BETHLEHEM, Pa. — More than a dozen people gathered in Bethlehem’s DAR House Sunday for the Lehigh Valley Labor Council’s annual Workers’ Memorial to honor Lehigh Valley residents who died in workplace accidents.
- Members of the Bethlehem Workers' Committee held their annual memorial for victims of fatal workplace accidents Sunday
- The group has counted nearly 4,000 fatalities over the Lehigh Valley's history
- Nine people died over the last year in the Valley from workplace incidents
“This past year was the kind of year we always fear,” said John Werkheiser, chair of the Lehigh Valley Workers’ Memorial Committee. “We had nine of our fellow Lehigh Valley residents die at their workplace. Nine workers that left their homes to earn a day's pay, and never returned.”
Among those nine workers were Marvin Gruber and Zachary Paris, two New Tripoli firefighters killed in a Schuylkill County house fire in December, and 17-year-old tree trimmer Isiah Bedocs.
Werkheiser said there were nearly two more names added, referencing a trench collapse in Allentown. One man caught in the trench was quickly rescued. The other was taken to the hospital after an hours-long extraction and ultimately recovered from his injuries.
A history of workplace deaths
Along with a physical monument in the Bethlehem Rose Garden, the Workers' Memorial Committee maintains a list of nearly 4,000 known job site fatalities in the Lehigh Valley, stretching back to the 1771 death of Nathan Ogden, a deputy sheriff killed arresting a fugitive.
The list reads like an industrial history of the Lehigh Valley, told by the people who died creating it.
A canal boatman who drowned while working for the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Co. is one of the first people listed. He’s followed by scores of men injured in iron ore mines, then railroads, then slate quarries, steel mills and cement plants. Over time, linemen, truck drivers and, more recently, warehouse workers joined their ranks.
The list includes about 115 child workers. The youngest, six-year-old George Dull, was struck by a locomotive at the Saucon Iron Company in January 1880.
“I think most people would be shocked because when they think of child labor fatalities, they think of something from the 19th century,” Ennis said. “But, indeed, it’s still happening.”
Lehigh Valley workers who perished this year
Adding to the committee's list of children killed in the workplace was 17-year-old Isiah Bedocs of Coplay. He was working in North Whitehall Township for Adam’s Tree Service in August when he was pulled into a wood chipper.
“You never expect to send your son to work and for him not to come home.”Amy Bedocs, mother of Isiah Bedocs
“[He] was the love of our lives,” His mother, Amy Bedocs, told the crowd. “You never expect to send your son to work and for him not to come home.”
The event’s organizers urged those in attendance to push for safer workplaces. They advocated for several policy changes, like increasing the number of safety inspectors working for the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
“In this state, there are over 700 full-time game wardens. There are 68 people working for OSHA,” Werkheiser said. “You're safer as a trout in Pennsylvania than you are as a worker.”
He also asked those assembled to push for “OSHA-type protections” for employees of state, county and municipal entities, along with rescue workers.
“If we don't remember those that died, if we don't make the changes necessary to make worksites safer,” said Werkheiser, “there's just gonna be more people dying.”
