Freeland native and historical expert Charlotte Tancin is returning to her hometown to share her historical knowledge of the borough during a presentation that will be held at MMI Preparatory School on Centre Street in Freeland.
The second in a series of historical presentations at MMI will be held March 12, 2015 at 6:30 P.M. in the Joseph A. Turri ’45 Library and Learning Center and is free and open to the public and children of all ages. The first presentation entitled “Anthracite Folklore,” was held in January and presented by historians Karen Esak and Bryan Dunnigan. It was a night of storytelling commemorating the trials and tribulations of the lives of the brave men and boys that worked in the coalmines.
The presentation will focus on Freeland through three different aspects of historical significance: the town’s first layout and how it grew, the early businesses and industries that made it thrive, and the 13 plus churches that nurtured its people.
“We will discuss some very interesting topics. My research has spanned several decades and I am very excited to come to MMI for a presentation on Freeland’s growth, businesses, churches in the town’s first 30 to 40 years, and will finish with a look at the 1906 Pearl Jubilee,” Tancin said.
Though Tancin now lives in Pittsburgh, she feels deeply rooted in her hometown. Tancin is a librarian at Hunt Institute of Carnegie Mellon University. In her spare time, Tancin maintains a Freeland history website (www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/ct0u/freeland.html) that began in the 1990s.
Tancin’s passion for Freeland area history began in the 1980s while she was doing genealogical research on her family’s roots throughout the local area. She reached out to another local historian that had published information about Freeland, the late Charles Reczkowski. He gave her files that helped her begin this historical endeavor.
There have been hundreds of individuals who have helped Tancin and her mission of sharing information about Freeland. People have provided her with images and information, much of which is on her website, though some remains unpublished as she hopes to create a book one day. Her main objectives are to continue providing captivating information and images about Freeland, do research that uses that information to educate, and to share this knowledge base with others so that the history is preserved.
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