Archibald Johnston: Mayor of Bethlehem, Bethlehem Steel VP, Gentleman Farmer
NOW ON VIEW THROUGH OCTOBER 5, 2025
Archibald Johnston arrived in Bethlehem from Phoenixville, Pennsylvania while still in elementary school. He thrived in school, was a graduate of Lehigh University, and became an employee of the Bethlehem Steel Company. His intelligence, salesmanship, and people skills were valued by senior management. He made “the Steel” – and himself – a lot of money.
Johnston married the daughter of a local family, Estelle Stadiger Borhek, and they had two children, Elizabeth and Archibald Borhek Johnston.
In the late 1910s, Bethlehem Steel’s senior management saw the wisdom in the consolidation of the three Bethlehem boroughs – Bethlehem, Northampton Heights, and South Bethlehem. Johnston led the consolidation campaign and voters selected him overwhelmingly as their first mayor. He served one term and moved to his new country estate, “Camel’s Hump Farm” in Bethlehem Township.
Johnston hired Curtis Lovelace, who would later create an architectural firm which would become today’s Spillman Farmer, to design a suitable residence for himself and his wife. His two children, already adults and married with their own children, would not accompany them to the 6,000-square-foot home completed in 1923.
Johnston had a passion for civil engineering projects as well as civic work. He walled the Monocacy Creek, built a fish hatchery, a riding rink, and a series of roads and bridges connecting the buildings and homes on what was almost one square mile adjacent to Nazareth Pike.
Johnston died on February 2, 1948, having enjoyed nearly 25 years of family life with his wife and their children and grandchildren.
Now on view at NMIH. Included with admission.
The Archie Project is a nonprofit 501(c)(3), whose purpose is to raise funds to restore the interior of the Historic Archibald Johnston Mansion in Bethlehem Township’s Housenick Park.
Interested in learning even more? Visit the Moravian Archives to explore their current exhibit Bridging Bethlehem: 100 years of the Hill to Hill, in which Johnston is discussed in the context of his role as the first mayor of the united Bethlehem and as an advocate for the bridge’s construction. On view through December. The MAB gallery is open from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Monday through Friday.