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Great Speakers of the Old Eighth Ward: With Biography of Frances Harper Website
No full textThe Old Eighth Ward was one of Harrisburg’s most diverse neighborhoods in the later 19th and early 20th centuries. The district’s varied ethnic and racial composition was unparalleled elsewhere in the city, and its residents were engaged in a range of occupations. Many were run-of-the-mill laborers who found employment in the nearby railroads and manufacturing facilities. Others represented a variety of professional classes: small business owners, lawyers, preachers, nurses, and teachers, among others. From the period before the Civil War to the opening years of the 20th century, the Old Eighth hosted numerous social events including public speeches from influential reformers and intellectuals. Public talks, sponsored by local clubs and civic associations, were common at venues such as the Lochiel and Brant hotels, while the churches, synagogues, and squares of the ward also hosted countless speakers—both local and national—who inspired change.
One of the most famous speakers to come to the Old 8th Ward was abolitionist Frederick Douglass. He traveled to the city of Harrisburg multiple times between 1846 and 1895. According to the Harrisburg Telegraph, in 1895, he first came as,
a young man who was active in trying to secure the liberation of his race from bondage.
Douglass spoke on a number of topics, drawing together Republicans from all over the city. He called for “the extension of the elective franchise to the colored people…” Douglass also came to many of the historically African American churches including the Wesley Union A.M.E. and Bethel A.M.E. congregations and well received by the whole ward.
Other speakers such as W. Justin Carter and A. Dennee Bibb spoke in the late 19th and early 20th century about Douglass and tried to further his mission. Others such as Francis Harper came to advocate for women’s rights. At a meeting of the National Council of Women in 1891, she stated:
There are some rights more precious than the rights of property or the claims of superior intelligence: they are the rights of life and liberty, and to these the poorest and humblest man has just as much right as the richest and most influential man in the country.
Frances Harper was a prolific anti-slavery poet and speaker who advocated for women’s suffrage and temperance as well as abolition. Born in 1825 in Maryland, she became an orphan at three years of age and went to live with her uncle, William Watkins, a teacher at the Academy for Negro Youth and a radical political figure in civil rights; his activism influenced Harper’s political, religious, and social views. Harper began publishing her writing at a young age, her first book being released when she was 20 years old. She wrote many additional literary works over the course of her life. In 1850, she became the first woman to teach at Union Seminary in Wilberforce, Ohio, with the support of Reverend John Brown, and later she taught in Pennsylvania and participated in the Underground Railroad. She began her activism through anti-slavery speeches in 1854 as a representative of the State Anti-Slavery Society of Maine, and donated much of the profits from the sales of her books toward abolitionist causes. She made many visits to Harrisburg to give speeches, including several on the topic of temperance. On February 10th of 1883 and February 21st of 1889, she led temperance meetings at the Short Street A. M. E. Church. She also directed a temperance meeting at the Wesley Union Church on South Street in October of 1884. Harper continued her work as both a writer and speaker on social issues social involvement until her death in 1911. A Harrisburg newspaper reported that she “had done more for her race than any other woman.” She undoubtedly left a lasting impression on the people and church communities of the Old Eighth Ward.https://mosaic.messiah.edu/look/1013/thumbnail.jp
The Old Eighth: Gateway to the Capitol: With Biography of Gwendolynn Bennett Website
Get PDFAt the beginning of the nineteenth century, Harrisburg began to develop as an industrial center. Railroad steel, cigars, flour, shoes, and many other businesses thrived, especially in the Eighth Ward. A large thoroughfare was required in order to accommodate the movement of raw materials throughout the city for processing. Like most industrial societies, Harrisburg utilized water as a means of transportation, with the Susquehanna River flowing alongside the southern border of the city. The Harrisburg canal system was started in a similar manner as the City Beautiful movement– through internal efforts. In 1822, the Harrisburg Canal, Fire Insurance and Water Company was formed by a group of local businessmen to build a canal “from John Carson’s property near Second mountain to Harrisburg and through Paxton creek valley…to the north, possibly Mulberry street.” The original people behind the canal system had grandiose ideas for its industrial capabilities in the city, with images of mills lining the waterways for miles. However, the State “got into the canal business” and interrupted the company’s plan by taking over the land that the canals were being built. Despite this change of ownership, the canals were officially built in 1826, along many lines of “interesting enterprise.”
