 Mineville Irish quickly established their superiority over the newly arrived immigrants. One way they did this was by controlling their names. When the newcomers, mostly from Southern and Eastern Europe, arrived in the 1890s, the Irish could not pronounce their names, so changed them. Wolanichevicz became Whalen. Kazlauskas became Kazlo. Podrezques became Podres. Mundi (Hungarian) became Mandy. Waservicaius became Savage. Dragungs became Dragoon. At the Mineville church, the Irish established a system of pew rentals that most newcomers could not afford.
One story goes that Italian workers were told by their Irish foremen that they had to have their own equipment to work. They were poor and couldn’t afford equipment, so the foreman said they could rent equipment from the company. They were to pay him the rent money. The company, however, did provide mining equipment.
Most Eastern Europeans lived on Wasson Street. Mine workers were expected to surrender some control over their daily lives. Living in company-built housing, receiving goods from the company stores, and cared for in the company hospital, workers recognized the company as central to their lives.
The Poles—sensing hostility from the Irish and wanting to maintain their own identity—held their masses in a defunct Hungarian Pentecost church until their church was built: St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church and Rectory, built around 1910. The church is constructed of concrete block, with Gothic detailing, including a pointed arch stained-glass windows and a spired bell tower.
The church’s crucial role is exemplified by the tenure of Father Stephen Wojciechowski at St. Michael’s Church (1927-1968). He helped people find jobs, lent money and influenced the local bank, acted as make-shift counsel and translator in legal matters, stressed the role of authority in word as well as in deed and emphasized discipline and pride in one’s ethnicity.
Listent to the Site 18 Iron Story Narration
St. Michael’s Church, built in 1910 for the Polish Catholic community, will be on your left, at 40 Wasson Street. You’ll also see many more concrete homes built by Witherbee, Sherman along Wasson Street. Stay on Wasson Street, go straight at the intersection with Main Street. Wasson Street now becomes Joyce Road.
Churches played an important role in mining society: “The priests assigned to the various parishes fulfilled expectations. Sts. Peter and Paul in Mineville retained its role as Mother Church for both Mineville and Witherbee. The Port Henry parish still held mostly Irish, with some Italian and Polish families. When the Eastern Europeans clamored for their own priest and parish, the bishop responded by allowing the establishment of a Polish Church, St. Michael’s, in 1910…. The Catholic Church joined with Witherbee-Sherman to demand loyalty and to help foster the sense of community. It served as one of the permanent authorities of the town, and that authority changed as the ethnic composition varied. Irish Catholics had arrived during the nineteenth century; the twentieth century arrivals included Italians, Poles, Lithuanians, French, Spanish, and Austrio-Hungarians. These new Catholics demanded (or were thought to require) different functions from their Church. They expected and received more direct intervention from the priest in non-religious aspects of their lives than had the Irish.” – Valerie Rosenquist, The Iron Ore Eaters