Birth of a Coal Mining Empire

Birth of a Coal Mining Empire. Pennsylvania Wilds. , Settled in the early 1800s, Punxsutawney remained a quiet farming and lumbering community until 1883. That year, the Rochester and Pittsburgh Coal and Iron Company opened coal mines just north of Punxsutawney, launching an industry that would transform the region., By 1900, thousands of men and boys labored in the mines, excavating coal deposits that surrounded the town, including one unbroken stretch from Reynoldsville to Punxsutawney. Their muscle and grit extracted an average of 25,000 tons of coal per day from each mine. Most coal was shipped out of the region to fuel the steam-driven engines used in factories, locomotives and ships. The rest was processed locally to produce coke used in iron furnaces., The commercial center of the mining region, Punxsutawney drew many new industries, including foundries, a silk mill, brick factories, and glass plants. In the early 1900s, more than 70 trains a day brought goods and people to and from Punxsutawney., Changing Times, Changing Industry , By 1920, declining yields and changing economics ended the rein of deep-pit mining. Some mining towns, like Eleanora, disappeared entirely. Others, like Walston and Adrian (also called Delancey), remain, though smaller than during the mining heyday. In 1945, advances in earth-moving equipment brought strip-mining to Jefferson County. Coal production peaked in 1947 when annual production reached 318 million tons. Regional strip mines, as well as a handful of deep mines, still produce coal, mostly burned in electric power plants., From Coal to Coke , Mines in the Punxsutawney region yield bituminous coal, which burns cool and smoky compared to anthracite coal. "Coking" turned the bituminous coal into a hotter and cleaner burning fuel. Beehive-shaped coke ovens burned crushed coal in the near-absence of air, a process that released noxious gas and coal tar and left pure carbon coke. Walston housed the world's longest string of coke ovens, stretching 1.25 miles. Smoke from the town's 700 ovens blackened the air and killed vegetation throughout the valley. In 1900, the region's coke ovens produced 100 train cars of coke daily., [Photo captions, top to bottom, read] , . Miners at the bottom of the Onanbaga Mine, circa 1912., . West Mahoning Street, Punxsutawney as seen in 1938. The Pantall Hotel on the left still serves customers today., . The Rochester and Pittsburgh Coal and Iron Company built the town of Adrian in 1888 and operated the coal mine until 1941., . The 700 coke ovens in Walston cast a red glow in the sky at night.