It is difficult to determine when the earliest comers of the Catholic faith began making their homes in Wilkinsburg and vicinity. For many years their number was small.
A few families lived in Swissvale, but by the time a church building was deemed necessary, the main body of the little congregation consisted of miners at the Duquesne Coal Mines who worked and dwelt in a district derisively known as Mucklerat, about two miles east of Wilkinsburg.
Shortly after these mines were opened, a number of Catholics, Irish for the most part, came from the anthracite region in the northeastern part of the state, the first arrivals being Michael Kennedy and John Boyle, in 1865. They were soon followed by others from that section and a few from more immediate localities. A number came directly from Ireland and before long forty-five of these families dwelt in Mucklerat.
James Kelly had donated property for church sites to several religious denominations of the town, and, though unfriendly towards Catholics, he was prevailed on to present ground to them, making the gift of a lot on the upper part of Franklin Avenue. Although the deed for this ground is dated January 17, 1868, James Kelly’s gift was made prior to that time. The Bishop and most of the congregation were dissatisfied with the location of this land, and had, about 1866, begun looking for another site. The present site of the church was the spot finally selected by the Committee and while deliberating, the two priests stood under a large old cherry tree. When this tree was subsequently felled, an oval frame was made of the wood, enclosing a script history of the church. This memento long adorned the pastor’s study and finally was presented by Mgr. Lambing to the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania of which he was president.
Considerable subterfuge was used to secure this land, known as lots 359 and 360 of James Kelly’s plan of Wilkinsburg. Each lot was 66 feet in width by 264 in depth, extending from Franklin to Rebecca Avenue. The property, bought in the name of Philip Weisenberger of Lawrenceville, was conveyed by him and his wife on May 8, 1868 to Bishop Domenec in trust for the congregation, for the sum of $2800.
When Mr. Kelly learned the identity of the actual purchasers he was very angry, feeling that the presence of the church would injure the sale of his valuable adjoining property. He applied for a court injunction but after long litigation lost his case.
Before entering upon a history of the church edifice, it seems fitting to note a misnomer entered on the early marriage and baptismal registers: that of “Saint Philip and Saint James.” Why this name should have been inscribed during the pastorates of Fathers Suehr and Burke has not been ascertained.
As has been stated, the number of Catholics in the parish was small and their means limited; so, when the church was to be constructed, outside assistance had to be sought. To this end a resolution was passed at a congregational meeting, whereby the person giving the largest donation should have the privilege of naming the sacred edifice. This donor was James K. Lanahan, proprietor and manager of the St. James Hotel which stood on Liberty Avenue directly across from the Union Station in Pittsburgh. His gift was 50 paid to a solicitor, Edward Sweeny.
The church was dedicated under the invocation of Saint James, Thanksgiving Day by the Vicar General Father Hickey, who officiated in the absence of Bishop Domenec, and has been noted under that title in all directories since 1872.
Donations had been solicited almost exclusively by Edward Sweeny of the Duquesne Mines and John Carley and Arthur Cregan of Wilkinsburg. Occasionally on Sundays, after Mass, they traveled on foot as far east as Irwin and as far west as Noblestown, soliciting contributions from the coal miners.
Would that it were possible to here record the names of those contributors!
The cornerstone was laid without ceremony. The church itself, an unpretentious little frame structure, 30 by 60-feet, was furnished with a small organ loft within and a tiny belfry over the entrance. The total cost was $3941.98.
On the occasion of its dedication a special train was run for the accommodation of Catholic Societies from the city and in its small way the affair was quite elaborate.
For a brief while after its dedication the church was attended from the Cathedral after which it was confided to the care of two young scions of the oldest and most respected Presbyterian families of Pittsburgh, Harmar Denny and Pollard Morgan. Having completed their studies for the Presbyterian ministry, they had gone abroad for a European tour before their ordination. During their travels they had become so deeply impressed with the history, teachings and practices of the Roman Church that they entered it and prepared themselves for the priesthood. Fathers Denny and Morgan, usually the latter, were ministrants to the little church of St. James until August 1870.
The first resident pastor was Reverend Joseph Suehr, born in a little village at the foot of the Vosges mountains in Alsace. When he was seven years of age his parents emigrated to America and located in Allegheny City. Their son’s education was acquired at the parochial schools, at St. Vincent’s College, Latrobe, and at St. Michael’s Seminary, Glenwood, Pittsburgh. In the latter institution and at Loretta he taught for two years. On his ordination in 1870 he was appointed priest of the little church of St. James.
St. James at that time was in the hands of the sheriff, but by dint of hard work on Father Suehr’s part and generous help from the church of S.S. Peter and Paul, East Liberty, the debt was paid. Father Suehr’s promotions were rapid. On January 24, 1906, a papal brief created him a Domestic Prelate to His Holiness, Pope Pius X, with the right to wear the purple.
Reverend W. L. Burke, the second resident priest, was born in the Cathedral parish of Pittsburgh and his studies were conducted in local schools and seminaries. Ordained in 1863 when 23 years old his pastoral duties were interrupted by delicate health. He was appointed to St. James, June 28, 1873, following which, his first care was to build a pastoral residence. This was an arduous undertaking for the small congregation in the face of an approaching panic. However, the building was begun in September and occupied the following April.
