Demolition of former St. Peter's school in Coplay triggers memories

When the demolition crew first started tearing down the old Christ the King School on Fifth Street in Coplay, former students some well into middle age would stop and ask for a brick or two.

So the demolition workers began putting bricks in a pile outside the construction fence to enable the alumni to take the mementos at will.

It was there that the mini reunions began. Classmates who hadn't seen each other in years would come for bricks and find each other.

"Almost every day I go over and take pictures of the demolition and almost every day I run into someone I haven't seen in decades," said former student Susan Kline, who lives across from the school. "Word has gotten around about the demolition and people are stopping by."

Freelance photographer Scott Nagy of the Stiles section of Whitehall Township has also been chronicling the demolition in pictures.

"I saw a guy I hadn't seen in 10 years," said Nagy, who attended the school in the 1970s when it was called St. Peter's.

Alumni have also reconnected through a Facebook page called, "You know you went to St. Pete's if." Former students post old class photos as well as pictures of the demolition and reminisce.

For some, the razing of the school feels bigger than the loss of bricks and mortar. The Roman Catholic parish started construction on the building in 1927, dedicating it in 1928. Originally, the first floor was the church, the second floor the school and the third floor a convent for nuns who were teachers.

It's a measure of how far back many of the parishioners go that some still refer to the next door stand-alone St. Peter's church, which was built in the early 1960s, as the "new" church.

Kline's mother went to the school. Her parents were married in the first-floor church and Kline was baptized there, later attending St. Peter's for grades 1-8.

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Demolition of former St. Peter's school in Coplay triggers memories