July 1, 2024
Peter and George in the Orphanage
Two years ago, I first heard the claim that Ilona Kerestesy Koletar sent some of her children to an orphanage after her husband, Joseph Koletar, died in 1919. I was finally able to verify this. I shared some of this infomration at our in person reunion, but thought it would be of particular interest to descendants of Peter Koletar.
The 1920 census lists all the Koletar children (John, Eleanor, Joseph, George (Soapy), Peter, Stephen (Larry), and Frank) as living at the family home in Shamokin. However, the 1920 census also lists George (Soapy) and Peter at St. John’s Protectory in Lackawanna, New York. They are listed as “inmates”.
I contacted OLV Charities, the current charitable organization who once ran the protectory. A wonderful archivist informed me that both George and Peter were admitted on July 19, 1919. That is about six weeks after their father died. They were nine and seven years old at the time. It is likely they were sent off as the older children were able to go to work and the Stephen (Larry) was only 5 and Frank was 2.
OLV does not have the original letter requesting the boy’s admittance, but provided me with a copy of the response to the request in which Father Baker accepts “the three boys you wrote us about”. The letter is addressed to Rev. M.M. Hassett who ran the local parochial school at Saint Edward’s in Shamokin, Pennsylvania that the boys likely attended. The third boy mentioned is unknown, but likely would have been Stephen. OLV Charities did not have any record of Stephen or any other “Koritars” besides George and Peter.
Father Baker, the head of the orphanage, was a Buffalo area priest renowned for his work with the poor. He led a national initiative to create several homes for the indigent and treat the children more humanely than the 1800’s orphanages that featured bars on the windows and locks on the doors. St. John’s Protectory housed almost 400 boys and it was rough. At a reunion, decades after being there, men recalled in a New York Times article lining up for everything and “fights, fights, fights.” “I fought every day for five years” recalled one man.
After over two years, George and Peter were discharged from the protectory on October 23, 1921 to their mother, Ilona, who still lived in Shamokin. The attached letter from the Pastor at Kulpmont, Pennsylvania (next to Shamokin) informed the home that Ilona (Mrs. Joseph Koritar) was coming to see her boys.