 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations .(September 2014) |
| Mount Pisgah | |
|---|---|
| Highest point | |
| Elevation | 1,360 ft (410 m) [1] |
| Geography | |
| Location | Carbon County, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Parent range | Appalachian Mountains |
| Topo map | USGS Leighton (PA) Quadrangle |
Mount Pisgah is a peak in Carbon County, Pennsylvania situated north-northwest from and looming over the right bank business district in downtown Jim Thorpe.
Mount Pisgah is located above Jim Thorpe and is the northeastern end of the 12.5-mile-long Pisgah Mountain (or Pisgah Ridge) above the Lehigh Valley. The peak is located in northeastern Pennsylvania's Anthracite Upland region on the west bank of the Lehigh River just north of and parallel to Broadway, which is a block downhill from the lower looping end of the historic Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company's historic Mauch Chunk & Summit Hill Railway, which delivered coal to barges through chutes crossing what is now U.S. Route 209 and the rail yard along the Lehigh.
While the lower south slope of the mountain and the ends of the railroad loop and yard have now been developed into private lots and a town street, there are still two railway rights-of-ways—railroad bed road ends now turned into bike & hiking trails to travel the 7.6 miles (12.2 km) trip to the upper terminus and loop at Summit Hill, Pennsylvania. The former Upwards or climbing roadbed connects via a switchback path the steep climb to the Mount Pisgah summit that has a view of the surrounding countryside, especially the Lehigh Valley and the Mauch Chunk-Bear Mountain Gap and the slackwater area above the last canal dam 600 feet (183 m) [2] below, and two hiking-biking trails now depart along the pathways up to Summit Hill, Pennsylvania once the uproad and downroads of the United States' and North America's second railroad, Mauch Chunk Switchback Railway is also located at the base of the mountain.
Mt. Pisgah is named for the biblical mountain in Jordan from which Moses first saw the promised land.
Carbon County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 64,749. The county is part of the Northeast Pennsylvania region of the state.
Jim Thorpe is a borough and the county seat of Carbon County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It is part of Northeastern Pennsylvania. It is historically known as the burial site of Native American sports legend Jim Thorpe.
Summit Hill is a borough in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of Northeastern Pennsylvania. The population was 3,034 at the 2010 census.
This is a list of the earliest railroads in North America, including various railroad-like precursors to the general modern form of a company or government agency operating locomotive-drawn trains on metal tracks.
The Lehigh Canal is a navigable canal that begins at the mouth of Nesquehoning Creek on the Lehigh River in the Lehigh Valley and Northeastern regions of Pennsylvania. It was built in two sections over a span of 20 years beginning in 1818. The lower section spanned the distance between Easton and present-day Jim Thorpe. In Easton, the canal met the Pennsylvania Canal's Delaware Division and Morris Canals, which allowed anthracite coal and other goods to be transported further up the U.S. East Coast. At its height, the Lehigh Canal was 72 miles (116 km) long.
Lehigh Gorge State Park is a 4,548 acres (1,841 ha) Pennsylvania state park in Luzerne and Carbon Counties, Pennsylvania. The park encompasses a gorge, which stretches along the Lehigh River from a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers flood control dam in Luzerne County to Jim Thorpe in Carbon County.
The Mauch Chunk Switchback Railway, also known as the Mauch Chunk and Summit Railroad and occasionally shortened to Mauch Chunk Railway, was a coal-hauling railroad in the mountains of Pennsylvania that was built in 1827 and operated until 1932. It was the second gravity railway constructed in the United States, which was used by the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company to transport coal from Summit Hill downhill to the Lehigh canal.
The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company (LCAN) (1988–2010) was a modern-day anthracite coal mining company headquartered in Pottsville, Pennsylvania. It acquired many properties and relaunched the Lehigh Coal Companies brand in 1988. The LCAN ran strip mining operations in the Panther Creek Valley east of Lansford, Pennsylvania along U.S. Route 209 with vast properties dominating the coal areas of Tamaqua, Coaldale, and Lansford.
The Lehigh Switchback Rail-Trail is a rail trail in Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania.
Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company was a mining and transportation company headquartered in Mauch Chunk, now known as Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania. The company operated from 1818 until its dissolution in 1964 and played an early and influential role in the American Industrial Revolution.
Mauch Chunk Creek is a 9.2-mile-long (14.8 km) tributary of the Lehigh River in Carbon County, Pennsylvania in the United States.
Josiah White (1781–1850) was a Pennsylvania industrialist and key figure in the American Industrial Revolution.
Panther Creek is a west-draining left-bank tributary of the Little Schuylkill River's drainage basin and rises in the vicinity of the east side of Lansford in the plateau-like nearly flat terrain of the complex three-way saddle between Mount Pisgah to its east, Nesquehoning Ridge to the north and Pisgah Ridge to the south, both ridgelines flanking its entire course as it makes its way east-northeast to west-southwest.
Pisgah Mountain, or Pisgah Ridge on older USGS maps, is a ridgeline running 12.5 miles (20.1 km) from Tamaqua to Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania from the Little Schuylkill River water gap to the Lehigh River water gap.
Nesquehoning Mountain or Nesquehoning Ridge is a 15–17-mile-long (24–27 km) coal bearing ridge dividing the waters of Lehigh Valley to the north from the Schuylkill River valley and the several near parallel ridgelines of the Ridge-and-valley Appalachians barrier range all local members of which run generally WSW-ENE in the greater overall area.
East Mauch Chunk is a former independent borough in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, United States. Located along the east bank of the Lehigh River on the opposite bank from the town business district, it was part of Northeastern Pennsylvania.
Mauch Chunk Ridge or Mauch Chunk Mountain is a historically important barrier ridgeline north of the Blue Mountain escarpment and 3rd parallel ridgeline south of the Nesquehoning Creek after Nesquehoning Mountain and Pisgah Ridge in the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians of Northeastern Pennsylvania.
The Hauto Tunnel, dug in 1871–72, was a 1.1-mile-long (1.8 km) single-track railway tunnel crossing under the barrier ridge of Nesquehoning Mountain between Lansford, Pennsylvania, in the Panther Creek Valley and the Central Railroad of New Jersey trackage near the dam of the Hauto Reservoir impoundment about 1.3 miles (2.1 km) above Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania. The tunnel was significant for cutting nearly 15 difficult mountainous miles (24 km) off the trip to the Lehigh Canal terminal or, by rail, to other eastern coal companies, in the era when anthracite was the king of energy fuels.
Lausanne Landing, Pennsylvania was a small settlement at the mouth of Nesquehoning Creek on the Lehigh River. Some historic references will mention the presence of a Landing Tavern as the entirety of the town. Lausanne Township was originally organized out of dense wilderness along an ancient Amerindian Trail, the Warriors' Path, an important regional route as it connected the Susquehanna River settlements of the lower Wyoming Valley to those around Philadelphia.
The Room Run Railroad was an early American gravity railroad with self-acting planes. It was built by the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company to transport coal from the Room Run Mine in Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania to landings at Mauch Chunk on the Lehigh River so it could be shipped on the Lehigh Canal to the Delaware River at Easton, Pennsylvania to markets in Philadelphia or New York City via the Delaware or Morris Canals.