AUBURN – At a World War II monument on Market Street, William K. Sowers reaches out and touches the past.
“My father’s name is right here,” he said, laying his finger on “William Sowers” etched in granite. “He was in the Navy in the Pacific Theater.”
When he was growing up in Auburn, Sowers’ father (William H.) told him bits and pieces of the time he spent aboard a Navy minesweeper when he was young and the world was at war.
Aside from dropping depth charges on Japanese submarines, he’d seen what was left of Nagasaki after the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb Aug. 9, 1945, on the Japanese city.
“If it was not for these guys whose names are on the monument, we wouldn’t be around,” said Sowers, 73, a retired Alpha Mills knitting machine operator. “It would be a different world.”
Sowers and his spouse, Cynthia Myers Sowers, understand the importance of preserving the past. He’s vice president and she’s president of the Auburn Area Historical Society.
Their vision, dedication and respect for the past are indicative of a passion for history that permeates Schuylkill County’s southernmost region.
Auburn and nearby Deer Lake, which lie north of Blue Mountain, were the first areas to be settled by immigrants moving north from Berks County in the 18th Century.
Fort Lebanon, originally called Fort William, was built around 1755 near Auburn to ward off attacks during the French and Indian War. It was part of a chain of forts, called the Great Wall of Protection, built across the northern rim of the colony to protect settlers.
The Mahantongo Chapter of Daughters of the American Revolution rededicated a monument to the fort last year. In 1949, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission erected a historic marker near where the fort once stood.
Lest we forget
In 1919, the year after World War I ended, Auburn erected a monument to borough residents who served in the war.
Atop a granite stone with a bronze honor roll, a mighty American eagle sits on a globe-like sphere. While the eagle symbolizes America’s strength, a laurel branch surrounding the sphere also suggests a yearning for peace.
Joseph Morrison, who was killed in action, is memorialized at the top of the honor roll.
A Lehigh University graduate, Morrison enlisted in the U.S. Army Ambulance Service. He was wounded in action when a German shell hit a field hospital in France on Nov. 1, 1918 – only 10 days before the end of World War I – and he died the following day in a military hospital in France, where he is buried. He was awarded the French Croix de Guerre posthumously, according to the Auburn historical society.
An alcove in the center of town contains monuments to residents who served and died in three wars – World War II, Korea and Vietnam.
Atop the WWII monument are the names Marlin Staller and Ray E. Luckenbill Jr., who died in combat. The Staller-Luckenbill VFW in Auburn was named in their honor.
St. John’s Church cemetery is a citadel for service men and women from Auburn, including Civil War veterans.
On a gravestone worn by time, guarded by an American flag and a GAR marker, the name Chas. Christ is faintly visible. Not much is known about Christ, who served in the 161st Pennsylvania Infantry. His name does not appear on an online honor roll kept by the Auburn Area Historical Society.
Deer Lake
Mayor Lawrence L. Kozlowski and David B. Crouse, borough council president, outlined an ambitious plan to erect a veterans memorial near the flagpole at the center of town.
Located on the lake’s eastern shore, in a section of Veterans Memorial Park, the memorial would be a 44-foot-long V-shaped wall patterned after the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall in Washington, D.C.
The centerpiece would be a statue of a soldier gazing at a battlefield cross, a rifle turned downward with a helmet on its stock.
Battlefield crosses are found as early as the Civil War, but became more common in WWI and WWII. They acted as a marker so the Graves Registration Service could remove the body for burial.
Kozlowski, who designed the memorial, said officials began thinking of constructing a memorial about four years ago.
As with any project of its scope, its future depends on obtaining grants from private sources and foundations.
“We want to keep alive the spirit of Deer Lake,” said Kozlowski, a professional designer.
Deer Lake was founded in 1926 as a resort community, with Pottsville Construction Co. building cottages a year earlier. Fed by Pine Creek, the manmade lake had a bath house, diving towers and a sandy beach.
The Deer Lake Theatre, a landmark summer stock venue, featured major stars from the 1930s to the 1950s.
Among them were Gloria Swanson, best known for the movie “Sunset Strip;” Yul Brenner, who won an Academy Award for the “King and I,” and Celeste Holm, who appeared in “High Society” with Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby and Louis Armstrong, and won an Academy Award for “Gentlemen’s Agreement.”
Muhammad Ali put the area on the map when he opened a training camp near Deer Lake in 1972. Now called Fighter’s Heaven, its historical significance was recognized by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, which placed a marker on the property in 2023.
Zion’s Red Church, possibly the oldest in Schuylkill County, is a southern Schuylkill County landmark near Deer Lake.
The original log cabin, built when the area was still part of Berks County, dates to the mid-1700s.
When it was burned in an Indian raid, Lt. Gov. John Penn of the colony, which was under King James of England at the time, authorized the congregation to raise about $1,000 to build a new church in 1770.
The current structure, sometimes referred to as “Old Red,” was dedicated in 1883.
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