Excerpt from Nelson's Biographical Dictionary and Historical Reference Book of Fayette County, Pennsylvania, Vol. 3: Containing a Condensed History of Pennsylvania, of Fayette County, and the Boroughs and Townships of the County<br><br>With the first settlers there came Luth erans to Fayette county, who without a real organization worshiped whenever a Lutheran minister came from the eastern part of the State. No records exist from this time as every minister kept his private records. The first Lutheran church in Connellsville was organized in the beginning of 1871 by Rev. H. J. H. Lemcke then residing in West New ton. The oldest church building, then pos sessed by the Christian congregation, was bought and remodelled for Lutheran ser vices which were held for the following years every other Sunday by pastors residing in West Newton. In the course of time more Lutherans, especially from Europe, settled around Connellsville and the congregation became larger. But during the strike of 1894 four - fifths of the congregation under the leadership of their pastor, Ph. Lamerdin, moved to Wisconsin and this was the darkest period of the congregation, hence it is slowly (but permanently increasing) its membership and has a solid foundation. The foreign Lutheran element residing in about a thirty miles radius belong to St. John's church, and the present pastor has the charge of about two thousand families, in the circuit of Con nellsville. Although the majority are Ger mans, the parish consists of beside them, Slovaks, Hungarians, Swedes and Danish Polanders, etc. The following is a list of the pastors since the organization: Rev. H. P. H. Lemcke, 1871-1877, now pas tor emeritus living in Altoona, Pennsylvania; Rev. P. Doerr, 1877 - 1881, now in Adams burg, Pennsylvania; Rev. W. A. C. Muller, 1881, September 18 - 1884, January 4, Char leston, South Carolina; Rev. C. F. Tiemann.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.