Theophany in American Orthodox history

The latest episode of my American Orthodox History podcast is up over at Ancient Faith Radio. In it, I discuss the feast of Theophany, focusing on several historical celebrations of the feast, including the famous annual celebration at the Greek cathedral in Tarpon Springs, Florida. In the podcast, I read...

The Forgotten Saint of the Forgotten Church on the Forgotten Island

Archimandrite Theoclitos Triantafilides is one of the most remarkable figures in American Orthodox history. An ethnic Greek, he served as tutor to the future Tsar Nicholas II and went on to establish the multiethnic parish of Ss. Constantine and Helen in Galveston, Texas, under the Russian Mission. His story has been mostly untold,...

Blessing the Kansas River, 1910

    For Orthodox Christians on the Old Calendar, today is the feast of Theophany. I'm hoping to air a whole podcast on Theophany very soon, but in the meantime, I thought I'd reprint an article about a Theophany celebration that took place one hundred years ago.  I live in...

Anti-Greek Riots in Omaha

The Greeks first arrived in South Omaha, Nebraska, in 1904, brought in as strikebreakers in the local meat-packing industry. That didn’t exactly endear them to the community, but they settled in, and by 1907, over 2,000 Greeks were reportedly living in the city. It wasn't long before they built a church, dedicated to St....

Protestant missions among Syrian Orthodox in Boston

Exactly 100 years ago -- January 15, 1910 -- the following article appeared in the Boston Globe: GREEKS OBSERVE NEW YEAR. Services Held in City Churches and Gifts are Exchanged. The members of the Orthodox Greek church celebrated their new year yesterday. The observation of the day included prayers in the two churches...

A Life of St. Herman from 1919

  Vera Vladimirovna Johnston was born in the Russian Empire, married an Englishman, and eventually moved to New York. Her own story is extremely fascinating, and we will discuss it in detail in the future. Today, however, I am reprinting an article she wrote in 1919, entitled, "Herman -- Russian...

Fraudulent “Chaldean” fundraisers in America

As I've probably said a hundred times now, America is a frontier region for Orthodoxy. This was especially the case at the turn of the last century, when the chaotic nature of the American Orthodox scene provided ample opportunity for imposter priests to make a good living on unwitting Orthodox...

The First Orthodox Liturgy in Boston

Not too long ago, I wrote about Fr. Christopher Jabara, an Antiochian priest who visited America in 1893-94. Jabara preceded St. Raphael Hawaweeny, but he wasn't the first Antiochian priest to come to the United States. That title, I believe, belongs to Fr. Constantine Tarazy. Tarazy was a celibate priest...

American Orthodox demographics, 1906-1936

Every ten years, from 1906 to 1936, the US Census Bureau compiled a Census of Religious Bodies. These censuses are gold mines of information on early American Orthodoxy. Also, unlike so many of the inflated numbers that you're likely to see floating around, the census data is reliable. With its...

100 Years Ago Today: January 8, 1910

If you were living in New York City exactly one hundred years ago, you could have read the following article in the Tribune, one of New York's many newspapers: GREEK CHRISTMAS Prayers Offered for Czar at Cathedral of St. Nicholas. Christmas was celebrated in New York yesterday by ten thousand...