Jim Thorpe and the old Jail Museum - Sidebar: April ‘00 American History

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Thorpe

By the 1950s, the coal industry had declined, bringing the neighboring communities of Mauch Chunk and East Mauch Chunk down with it. Desperate to recapture their nineteenth-century prosperity, the two towns decided to merge, change their names, and look for a way to attract visitors. It took the death of a famous American athlete with absolutely no connection to the area to give them a new lease on life.

When Jim Thorpe died in 1953, his home state of Oklahoma lacked the funds to erect a fitting tribute for him. His widow, hearing about the Mauch Chunks’ impending name change during a visit to Philadelphia, approached town officials with a proposal. If they would organize an appropriate burial spot and memorial to her husband in their community, they could name their new town after him. In 1954 they did just that, and in the years since, Jim Thorpe has become a popular tourist spot that overflows with crafts and antiques shops, art galleries, and boutiques. A 20-ton granite memorial situated in a small park on the east side of town marks the burial place of the famous athlete.

Thorpe

Thorpe

Thorpe

The jail’s main area is flanked by the 8-by-13-foot cells, each secured by two doors, an outer oak padlocked door and an inner door made of iron bands and locked by a bar and padlock. The cells, cold and damp, remain just as they were when prisoners occupied them less than five years ago. The main area is lit by a skylight, but the meager daylight that reaches each cell does so through a high, narrow, six-inch-wide window that is secured by bars.

The jail tour’s main attraction is cell number 17, which contains a faint handprint on the wall. According to legend, just before his execution, one of the Molly Maguires–either Campbell or Fisher–placed his hand on the wall and declared that his handprint would remain there forever as a sign of his innocence. McBride said that the wall has been cleaned and painted many times in the years since, but the handprint always returns.

Like the handprint, memories of the Molly Maguires refuse to fade from Jim Thorpe. During the local St. Patrick’s Day parade each year, members of the Ancient Order of Hibernians (an Irish fraternal organization) place a large, green-tinted chrysanthemum wreath bound with a black ribbon outside the main door of the Old Jail Museum to commemorate the men who were hanged there.

The Mollies are remembered elsewhere in the region. The Historical Society of Schuylkill County in Pottsville displays portions of the ropes used to hang the men, trial transcripts, and a revolver used by an adversary of the Mollies; and what was once the headquarters of alleged Molly boss Jack Kehoe in Girardville is now a bar run by Kehoe’s great-grandson. To get a sense of the conditions the Mollies and their fellow miners experienced, visitors can stop by the No. 9 Mine "Wash Shanty" Anthracite Coal Mining Museum in Lansford and see a collection of mining memorabilia, while the Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine in Ashland offers tours of an anthracite mine.

Christine Techky
 

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