Press Room

AAI in the News

From Peddlers to Prominence: Mideast Descendants Add to Area

By Chris Bjorke
The Times Leader (Wilkes Barre, PA)
Posted on Sunday November 25, 2001

At the end of the 1800s women in coarse black dresses with kerchiefs on their heads walked from mining village to mining village, pulling wagons loaded with small goods to peddle to miners.

Some men collected rags or scraps of metal to sell. They learned enough English or Polish to conduct business, but spoke Arabic among themselves.

More than 100 years later, their children and grandchildren are doctors, lawyers, priests, professors and politicians, with names from half a dozen nationalities.

``They started off peddling, and when they became successful, they had momma-and-poppa stores,’’ said Albert G. Albert of Wilkes-Barre, a devotee of the history of Lebanese migration and the Maronite Catholic Church. ``In the beginning, the culture was very alien to them.’’

Though popular images of Arabs and the Middle East have been shaped by the politics of that region, for more than a century those who live in Northeastern Pennsylvania have been as American as apple pie – or maybe baklava.

The story of the movement of Lebanese and Syrians to the hills of Luzerne County reads like many immigrant success stories in the United States. The predominantly Christian immigrants left the political, religious and economic turmoil of the declining Ottoman Empire, came to America, devoted themselves to small enterprises, built churches, educated their children and – after a few generations – became as assimilated as other ethnic groups.

The first immigrants from Lebanon and Syria arrived in the 1880s, with many of them settling in the Rolling Mill Hill neighborhood on Hazle Avenue. Successive waves came to America throughout the early 20th century to escape strife in the Middle East.

The Maronite Catholic Lebanese founded St. Anthony’s Church on Dana Street and St. George Church on Loomis Street, while the Antiochian Orthodox Syrians founded St. Mary Church, now on South Main Street.
``They worked like fools. Hours meant nothing to them,’’ said Albert, who, like many Maronite Lebanese does not consider himself to be an Arab, but can speak Arabic and stresses his roots.

In addition to hard work, the new Americans also stressed education for their children. ``I never knew that there was a choice to go to college or not,’’ said Therese Zogby of Hazleton, who remembers her mostly unschooled, Lebanese-born mother reading during every free moment.
Zogby is part of an especially successful extended family that includes Pennsylvania Education Secretary Charles B. Zogby, prominent national pollster John Zogby and President of the Arab American Institute James Zogby.

The Moses family of Wilkes-Barre typifies the story of the Lebanese and Syrian immigrants in this area.

``My grandfather had no education,’’ said attorney John P. Moses, whose grandparents were born in Lebanon. ``He couldn’t read or write English. He could understand mathematics. He could speak English, broken English.’’

Moses’ grandfather arrived here in 1912 and worked as a dry-goods peddler, eventually opening a store on Hazle Avenue. Two generations later, his grandchildren were doctors and lawyers.

``You have to understand, in our family the most important thing in the world was education,’’ said Moses, who credits the Lebanese and Syrians with a strong commitment to family and community. ``When my brother George became a doctor, that was a huge, huge event.’’

Former Mayor Lee Namey is another prominent Wilkes-Barre resident who traces his roots to the Middle East – in his case, Syria. When he entered politics, he enjoyed the backing of others from that community.
``Where they could help, they helped,’’ Namey said. ``There was no great deal of money, but it was simply the idea that there was an Arabic candidate.’’

Once families had established themselves in the community, the second and third generations began to come together in social organizations, said Joseph Elias, a teacher at Solomon-Plains Memorial School, itself named after former School District Superintendent Leo Solomon, an Arab American.

``Initially, I think (the organizations) were looking for the social aspect of it,’’ said Elias, the son of a Syrian ragman and World War I veteran. He was an early member of the Northeastern Pennsylvania Association of Arab Americans and the national Arab American Institute.

But what started as social organizations had to adapt when perceptions of the Middle East worsened during the oil embargo in the 1970s and the increasing political turmoil there.

That was what separated Arab American organizations from similar groups based on nationality, said James Zogby.

``The difference for us is that while we were forming there were other efforts to negatively stereotype people of Arab descent,’’ he said. These stereotypes were more damaging than what other groups faced. ``They had to deal with Polish jokes.’’

Now as with other times when the Middle East is the focus of attention, organizations such as Zogby’s work toward more accurate perceptions beyond the stereotypical oil sheik and terrorist. But stereotypes do not die easily.

``I don’t know if that ever will change,’’ Elias said.

Misperceptions aside, the reality is that local Lebanese and Syrians followed much the same path as other ethnic groups, working hard and merging into the melting pot until the only visible part of their roots is often their food – stuffed grape leaves, kibbe, tabbouleh, hummus and baklava.
``That’s all that binds us today,’’ Albert said, and paraphrased a Lebanese friend. ``Aside from our church, the only thing that will remain after we’re totally assimilated is our food.’‘