The Tamaqua Award for a Collection of Essays

The Tamaqua Award is named after the Tamaqua River (now called the Little Schuylkill River) and the Tamaqua Borough of Pennsylvania, which lies within the southern coal region of the Appalachian Mountains in the Schuylkill River drainage basin, just off the western end of the Pocono Mountains. A region known during the height of the industrial age for its anthracite mining history and its renown as a railway hub, the decline of those industries connects Tamaqua’s economic history to that of other small industrial towns and cities throughout the U.S., where we see the hard-scrabble lives of once thriving, now hollowed-out communities. Before the economic collapse, the mining industry in the Tamaqua region was a catalyst for mass migration to the area. Immigrants from Eastern Europe moved into the region: Poles, Hungarians, Lithuanians, Slovaks, Russians and Ukrainians. Even today, this area is home to the highest number of Lithuanians in the United States. (If you think of the film “Deer Hunter,” which portrayed such a town, set in the Allegheny Mountains in Pennsylvania, you’ll have a general idea of the kinds of communities we are talking about.) The Tamaqua Award for a collection of essays is looking for a collection that mines deep in its search for the truth of the human experience, essays that go beyond safe boundaries to discover deep realities. The history and realities of Tamaqua are, in many ways, archetypal histories; they are woven histories of many peoples and many lives. Stories of nature v. industry. Of boom, bust and devastation. Stories of the unending sweep of human history. These are stories that can be found in any part of the world, of course. This is the kind of richness we are looking for in submissions to the Tamaqua Award — stories that mine the world for the deep, primordial truths.

Country of Publication & Year Established

United States

Established in 2018