STRUCKE, ALBERT (April 23, 1891 -- Dec. 19, 1953)Chief Burgess. In August 2008, while sorting out material I have collected over 75 years of my life, I found notes of a brief conversation I had on May 12, 1955, with Edward Strucke, whose father was the first Polish chief burgess of Dupont, surrounded by coal mines in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. Now, in the week of my 92nd birthday, when I tried to find the real spelling of the family name, whether it was Struczke, Struczek, Strucki, or Struck, I found nothing to verify the real name. Whatever it was, the Strucke family has buried it. Many persons still live in Dupont with the same name. If it was spelled by sound, it would stand to reason that the root of the name is strukac, which means, as William Hoffman wrote, "to make a noise like a crane."
Albert Strucke lived his entire life in Dupont, the son of Albert (Wojciech) Strucke, who came from Galicia in 1888, and Anna Strucke, who came two years later from the same part of Poland. The father was born in October 1866, the son of Jacob Strucke, who came to Dupont in 1903, and the mother was born in July 1869. Albert was the first of their four children and was the first altar boy at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Dupont. The church, built in two stages, first to the level of the basement, served about 300 Polish families in Dupont until they had a fight and broke up into two parishes. The dissidents joined Bishop Hodur.
When Dupont broke away from Pittston Township and formed a borough in 1917, Albert Strucke was elected chief burgess and served two consecutive terms while working in the coal mines. He also served one term as justice of the peace and another term as chief burgess. The man who succeeded him as chief burgess in 1933 was another Pole, Joe Lukasik, who was previously involved in the church fracas.
In addition to the Polish churches in Luzerne County, beer and saloons were very much embedded in the lives of coal miners. For example, Wilkes-Barre had at least three breweries. Charles Stegmaier, who started the first one, used a goat and a cart to deliver beer to local taverns. Another brewery, built on land owned by the Delaware and Hudson Coal Company, had to brew 100,000 barrels of beer each year and sell each barrel for no less than one dollar each. In 1934, John Malinowski, who followed in the footsteps of Emil Malinowski, who had a brewery from 1911 to 1927, revived the Franklin Brewing Company and hired Albert Strucke to work in the brewery. After the Second World War, Strucke became assistant brewmaster of Franklin Brewery.
Dupont had another Polish chief burgess when Strucke died. His wife, Mary, with whom he had six children, the daughter of Slovak ummigrants, treasured the Strucke name.
Author: Edward Pinkowski - e-mail: [email protected] - (2011)