WAVERLY TWP. — New materials from the heyday of the Scranton Lace Co. complete a collection detailing the history of what was once a major employer in the city.
The Waverly Community House received the remaining Scranton Lace Co. archival materials from the Lackawanna Historical Society last week. The boards of both entities approved the transfer earlier this year.
The seven boxes include treasury reports, meeting minutes, Department of Defense contracts and blueprints, which Delayne DePietro, the community house’s archive coordinator, has been sorting through.
She said many of the items are records the center didn’t have in its archives of the company, such as meeting minutes from the 1960s.
Established in 1891 as the Scranton Lace Curtain Manufacturing Co., the company, located on Meylert and Albright avenues, was the largest manufacturer of Nottingham lace in the country. In addition to lace, other products made there included tablecloths, napkins, valances and shower curtains. It closed in 2002.
The former factory, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is now Lace Village, a mixed-use residential and commercial complex.
The Waverly Community House, which was created in 1919 by the family of Henry Belin Jr., one of the company’s early leaders, began acquiring company records and archives in 2012.
Gia Tugend, the center’s director of advancement and digital marketing, said the organization has received calls from people whose relatives worked at the company, as personnel files are among the collection. Among the names listed in the materials is Hugh Rodham, father of former first lady and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who was briefly employed by the company.
“It’s really something that’s here that’s a testament to our dedication to preserving local history,” Tugend said.
DePietro, who has worked on the archives for nearly two years, said the most interesting items are the Defense Department contracts from the time when the company made parachutes and camouflage netting during World War II.
“It’s interesting to see what the government required and what Scranton’s role was in World War II,” she said.
Also included among the new materials are a pricking board for lace making and a few bobbins.
Tugend said once DePietro finishes looking through the items, they will be archived and materials such as boxes will be ordered to ensure the process is in line with historic preservation standards.
The center plans to open the Scranton Lace archives once a week in the summer to allow the public to look at and do research with them. Tugend said with all the materials in place, there is potential for them to be viewed more widely by the public, such as future exhibits and blog posts about them on the community house archives website. The Lackawanna Historical Society handled digitization and the center regularly works with them, Executive Director Michelle Hamilton said.
“The potential is endless,” Tugend said. “Right now, it’s just a matter of going through everything.”
DePietro said having all the materials gives her more of an insight into the scale of the factory — which at one time employed 1,400 people — its operations and what it was like to work there.
“It’s hard to conceive of the size of such a huge industry,” she said. “You get the whole story and it’s more of a picture than a vague notion.”
Tugend, who was one of the community house’s first archive employees, said having the remaining materials completes the collection. She added it shows how much the Scranton Lace Co. was part of people’s lives and how innovative Belin was as the company president, providing employees with onsite recreational activities.
“I feel like it’s all come together now,” she said. “We’re excited to continue to work with it. It’s important to the history of our region and we’re just thrilled to have it here, and we’re thrilled to be able to preserve that history and continue to tell the story and keep it alive.”
A pricking board from the remaining archives from the Scranton Lace Factory now located at the Waverly House in Waverly on Thursday, May 1, 2025.(REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Archive director Delayne DiPietro shows items from the remaining archives from the Scranton Lace Factory at the Waverly House in Waverly on Thursday, May 1, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Archive director Delayne DiPietro talks about the archives from the Scranton Lace Factory that were added to the Waverly House collection on Thursday, May 1, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Gia Tugend, director of advancement and digital media, talks about the addition of the remaining archives from the Scranton Lace Factory at the Waverly House in Waverly on Thursday, May 1, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Archive director Delayne DiPietro shows paperwork highlighting the Scranton Lace Company’s role in WWII at the Waverly House in Waverly on Thursday, May 1, 2025. The documents come from the remaining archives from the factory that were recently added to the group’s collection. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)