For immediate release
Further information: contact Joseph Giomboni
Public Relations office, (570) 208-5957

January 10, 2018 – Author and “The New York Times” Senior Editor Mark Bulik will discuss “The Molly Maguires” and their historic labor movement during the annual Msgr. John J. Curran Lecture at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 18, in the Burke Auditorium at King’s College. 

The Curran Lecture is part of Anthracite Mining Heritage Month. The free public lecture is co-sponsored by the McGowan Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility at King’s and the Anthracite Heritage Foundation.

Bulik is the author of “The Sons of Molly Maguire: The Irish Roots of America’s First Labor War,” which explores the origins of the Molly Maguires, a secret society of labor activists in Ireland and the anthracite coal fields of Pennsylvania. 

Bulik comes from a long line of anthracite mineworkers who emigrated from Ulster to Cass Township, Schuylkill County. His grandfather James O’Connor, to whom the book is dedicated, went to work as slate picker at age 12.

Bulik has supervised the Sunday front page and the home page of the “The New York Times” web site. He also wrote a regular history feature, “First Glimpses,” about the paper’s earliest mentions of famous people and things, from Winston Churchill to the cheeseburger. A graduate of Georgetown University, Bulik was a reporter, editor, columnist and editorial page editor for newspapers in the Philadelphia area. 

The lecture is named after Msgr. John J. Curran from Wayne County, who was part of an Irish immigrant coal mining family, working in the mines as a boy before turning to the priesthood in the Diocese of Scranton. He was widely known as "the labor priest" for his role as a mediator between labor and management in resolving the 1902 anthracite strike, which affected nearly 160,000 mineworkers throughout northeastern Pennsylvania.  

The Burke Auditorium is located in the William G. McGowan School of Business on North River Street. Parking will be available in on-campus lots. For more information, please contact Dr. Tom Mackaman, associate professor of history at King’s, at (570) 208-5900, ext. 5715 or e-mail thomasmackaman@kings.edu

Author Mark Bulik will discuss “The Molly Maguires” and their historic labor movement during the annual Msgr. John J. Curran Lecture at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 18, in the Burke Auditorium at King’s College.