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Saturday, November 13, 2010

Cambria City/Morrellville - 1889 Flood

This photo is from the Library of Congress collection. It is not marked as are most of them. I am currently writing a family history book and have been doing a lot of research in regards to the flood and its inpact on Cambria City-Morrellville Area.

There are scant references to this section of Cambria City near the Morrellville line. After alot of thought and research I am convinced that this rare shot was taken just above the railroad tracks along Pennsylvania Avenue - which is just below Virginia Avenue.

Did you know that there was a morgue in Morrellville and that it sat what would have been just off camera on the far left. It was located at 61 Fairfield Avenue in an old bar called Leckey's. For my relatives reading this - our old Hanzel Homestead on Stackhouse Street would have been in their backyard. The current location - right next to the train tracks a couple of houses down from Leo's Pizza - by the Fairfield Avenue underpass.

The church on the upper right is St. Nicholas and though its very hard to tell - St. Columba (which was also used as a morgue) would have been across Broad Street. This is years before the Ten Acre Bridge would be built. You are looking up towards Minersville on the hillside. The new Sheetz store is currently located slightly to the upper left hand side of where St. Nicholas was.

The railroad tracks were more at ground level - until around 1915 or so. Too many people were getting hit by trains and killed at the intersections of Delaware Avenue and Fairfield Avenue. So they moved part of the line above each roadway.

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