Nestled in the Saucon Valley, Hellertown lies just south of Bethlehem, bordered on the west by the Saucon Creek. While the creek derives its name from the Native American word sakunk, meaning "place where a small stream enters into a larger stream," the town inherited its name from Christopher Heller and his descendants who settled the area in the mid-1700s. The 1800s brought a wave of Deutsch (German) immigrants to this corner of Pennsylvania Dutch (Deutsch) country. During the latter years of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century, Hellertown resembled any small...

Lower Saucon Township provides a unique glimpse of the region's many diverse villages and the German immigrant population. Towns including Wassergass, Shimersville, Polk Valley, Redington, and Bingen were settled largely because of the area's fertile soil, abundant water, and many iron and limestone deposits, which contributed to surrounding communities such as Bethlehem and Hellertown both socially and economically. These rare family photographs depict a blend of lives that influenced the area before and after the industrial revolution.