Officials hail latest move in transformation of Shenandoah’s east end

SHENANDOAH – “The one thing that I love about Shenandoah? They never give up.”

State Senator David G. Argall (R-Schuylkill) commended the grit and resiliency of the heart of the anthracite region Thursday morning as he joined borough and county leaders as a long-abandoned, burned factory finally met the excavator.

Contractors began work to demolish the former United Wiping Cloth factory on East Lloyd Street this week after flattening several row homes on North Bower Street over the last few weeks.

A massive blaze burned the factory in January of 2020. It had been converted into an apartment by a New York City man, Semyon Klimov, who purchased the property in 2011. Klimov left the building in a burned wreck until the Schuylkill County Redevelopment Authority acquired the property last January.

The redevelopment authority acquired all of North Bower Street from 128 North Bower down to Lloyd Street, and Lehigh Street from 130 North Lehigh to Lloyd Street.

Demolition began earlier this month.

“This wasn’t easy, but it looks a lot better than the last time we were here,” Argall said. “I know at one point, the commissioners thought this might be the most blighted site, certainly the largest blighted site in all of Schuylkill County.”

State Rep. Tim Twardzik (R-Schuylkill) said the project originally began when he was still Shenandoah’s state representative, before redistricting split the Greater Shenandoah Area between two house districts.

“This project is very important to rebuild a community that once had 33,000 people here in the coal boom,” Twardzik said. “It’s a chance to get rid of abandoned, blighted properties.”

“This one started out perhaps being senior housing, but we might take a turn and become the first veteran housing project [in Schuylkill County,]” Twardzik added.

“I think as a community, we’re just thrilled to have this blighted ruin out of our way and looking forward to progress and seeing how it can help our grow,” Councilwoman Katie Catizone said.

Council Vice President Michael “Zeckie” Uholik expressed optimism that the blight fight will continue to have success in town.

The east end of Shenandoah has arguably had the most remarkable transformation over the past few decades as blighted buildings have come down and new construction has been built.

Last year, the former J.W. Cooper Memorial High School came down after the Lehigh Street portion of the school suffered a partial collapse. It had served as Shenandoah’s central high school from 1918 until 1982, first serving as a temporary hospital during the Spanish Flu pandemic and surviving the Mine Subsidence of 1940. It continued to serve as the Shenandoah Valley School District’s first central elementary school until the mid 1990s.

Kent Steinmetz and a group of volunteers worked for over a decade to save the building and turn it into a focal point of the community, the J.W. Cooper Community Center. In the latter years, a food bank — the Beverly Mattson Memorial Food Bank — operated in the center and was displaced by the collapse and demolition. It moved to Pottsville to become the city’s second food bank, leaving Shenandoah with none for a time.

In 2019, the former Swift & Company building, which ran the length of the west side of the unit block of North Bower Street, came down nearly two years after the roof caved in.

In the 1990’s, it was supposed to be taken down and become a Uni-Mart. That never happened.

It was once a branch of the Chicago-based Swift & Co., a producer and distributor of a wide variety of meat products. Located along the Lehigh Valley Railroad, it received regular rail shipments.

The neighborhood also has some of the newest construction in Shenandoah borough.

On the east side of the 100 block of North Bower is Shenandoah Village Apartments, built in 1993. It replaced the remnants of a long-closed lumber yard once located along the also long-gone Lehigh Valley Railroad.

Speaking of the railroad, the train station off East Centre and Lehigh Street, an empty lot for decades following its demolition in the late 1950’s or early 1960’s, found new life in 2007 with the construction of the new C&R Emporium.

Today, the small strip houses the WIC Office, the Shenandoah office of Child Development, Inc., and Strive Physical Therapy.

Sentiments regarding the planned project for the United Wiping Cloth site echo those expressed as plans for Shenandoah Village Apartments were just getting underway.

Though, Argall said Thursday, officials are now “hunting for the funding to put something good” on the site.

Micquelynn Kapuschinsky contributed to this report.

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Kaylee Lindenmuth

Kaylee Lindenmuth is a Shenandoah native with a passion for journalism and the community she calls home. She is a 12-time Keystone Media Award winner, a PAB Excellence in Broadcasting award winner, and has been nominated for a Mid-Atlantic Emmy award.

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