These canals served as gateways for economic prosperity in Harrisburg, bringing increasing business to the Old Eighth Ward. Roads were built along the canals out of necessity in order to accommodate foot traffic from the canals. With the canals increasing the amount of products that could be introduced into the city, a better system of land transportation was needed. Beginning in the 1830s, rail lines were being installed throughout the city to connect with the canals. By 1834, there was a complete line of transportation between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, with Harrisburg serving as a natural midpoint. Due to the increasing railway lines being built, additional lines began to connect through Harrisburg until it became one of the leading railroad centers in the United States. With most of these lines running to or around the factories of the Old Eighth Ward, it became known as a stopping place frequented by all walks of life.
Harrisburg, according to historian J. Howard Wert, “was a radiating point for the distribution of goods north, south, east, and west. This same law of location made it an inevitable railroad center.” Comprised of many factories, schools, churches, and small businesses, the Eighth Ward acted as a gateway to the rest of the city, prospering from the constant influx of people from the railway lines. Blue collar workers who traveled along with canal industry frequented many of the ward’s institutions. Union soldiers encamped at Camp Curtain would often find their way to the speakeasies to engage in games. In this way, the Old 8th Ward was a hub for people from many different walks of life.
The canals and railroads that passed through and around the Old 8th brought people from across the country into the city. They connected Pennsylvania’s capital city to the rest of America. Many people’s first introduction to Harrisburg was stepping off the trains in the Eighth Ward, experiencing the diverse life that it fostered. These transportation networks fostered opportunity for work, trade, and interaction between a variety of people, bringing even greater life to the ward and the city as a whole.
Gwendolyn Bennett would come to be world-renowned as one of the many writers and artists who were collectively part of the African-American cultural flourishing of the 1920s known as the Harlem Renaissance. However, before making her way to Manhattan Island, Gwendolyn Bennett spent time in Harrisburg. Unfortunately, she did not arrive under the best of circumstances, as she was kidnapped by her own father and stepmother amidst a custody dispute. Because Harrisburg was such a busy transportation hub at the time, Bennett’s father was able to avoid authorities until they relocated to Brooklyn in 1918. However, despite the troubling circumstances of Bennett’s time in Harrisburg, she nevertheless flourished in her elementary school, attending the Lincoln School located in the Old Eighth Ward.https://mosaic.messiah.edu/look/1021/thumbnail.jp
Seeking Shalom in the Old Eighth Ward: With Biographies of Rabbi Dr. Nachman Heller and Rabbi Eliezer Silver Website
Get PDFThe Old Eighth Ward was the center of Harrisburg’s Litvak–or Lithuanian Jewish–community prior to the Capitol expansion. While an older German Jewish population was already thriving in the city, the newly arriving Litvak found it difficult to integrate with the pre-existing community. Two synagogues were therefore founded in the ward, Kesher Israel and Chisuk Emuna. The presence of both of these congregations serves not only as a testament to the vibrancy of the Jewish community, but also the diversity among these co-religionists.
Chisuk Emuna–originally named “Chiska Emuna bene Russia,” meaning “Strengtheners of Faith of the Children of Russia”–was the first Jewish congregation formed in the Old Eighth Ward by the Litvak fleeing persecution in Russia. These refugees and freedom seekers hailed from just a few towns in Lithuania (which at this time was a part of the Russian empire) and thus were culturally, linguistically, and religiously tight-knit. As such, Chisuk Emuna represented and served a very specific Lithuanian Jewish culture. The congregation was more than a place of worship for Jewish people, it also served to hold the community together as they adjusted to life in a new city where they did not speak the language, eat the same foods, or celebrate the same holidays. Moreover, the synagogue provided culturally appropriate “social security” for its members, as both health and wellness and funerary practices could be difficult to navigate in the community’s new American home.
