, making thing happen, that`s the old coal region initiative around here, that`s why this is the Saint Patty`s Day parade of the coal region in Girardville,” said parade manager Stephen Barrett.“We have a very optimistic view of this thing, this isn`t the first time we`ve had snow,” said Joe Wayne, the owner of Hibernian House.He says he’s ready for the event with his bar and the block outside being where everyone ends up after the parade.“Well, it`s like inside here, they said if you died you can`t fall over, and it`s not too different out here,” said Wayne.
Going old school this weekend—something about parades in the coal region remind me of my early childhood days of the 1980s.. But so much has changed in the coal region of Pennsylvania since the Reagan days of the shining cities on hills and Communist threats. Now we are faced with dilapidated structures and hardcore drugs running wild on the streets..
But it was still a decent day in Girardville as bagpipers played as beer guzzling parade goers cried until their kilts ran dry..
All we need is a miracle.. maybe a miracle… Maybe some day.
"I tried to get my doctor to give me Aderall and he said no, and I’m like ‘come on man,’" said the underage teenager as he passed by with a green container clearly containing Miller Lite
There has been an exodus from the coal region of Pennsylvania over the past generation.. high unemployment, economic conditions worse than other areas, and traveling to better jobs, all have forced younger people away from Schuylkill County .. And now the POTTSVILLE REPUBLICAN is sharing knowledge that has already been assumed: Most people who are young want to leave Schuylkill County..
Schuylkill County commissioners had a press conference on Thursday. They say that the county has lots to offer—presumably more than Yuengling beer and the A-Hole in Girardville—but they lament the fact so many young want to leave the area. To put a number on that, survery was conducted of the ‘yout’ of the region.. it found that 55% want don’t plan on living in the county when they are adults.
Of course, kids have grand plans. There is sure something about the coal region, maybe those tentacles of coal veins, that latch on to your spirit and trap you in the area.. Kids today become coal-region bar hoppers tomorrow, still wearing their varsity football jackets, trying to relive the dream of yesteryear. Just place GLORY DAYS by the Boss, and most will tear up thinking about the Friday night lights—unless your school didn’t have lights, in which case you’ll think of Saturday Afternoon Sun (*Cardinal Brennan football players would understand that*)…
So ….what would be a model for the future?
Two possibilities exist:
1) The county will continue to perish slowly, like a miner running out of oxygen in a confined space.. It will keep its high unemployment, and is generation of disenchanted kids..
2) Many who leave the area for experience and knowledge, will actually come back to Schuylkill county at some point in their lives, and bring progress to the area. The future will feature people, people who don’t sport mullets and cutoff jean shorts, creating jobs and hope ..
Which possibility is more likely?
A stroll down any street, Schuylkill County, will show how difficult number 2 would be to achieve.
You’d think since it’s spring I’d be getting some nice sun.. But no, thanks to cold and wintry winds, I am now sporting that lavish mid-January chapped ‘wind burn’ George Hamilton kinda look..
The coal region of Pennsylvania was a quaint little place since I can remember.. I was born and raised (for a bit) in Centralia PA, with a mine fire burning hot under my feet.. My family moved to a nearby town.. my heart and soul has been in this place for a long time.
But perhaps the same ties that bind you also trap you in.
I read an article today in my morning paper.. It’s a little inside baseball perhaps, but it’s on my mind.. The article paints a story of a dying area.. Restaurants and bars are shutting down in the coal region.. the Pottsville REPUBLICAN and HERALD speaks about Cactus Jacks, the Restaurant at the Station in Tamaqua.. Yockos in Minersville. (All big deals).. another bar detailed in the article is only open one day a week..
A bar being shut down in the coal region is a big deal. You’d expect in this area a dirty little tap room would be shuttered if they were serving underage minors. But in the economic troubles lately, the prime reason for closure is money troubles..
I think back to my life as a child. The area, then, wasn’t the best. As mentioned at the beginning of this post, it’s a nice little quaint place, for sure.. but things to do? This ain’t no city, bo. There were restaurants and run down bars, and a mall or two or three, or ‘tree’. When I was a child I didn’t think there was much to do. No kids did. It’s why most of them had ‘bush parties’ where beer was served in the middle of no where. But today, now, I look at the local disgrace the area is becoming and wonder if anything is left for my son to enjoy.
I thought deeply about this as a result of that newspaper article. What does bind me to this area? It’s family. That is the answer.. It’s family.. I don’t work close to here, I actually commute a distance. My wife does too. When we want to do something with my son, we travel away from here.. But when we want to be comfortable and feel at home, here we are..
I think it was always that way, a bit. I believe that this region ‘felt like home’ .. It’s why, for decades, the Ashland Boys Association Parade was filled with thousands. Until it got canceled a few years back and struggled to begin again. Good luck to Ashland bringing it back in ‘13.
It’s also why a town named Girardville hosts a spectacular St. Patrick’s Day parade. Even Bill Clinton showed up in 2008 to campaign for his wife. The town wholeheartedly supported him.. he even had a screamer from Tony’s.. no word on whether he became immediately dyspeptic.
There are other pearls that can be unearthed from time to time. Jim Thorpe is a beautiful and fun place.. Schuylkill Haven hosts a great summer weekend with fireworks.. and the Bloomsburg Fair is going strong.
But what else is occurring?
Crime… drugs… lots of drugs. Lots of drug abuse. Lots of dilapidated homes literally falling down into streets (Girardville, PA)… and now closing businesses..
The Schuylkill Mall is being hard hit, as are other malls. A new refurbished movie theater opened. I wish them luck and hope the mall stays open. I recall some early memories as a kid thinking it was a mecca of shopping.. of course smoking was legal indoors the smell of cigars also fills my fading memory..
I just hope and pray that, as long as we choose to live in this place, it will stay safe and quaint.. and more and more quiet, perhaps..
Family is why we stay.
Besides the ties of that, there are few others …
However … even one day if the Coal Speaker leaves the coal region, you will never be able to extract the ‘area’ from him.. or anyone else that chooses to go.
After high school several friends had a mass exodus from here to go other places. Many returned and now, again, live locally after ‘living their lives’ in a city or larger place.
But the coal region can come back, though it will never return to the paradise that it was during the coal mining days—that paradise was not shared by all and truly only for barons and bosses of coal mines that could care less about safety of workers. A part of this region’s history is that it was filled with hard workers and good people. Conservative Democrats… fair-minded but also sometimes a little suspicious of ‘outsiders’. Perhaps that also became its 21st century demise..? Any for of progress is despised by too many, forcing those younger with dreams and ambitions to look elsewhere to find that progress.
I don’t know.
I cannot count myself as smart enough to understand why an area disintegrates .. I wish I was smart enough to know how to bring it back.
But I’m not.
So with that all said, I end with this: Perhaps within the next few years my wife and I will be forced to make a decision. Keep the ties that bind us knotted and tight, or loosen them up and fly away. No matter the choice, we have a third party role: Our son. And in the end, it’s his future that matters the most now of all.
This is Girardville, Pennsylvania, tonight. The Jiffy Mart has stood for decades. And now it’s burning to the ground.. those who live in the coal region or who did live in it will know this is a pretty big deal. This is a huge chunk of history in a small mining town vanishing before firefighters’ eyes.. Sad night in the coal region.
Not bad for a small town in the Coal Region.
The Saint Patrick’s Day parade yesterday in Girardville, PA, got over 20,000 people. And that was without an appearance from Bill Clinton.
There was a large appearance however of untidy spandex pants, green buttons that blinked, and a leftover sea of aluminum cans of beer lining the streets.
But that’s what day afters are for.
