[PRCo] Castle Shannon slum???
Edward H. Lybarger
trams2 at comcast.net
Thu May 15 08:14:49 EDT 2014
Coal seams were generally named for a location at which there was a
pronounced outcrop (where they appeared at the surface). The Freeport seams
were below the Pittsburgh Coal, but because the beds were no longer level,
come to the surface mainly north of Pittsburgh (there are exceptions). I
have data from the state that shows the outcrop lines of all the major coal
seams in southwest PA, but they are presently housed in the PTM library.
Without looking at them, I can't say off the top of my head which seam
outcropped where, but I'm suggesting it's unlikely that the Upper Freeport
would be mined in Wilkinsburg.
Ed
-----Original Message-----
From: pittsburgh-railways-bounces at mailman.dementix.org
[mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounces at mailman.dementix.org] On Behalf Of DF
Cramer
Sent: Thursday, May 15, 2014 6:43 AM
To: Western PA Trolley discussion
Subject: Re: [PRCo] Castle Shannon slum???
John,
These may help especially the second link. The coal seams lie on top (or
undeneath) each other and all were mined to some extent.
http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/cs/groups/public/documents/document/dcnr_014594.
pdf
http://www.libraries.psu.edu/content/dam/psul/up/emsl/documents/bulletins/bu
lletin73.pdf
Dennis F. Cramer
http://home.windstream.net/dfc1/
> From: j_swindler at hotmail.com
> To: pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org
> Date: Thu, 15 May 2014 06:15:58 -0400
> Subject: Re: [PRCo] Castle Shannon slum???
>
>
>
>
> We initially lived on Coal St. in Edgewood, Jane St. terminal. There was
an alley - which later learned was former coal mine spur - that headed
towards area around Penn Lincoln Parkway/Ardmore Blvd. in Wilkinsburg.
There was another coal mine spur that briefly paralleled Penn Lincoln
Parkway near Edgewood Ave. before curving towards 'hollow' near
Swissvale/Edgewood border.
>
> Ed once mentioned a 'Freeport' coal seam - was this the seam that was
mined??
>
> I still remember that mid-70s trip to 111 Delp Rd. with Ed, and Fred's
> case of beer. (:>)
>
>
>
>
> > From: fwschneider at comcast.net
> > Date: Fri, 9 May 2014 14:54:33 -0400
> > To: pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org
> > Subject: Re: [PRCo] Castle Shannon slum???
> >
> >
> > I wonder what you pay for mine subsidence insurance up the hill from the
mine tipple in Castle Shannon? I notice the street that goes up from the
tipple is called Rolling Rock Road today . probably has more to do with what
goes on underground than teenage beer parties. :<) Wonder if those
tunnels wound up under the home that John Swindler's parents owned?????
> >
> > I remember early conversations with Ed Lybarger about the coal industry.
Don't know when . John Swindler brought him to my house to meet me about
1974. Hard to believe we've been friends for 40 years now. But at any
rate, one of the things Ed pointed out to me very early was how the
Pittsburgh seam [of coal] was mined out first in Allegheny County, then
pretty much in Fayette County by World War I, and then mining moved down to
West [by God] Virginia because it was cheaper to get it out of the
Pittsburgh seam down there than dig deeper to the next seam of coal in
Pennsylvania. For one thing, going down deeper involves pumping a lot of
water.
> >
> > To paraphrase this . coal isn't necessarily all gone in Allegheny,
Westmoreland and Fayette Counties, but the Pittsburgh seam, which is closest
to the surface is mined out. You do not waste money digging deeper until
you get all the cheaper coal elsewhere.
> >
> > I remember growing up in Penn Township (Penn Hills Municipality today)
in the 1940s. We lived on Crescent Hills Drive, since renamed Crescent
Hills Road. The development was begun in the 1930s. Around 1947 or 1948
when the houses 125, 127, 129 (I do not remember exactly which one) were
being built, the builder was having problems with his construction sliding
into a mine. They poured a lot of concrete into a hole in the ground to
stabilize that house. I also remember walking with my dad up the hillside
that lay between Crescent Hills and Frankstown Road and finding a blocked up
mine entrance . the rails came out of a hole in the ground and the entrance
was blocked with a sheet of corrugated steel. But when I walked up on the
hill above the entrance . alone when my folks didn't know where I was
wandering . I found another opening. The roof had caved into the old mine.
There was simply a hole in the mountainside where some unsuspecting fool
could fall in. Today that entire area is filled with houses on a new road
called Springdale Drive. But even between the time I found the old mine
and the construction of Springdale Drive in the 1960s and 1970s, . in the
late 1940s that entire area was strip mined of what remained.
> >
> > If you were to start at the Pennsylvania Railroad, nee Allegheny Valley
RR, where Sandy Creek Road comes out to the Allegheny River today (you can
look it up on google maps), there used to be a mine branch of the PRR or
AVRR that paralleled Sandy Creek Road and Coal Hollow Road to serve those
mines. There is one old postcard floating around that shows a Verona
streetcar passing over the railroad at Sandy Creek (White Oak P.O.). This
map shows it in 1895 of there abouts. There were mines in all the hollows.