Foreseeing the growth of his congregation Father Burke secured a lot adjoining the church property. In order to secure money for this transaction it was necessary to sell the ground which had years before been donated by Mr. Kelly and this could not be done unless Mr. Kelly annulled his proviso: “to be used for church purposes only.” This, Mr. Kelly forgivingly did, whereupon the original Kelly gift on upper Franklin Avenue was sold and the Mulberry Street corner lot purchased for $1400 by a member of the congregation.
On this a one-story frame hall, 32 by 60 feet, was built for the use of the congregation. It was Father Burke’s wish to open a parochial school on it, but the congregation was at this time considered too small and too scattered, so he was obliged, reluctantly, to give up the project.
The work of this energetic man was suddenly interrupted by death in September, 1885, but he will be remembered by the flock among whom he labored long and zealously.
Father Burke was succeeded on October 15, 1885, by the Reverend A. A. Lambing, the third pastor of St. James. “Father” Lambing, as he was intimately and affectionately called not only by his own congregation but by the villagers in general, was descended from a long-lived and honorable ancestry. His paternal line settled in Eastern Pennsylvania in 1749, having emigrated from near Strassburg, Alsace, Germany. The emigrant, Christopher Lambing, died, 1817, at the age of 99 years and 2 days. One of his sons, Matthew, drifted westwards and ultimately settled in Manorville, Westmoreland County. Here his son, Michael, married Mary Shields whose ancestors had come in 1745 from County Donegal, Ireland. Michael and Mary Shields Lambing had nine children; two of them became priests; one, a Sister of Charity; and three served as soldiers in the Civil War. Andrew Arnold (Father Lambing) was their third child, born in Manorville in 1842. From his records we give the successive steps of his education. “Having worked successively on a farm, in fire-brick yards, and in an oil refinery with some four months of schooling each year; with a term in the Kittanning Academy and much private reading and study, he, in 1863, entered St. Michael Preparatory and Theological Seminary at Glenwood, Pittsburgh. Here he studied hard, rising at three o’clock in the morning to pursue his tasks and spending four of his vacations at hard work to help him defray the expenses of his education”. His ambition was the priesthood. This was realized when he was ordained on August 4, 1869 by Bishop Domenec.
He was sent successively to a teaching post at Loretta, and to serve the little congregation at Williamsburg, forty miles distant. His next pastoral duties were in Kittanning, Armstrong County, with its five monthly out-missions, following which he went to Freeport and Natrona.
In July 1873 he was appointed Chaplain of St. Paul’s Orphanage, Pittsburgh, and, simultaneously, was made pastor of the Church of Our Lady of Consolation at the Point. He, also, placed the parochial schools, which until then had been in charge of lay teachers, under the management of the Sisters of Mercy. A Protestant Church at the corner of Ferry Street and Third Ave. was bought, remodeled to Catholic needs, and dedicated under the invocation of “St. Mary of Mercy.” Later he placed in it an altar dedicated to “Our Lady of the Assumption at the Beautiful River”. This altar was a replica of one in the chapel of the same name at Fort Duquesne during the French occupancy, 1754 to 1758.
The Rev. Lambing was for many years president of the Catholic Institute, which in a sense was the predecessor of the “Pittsburgh College of the Holy Ghost”, later developed into the “Duquesne University of the Holy Ghost.”
He was the writer of newspaper articles on ecclesiastical and historical subjects and is the author of many books. A not inconsiderable part of “The Standard History of Pittsburgh” was written by him. The Editor of that work says of him that “he has done more than any other man to place in permanent form valuable and fast fading records.” For many years the Rev. Lambing was president of the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania; was a trustee of the Carnegie Institute, and Carnegie Technical Schools, by appointment of the founder, Andrew Carnegie.
In 1883 he received the honorary degree of Master of Arts, conferred by the University of Notre Dame, Indiana, and three years later, that of Doctor of Laws.
Such, in brief, is a review of the consecrated and distinguished lives, which guided the destiny of St. James Church of the village of Wilkinsburg.
Beyond the year 1887 this history does not go. Of the opening of the parochial school in 1886, of the change in size and character of the congregation through the growth of the village, and the influx of families connected with the Westinghouse and the Bessemer Steel Works, of the number of mission churches going out from St. James, we cannot write.
We close with three lines written after the first parish church burned, December 23, 1888; “. . . The citizens of the borough generously lent a helping hand to every undertaking that was resorted to by the congregation for the new building, a kindly spirit that was duly appreciated by both pastor and people.“
______
Compiled from an account of the church by the Rev. Mgr. A. A. Lambing, M.A. LL.D., “St. James Roman Catholic Church,” Davison, Elizabeth M. and Ellen B. McKee eds. Annals of Old Wilkinsburg and Vicinity: The Village 1788–1888. Wilkinsburg, Pa.: Group for Historical Research, 1940, pp. 426–432.