However, as the Lithuanian Jewish community began to assimilate in Harrisburg, a divide in the Chisuk Emuna congregation emerged. A number of members of the community felt that their Orthodox beliefs were growing more compatible with the larger American culture. Jewish businesses, especially bakers and confectioners in the Old Eighth Ward, had grown to serve more than just the tight-knit Jewish community, helping to enfold them within the larger multi-cultural fabric of Old Eighth. This led to the formation of a new congregation, Kesher Israel, which sought to maintain Orthodox practices while also engaging more with the public. While most members of Chisuk Emuna conducted both their religious and secular business exclusively in Yiddish, Kesher Israel’s congregants were more comfortable with English. This also allowed Kesher Israel to draw congregants from the larger non-Lithuanian Jewish community in Harrisburg.
Joining those who left Chisuk Emuna for Kesher Israel, was Rabbi Eliezer Silver, who left his position of leadership at his former congregation to become the first leader of Kesher Israel. While leading the congregation, Silver became a prominent member of American Rabbinical circles. He used this place of prominence to advocate first for Jewish people suffering in Russia and then, after leaving his position at Kesher Israel, became the first president of Vaad Hatzalah (Rescue Committee) that sought to help Torah scholars escape Nazi-occupied Europe during World War II. It is perhaps no coincidence that a neighborhood that played a prominent role during the American Civil War in assisting freedom seekers would also feature such an important man who worked to save those who may have otherwise died in the Holocaust. Moreover, like those working in the Underground Railroad, Silver was willing to work both within and outside the law to save lives. Even before World War II, he regularly lobbied U.S. presidents to support Jewish people being persecuted in Europe. During the war, he even dressed as a U.S. Army Chaplin and traveled to Europe to gain access to war zones.
Rabbi Silver’s legacy lived on among the Kesher Israel congregation, as he returned in 1933 to help lead the installation service of the congregation’s new rabbi, his son David L. Silver
Rabbi Dr. Nachman Heller only spent a short time in Harrisburg. However, during his time at Kesher Israel Synagogue, he earned a reputation as an important Jewish author, teacher, and intellectual. At a time when anti-Semitism was still rampant, he used his journalistic skill to educate the public about important aspects of Jewish life and worship. For example, he wrote an explanation of the Jewish observances of the Fast of Esther and the Feast of Purim in the Harrisburg Telegraph on March 16, 1908. Similarly, he took great pride in the education of Harrisburg’s Jewish youth, establishing a Hebrew Academy in association with Kesher Israel. Although he left Kesher Israel in 1911 to begin work at another congregation in Charleston, West Virginia, he continued to return to the Old Eighth Ward as a guest lecturer while remaining active as an author and public intellectual.
burg’s Litvak–or Lithuanian Jewish–community prior to the Capitol expansion. While an older German Jewish population was already thriving in the city, the newly arriving Litvak found it difficult to integrate with the pre-existing community. Two synagogues were therefore founded in the ward, Kesher Israel and Chisuk Emuna. The presence of both of these congregations serves not only as a testament to the vibrancy of the Jewish community, but also the diversity among these co-religionists.https://mosaic.messiah.edu/look/1016/thumbnail.jp
Harrisburg\u27s Historic African American Community: An Interview with Calobe Jackson Jr.
Get PDFThis excerpted oral history with Calobe Jackson Jr., prominent citizen and local historian, discusses Harrisburg\u27s African American community in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, relationships between the city\u27s black and white population, the City Beautiful movement, and the Commonwealth Monument Project
Happy
Get PDFShe said,
“You look better, brighter than usual? Did you get some sleep?’
I laughed.
“Yeah, like five hours. Better than nothing.
Blooms in the Wind
Get PDFI lay upon a grassy knoll and gaze.
I behold youthful blooms, so fresh, so new.
Like rainbows, blossoms sway in a soft daze,
whirl innocently with winds great and bold
Crossing
Get PDFA photo showing an hunched, old man holding a bag and crossing the street (pictured in black and white.
Brick Wall
Get PDFI used to be an open book,
blindly granting trust.
I’d gladly give away my heart,
to have it thrown out to the dust
Ten-Frame Counters (Seasonal)
No full textArithmetic--Studying and teaching (Primary); Mathematics; Educational gameshttps://mosaic.messiah.edu/kits/1599/thumbnail.jp