> >
> >
> > http://images.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/i/image/image-idx?view=entry;
> > cc=maps;entryid=x-20090121-hopkins-0032
> >
> > And that is just one tiny chunk of Allegheny County that was once mined.
> >
> >
> > On May 9, 2014, at 10:21 AM, Herb Brannon wrote:
> >
> > > Yes, I was going to mention that the area would be hidden from
> > > Library Road by the railroad.
> > >
> > >
> > > On Fri, May 9, 2014 at 8:31 AM, Edward H. Lybarger
<trams2 at comcast.net>wrote:
> > >
> > >> And behind the P&WV embankment.
> > >>
> > >> -----Original Message-----
> > >> From: pittsburgh-railways-bounces at mailman.dementix.org [mailto:
> > >> pittsburgh-railways-bounces at mailman.dementix.org] On Behalf Of
> > >> Herb Brannon
> > >> Sent: Friday, May 09, 2014 8:01 AM
> > >> To: Western PA Trolley discussion
> > >> Subject: Re: [PRCo] Castle Shannon slum???
> > >>
> > >> Ahh, they sat on what is now Castleview Road on the west side of
> > >> the trolley line.
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> On Fri, May 9, 2014 at 7:45 AM, D Brashear <shadow at dementix.org>
wrote:
> > >>
> > >>> There are 37 buildings next to a mine plainly visible here:
> > >>>
> > >>> http://data.cei.psu.edu/pennpilot/era1940/allegheny_1938/alleghe
> > >>> ny_193 8_photos_jpg_800/allegheny_051739_aps7264.jpg
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>> On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 9:45 PM, Dwight Long
> > >>> <dwightlong at verizon.net>
> > >>> wrote:
> > >>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Fred
> > >>>>
> > >>>> P&WV did indeed at one time own the Pittsburgh Terminal Coal
Company.
> > >>>> However, even though the coal outfit was separately
> > >>>> incorporated, there
> > >>> was
> > >>>> an issue with the Commodities Clause of the Interstate Commerce
> > >>>> Act
> > >>> (added
> > >>>> as part of the Hepburn Act of 1906), and this led to government
> > >>>> pressure
> > >>> to
> > >>>> sell the coal company, which the P&WV did in 1924.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Mine 7 was shown as being variously in Horning or Large, Pa.,
> > >>>> in
> > >>> Jefferson
> > >>>> Twp. USGS Co-ordinates are given as:
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>> 40.3375696 -79.9914409 402015N 0795929W
> > >>>> Glassport
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>> This is in the present day borough of Jefferson Hills. Large
> > >>>> is a part
> > >>> of
> > >>>> Jefferson Hills. This is a few miles southeast of Washington Jct.
> > >>>> Mine
> > >>> #7
> > >>>> was served by the West Side Belt RR, a P&WV subsidiary, at
> > >>>> their M.P
> > >> 18.
> > >>>> This was about 2 1/2 miles from the point where the West Side
> > >>>> crossed
> > >>> over
> > >>>> the PRR Peters Creek branch.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> I do not think that the reference is to Mine #7. There were
> > >>>> several PTCC mines with lower numbers in Castle Shannon or
> > >>>> vicinity, however. And I seem to recall a stop on the
> > >>>> Charleroi line just south
> > >> of Washington Jct.
> > >>>> with a mine s name.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Dwight
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>> From: Fred Schneider
> > >>>> Sent: Thursday, 08 May, 2014 16:18
> > >>>> To: Western PA Trolley discussion
> > >>>> Subject: [PRCo] Castle Shannon slum???
> > >>>>
> > >>>> This link leads to an abandoned mining patch story in the
> > >>>> Pittsburgh
> > >>> Press
> > >>>> ("50 Heath Law Violations .") in the postwar period at Castle
Shannon.
> > >>>> Pittsburgh Terminal Coal Company sounds like a subsidiary of
> > >>>> Wabash-Pittsburgh Terminal Railroad, i.e. the Pittsburgh and
> > >>>> West
> > >>> Virginia.
> > >>>> The earlier maps show they did own Mine 7 down at Washington
> > >> Junction.
> > >>>> However, I have no clue that it was in Castle Shannon borough
> > >>>> in
> > >>>> 1947
> > >>> it
> > >>>> was not 40 years earlier.
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>> http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=mfUaAAAAIBAJ&sjid=40wEAAAAI
> > >>> BAJ&pg
> > >>> =3890%2C1953753
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Anyone knowledgeable enough to tell me what this refers to in
> > >>>> todays
> > >>> terms?
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
> > >>>> _______________________________________________
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> > >>>> Pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org
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> > >>>> ys
> > >>>>
> > >>>>
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> > >>
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> --
> > >> Herb Brannon
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> *In Pittsburgh.............................A City And.........A
> > >> State of Mind * Let's Go Pens Let's Go Bucs
> > >>
> > >>
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> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > Herb Brannon
> > >
> > >
> > > *In Pittsburgh.............................A City And.........A
> > > State of Mind * Let's Go Pens Let's Go Bucs
> > >
> > >
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