The Tale of Two Counties
Cambria vs Montgomery
Montgomery county is the third largest county in the Southeastern region of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It borders Philadelphia, the nation’s sixth largest city. When King Charles II granted William Penn the charter for Pennsylvania in 1681, the region was meant to be a haven for Quakers particularly from Wales. As a Quaker who had faced religious persecution, Penn was determined to make religious freedom one of the tenets of Pennsylvania. As a result, many persecuted groups came to Penn’s colony and settled in the future Montgomery County: Dunkards, Mennonites, Schwenkfelders, Catholics, Lutherans, and many others. They came from England and Wales, Ireland, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Germany. Joe Biden’s forefathers were among them.
The American Revolution was an exciting time here. With its strong Quaker heritage, Montgomery County was a center of the abolitionist movement. It was the home of Lucretia Mott and Hiram Corson. The Underground Railroad was active here.The early Europeans who settled here tended prosperous farms, forges, and mills. They depended on the Philadelphia market to sell their products and on its port to connect them to the wider colonial world. Subsequent generations built a dense transportation network that linked laborers, suppliers, and consumers with each other and with the city, fueling the county’s prosperity across the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. By the close of the twentieth century, Montgomery County had become an economic engine in its own right, boasting the largest population and by far the largest job base among the counties surrounding Philadelphia. Today Montgomery County is the home of diverse communities and some of the nation’s premier universities. Bryn Mawr, one of the Seven Sisters, a group of historically women’s colleges, was founded here in 1885.
About three hundred miles from Montgomery county, in Pennsylvania’s southwestern region, lies Cambria county, with an equally rich history of immigration but widely divergent in fortunes. Created in 1804, the county was named for Wales, whose Latin name is Cambria. The county seat is Ebensburg, and includes Johnstown, the birthplace of the steel industry in the United States. Johnstown was founded by Joseph Schantz, aka Joseph Johns, a German immigrant. By the 1830s, Johnstown had developed into a small town, and the dominant ethnic group was German. Founded in 1852, the Cambria Iron Company of Johnstown is considered one of the greatest of the early modern iron and steel works. Forerunner of Bethlehem Steel Company, and United States Steel Corporation, the Cambria plant became a model for the industry.
In the late 1800s, the growth of Cambria Iron Works attracted workers from all over Europe. Driven by economic hardship, large numbers of immigrants began to arrive and found work in the growing steel industry. The Welsh, traditionally miners for generations, found work in the coal mines. Irish immigrants, who originally came to build railroads, were hired by the steel mills. By 1880, train cars filled with Germans and Scandinavians were on their way from New York city to Johnstown. The Irish, Germans and Welsh assimilated into American culture and became the most powerful, well-established groups in the Johnstown community. Later, the Jewish people arrived in the region, but were excluded from most jobs in the steel industry. Then came the Polish, Italians, Russians and Hungarians. Johnstown was truly a melting pot in the late nineteenth century. By the turn of the century, the area attracted a small number of Blacks and Mexicans, who were given the most menial and least paying jobs and denied promotions.After the Second World War, young men in the area began to leave to attend college and seek other employment opportunities. By 1982, the revenue of Johnstown had declined by over fifty percent, as Cambria Iron Works (now Bethlehem Steel) began to shutter operations, unable to meet stringent new environmental standards and Japanese competition. By the 1990s, Johnstown had largely shut down its steel making operations.
I know a thing or two about Johnstown, PA, because I lived there for three years between 1992 and 1995.
These two counties in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania are proxies in the MAGA versus liberalism contest in this year’s election. The results will be shaped equally by the non-college-educated men of Cambria county and the liberal, educated women of Montgomery county. Once a model for immigrant success, Cambria now stands forlorn and stubborn, on the side of a misogynistic Donald Trump. A region that birthed the first college to award PhDs to women, Montgomery county stands with Harris.
Donald Trump is on the run, and Kamala Harris knows it. Uncertain about how to get his footing against Harris, Trump is starting to doubt his own advisors. That’s a bad place for a campaign to be. Some advisors are counseling him to “stick to the issues,” and others are telling him “to be who he is.” There is tension in the keep. Trump, if anything, is a survivor. He knows instinctively that if he tries to pivot, he is going to lose his core supporters, who have to be fed with a constant stream of misogyny and hate to keep them within the fold. Trump is not going to win this thing with the women in Montgomery county. He’s going to win it by turning out the vote in Cambria county. When he says “I’m going to be the greatest President for women in history,” even Trump does not believe it.
You can tell that Trump is in two minds about whether to show up for the debate. I think he will have to, whether he wants to or not. Given where he is, with the polls numbers slipping, he has no choice but to take a shot. I really like Harris’ chances in the debate. She is a trial lawyer. She showed in her convention speech that she is very much improved and ready. Trump, on the other hand, has never really won a debate. He didn’t fare well against Clinton in 2016 and Biden in 2020. He is not going to do well against a confident woman prosecutor.
Trump thought he was getting a woke,. California liberal in Harris, fluent in LGBTQ lingo and talking about abortion all the time. I think he is genuinely shocked at her transformation. The other trick Harris has pulled off is to pivot from Biden’s portrayal of Trump as a man to be feared to her own portrayal of Trump as a man to be mocked. She has struck the perfect balance between Trump the buffoon and Trump the monster. “He is an unserious man, but electing him has serious consequences.” The jokes are landing. The attack lines are playing well. For once, the feared Republican machinery (Fox News et al) is on the back foot, and it’s a glorious sight to behold.
While the blue collar men of Cambria and the suburban women of Montgomery go head to head, this election may be decided by the people we all seem to have forgotten: college educated white males. 70% of America is white. 48% of them are men. Harris is polling better in this demographic than Biden did in 2020. Not to mention, Walz is playing better into this group than Vance, and that just might push Harris over the finish line. Trump knows it, and he has 70 days to figure things out. RFK Jr may help in Arizona, but not so much in must-win Pennsylvania.
Who’s going to win this thing? It’s still too close to call, but I’ll say this: I’d rather be Harris than him right now.
Have a great week ahead!