In December 1873, a 4,000 foot tunnel was completed through Big Lick Mountain in Dauphin County. Williamstown Tunnel opened up Bear Valley for profitable coal mining.
The completion of Williamstown Tunnel – 1873
A visit to the Coal Region in the summer of 1873 – The Atlantic Magazine
A writer's visit to the Coal Region and his fascinating, but scathing opinions about what he found - Summer of 1873
“In the Depths of a Coal Mine” – Stephen Crane’s 1894 visit to Pennsylvania’s Coal Region
Author Stephen Crane made a visit to a coal mine near Scranton in 1894 for an article in McClure's Magazine.
“Children of the Coal Shadow” – A haunting report about the children of the Coal Region from 1903
A gripping, harrowing story documents the lives and struggles of Coal Region children shortly after the Great Coal Strike of 1902.
“Killed all the fish for miles around” – A lament for Coal Region waterways – 1895
The mining industry in Northeastern Pennsylvania destroyed waterways and killed wildlife and its legacy remains with us today.
Photographs from the 1930s show a ramshackle mining operation on outskirts of Mount Carmel
These 1938 photographs by Sheldon Dick show a landscape destroyed by mining and the efforts of local residents to survive the Great Depression.
Remembering the local emergency response to the Porter Tunnel Disaster – March 1977
On March 1, 1977, water poured into the Porter Tunnel mine in western Schuylkill County. Emergency crews raced to the scene.
Charles Miner’s description of the mining industry in Pennsylvania’s Wyoming Valley – 1830 (Part One)
Early industrialist and political power broker Charles Miner describes the opportunity for the future of the mining industry in Northeastern Pennsylvania.
The Coal Region’s economic woes featured in book: “The Year of Peril: America in 1942”
In Tracy Campbell's 2020 book, the author uses the examples from the anthracite coal fields to show how our national myths about World War II often miss the mark.
A 1938 photograph shows desolate Coal Region landscape during the Great Depression
This photograph of Mount Carmel, PA in reveals the physical and economic gloom that hung over the anthracite coal fields during the 1930s.
Wynning History 