After being here for a full five days, we have the weekend to relax, do some exciting activities, and still learning on and on. Beginning on Saturday, we have an easy start, our entire group went to go see the St. Nicholas Croatian Catholic Church and its Murals made by Maxo Vanka, he painted them around 1930’s – 1940’s, just located in Millvale around a 10-15 minute drive from the University campus. It was around an hour tour, we arrived pretty early so it was nice to get a bit of an insight of what the Murals looked like up close. From the outside, the church looks just like any other one you would pass by, but the interior is just absolutely stunning. Each Mural has a story to tell, and one of my favorite Mural’s was the angel of Justice. I loved how the Angel of Justice and the Angel of Injustice were right on the opposite sites of each other, I think the contrast really gave off a strong aura, the Angel of Justice was holding a balanced scale, and dressed very polished. While the Angel of Injustice was wearing a gas mask, holding an unbalanced scale, and one of the gloves the Angel had on was red while the other glove was white. I think the two angels had each and it’s own story to tell, and I found it very fascinating.

This is my very first time visiting Millvale, but I could already tell it is not trying to be like Pittsburgh, or Philadelphia, or any other major city in the US, they are it’s own town, and dang they do have a story to tell. When you visit the St. Nicholas Croatian Church, you really start to think, Millvale has it’s own identity; Millvale relies mainly on its people, the community, and its backstory. I also really found fascinating that Millvale did not try to hide their trauma at all, but instead embracing it. I did some research on this town solely because I’ve never stepped foot in Millvale, but found out that this town suffered a traumatic flooding back in September of 2004, and another occured again 3 years later. The town had either option to re-locate, or stay put and help the community re-build, and that’s what majority of the residents did. Even while re-building, residents thought it’d be a great idea to add a community library, a small park, the little things to brighten up the town resident’s have already fallen in love with. And yet, they are still expanding! More and more businesses have been moving to Millvale, and it’s been structured to be stable and stronger than ever before. I really do believe Millvale has been through its toughest moments overall, but they have built themselves upwards, and slowly getting more recognition.