Dr. Milton Loyer, Conference Archivist
January – 100 years ago.
January 13, 1922, the most disastrous mine cave-in of Scranton’s history occurred when three city blocks on Pittston Avenue collapsed and 20 acres of rocks fell into holes that swallowed buildings and claimed the lives of several miners working beneath the surface.
The disaster had been predicted months earlier by Rev. George Peck Eckman, pastor of the Elm Park Church, who had thrown himself into a campaign to address the fact that large sections of the city were menaced by the weakening pillars supporting the surface above the coal mines. As reported in the January 19, 1922, Christian Advocate: “It was at a public meeting of organized protest that he made his last impassioned speech as a real tribune of the people, and his heart literally broke under the effort. Within a few minutes he was dead.” George’s father John, also a member of the Wyoming Conference had served in the area as a pastor and district superintendent.
February – 50 years ago
The February 1972 edition of THE LINK included a full-column appeal on behalf of the Chauncy Varner Emergency Fund set up with the Dauphin Deposit Trust Company. Past executive director of the Pennsylvania Council of Churches and current pastor of St. John’s UMC in State College, he was suffering from kidney failure and in need of a transplant to save his life. Reportedly, “In order for Dr. Varner to be accepted by the hospital, there needs to be some assurance of a concerned group which would begin canvassing the churches and friends to secure the needed funds.”
Support followed, as did regular updates in each issue of THE LINK. The following month, for example, pastors from several Sunbury-area denominations played a benefit basketball game in Northumberland against the Shamokin State Police. Dr. Varner’s kidneys were removed in November, and he was placed on dialysis while remaining on the list of those awaiting a transplant. Chauncy Varner died in March 1974 at the age of 50.
