Hike #1105; Middleport to Landingville

Hike #1105; Middleport to Landingville

2/3/18 Middleport to Landingville with Mr. Buckett (Jim Mathews), Eric Pace, Jennifer Berndt, James Quinn, Captain Soup (David Campbell), John Jason and Honey, Diane Reider, James De Lotto, Jennifer Tull, and John Pershouse

Our next hike would be another point to point in Coal Country, this time the 24th in our 911 Memorial Trail series. The series has been going really great, and after the previous one I was really looking forward to this one.

Delotto's lunch photo

We had a great group which seemed to promise us a good time. The previous hike in the series was very enjoyable the way we did it, and I saw this one as sort of a continuation.

Historic image of Middleport Station

Part of what made it so good was the fact that I took some liberties with the route.
The actual designated route is just along Rt 209. The previous section followed the former Reading Railroad bed, which is just along Rt 209, for seven miles. That was kind of boring, but we got through it. This time, the route just remained on the highway. I wasn’t going to do that. There’s a lot of road walking involved in the northern leg of this trail, and if I were to do all of that through these hikes, it would be awful and I would ruin Metrotrails as an organization.

Former Middleport Station site

Instead, I came up with some parallel routes, some of which would be the future route of the trail, others just immediately parallel with it, which made it a very good hike.
We met in the morning in Landingville at the fire department, and moved our cars adjacent to a small municipal park that had the filled in remains of an old Schuykill Canal lock. We then shuttled in two cars to Middleport where we met up with James Quinn and James DeLotto. This was where we finished the previous hike.

End of the tracks in Middleport

The Philadelphia and Reading Railroad was formed in 1839, and acquired most of the existing lines in the area on it’s way to becoming the first conglomerate, owning both the mines and Port Richmond for coal industry, as well as the rails to transport between.
The section in Tamaqua was the first railroad to ever use steam propulsion. The section between Tamaqua and Middlepot is abandoned, but trackage is still in place, dead ending just at the west side of Middleport. From there, it’s pretty much just used for car storage, which is a lucrative operation.

Former Reading line

Diane told us they get something like $200 a month per car stored on the tracks, which is not bad for a piece of linear property that otherwise doesn’t access any industry.
Middleport is what is referred to as a “mine patch town”. It’s just a little settlement built around coal mining. A simple place miners could live and raise families. The patch towns were never really big. This particular town is on the edge of the Schuykill River, which is still only small creek size at this point. We crossed it three times on the previous hike; it starts in the hills above the town of Tuscarora in a coal mining area.

The Schuykill

We crossed it three more times on this trip as we got on the tracks and headed west from Middleport. It remained small through this length as well, and was fed by various tributaries along the way.
Middleport might have been named for the Schuykill Navigation, because it was between Tamaqua and Port Carbon. Although the canals never reached this far, they were originally intended to travel farther until the advent of the railroad. The lands to the north proved too difficult and not really worth maintaining.
When we left Middleport, the roadside trail section took us for just a short distance. I was trying to figure out where the station used to be, but just couldn’t find it. Probably at the beat up old bus stop site that’s now along 209 where we started.
We then got on the tracks heading to the west. It used to be double tracked, so walking this stretch was really very easy.

As we neared the town of New Philadelphia, some seventy miles northwest of Philadelphia, I spotted a former siding or spur line breaking off to the right. The right of way led to a bridge site with good abutments still in place. It was an interesting spot, because there was still wooden framework in the creek, maybe remnants of the scaffolding that was in place when the bridge was first constructed. This spur line went to coal mines to the north and apparently dead ended. We turned back on the right of way to continue following the main trackage to the west, and passed the middle of town.

New Philadelphia

The town of New Philadelphia is just another patch town associated with the mines. There were a lot of mine tailings and remnants of operations visible in the woods around us walking through. We crossed over Ferndale Road near the middle of town and continued.
New Philadelphia has predominantly been people of both Lithuanian and Irish heritage, which led to disputes in the past. They even formed two separate Catholic churches. Fights continued until church leaders reportedly called on their followers to end the strife and “buy a beer” for their adversaries. I thought of my late buddy Kyle Zalinsky, who is half Irish, half Lituanian. He’d have wanted to go explore more.

We headed back into more woodlands to the west of town, and it looked like the next settlement we’d pass through was called Cumbola. We took a little break next to a scenic pond to the left. Delotto proclaimed it to be beautiful and asked how everyone could just walk past it so easily. While stopped, we laughed at the “Cumbola Good Will Hose” being the most prominent thing coming up on the map in the next settlement.

Cumbola

The town of Cumbola apparently takes it’s name from Cumburla Township in Wales. This similar old mine patch town must have had predominantly English ancestors.
The view we got of the town was across Timothy Freed Park on the east side, set up on a flood plain of the Schuykill.
Just after, we went back into more woods, and a former spur line was visible breaking off to the left. I was surprised to see that one rail, the one closer to the bank was still in place. It looked as though it was because some of the hillside had collapsed. Further, both rails were still in place.

Old tracks

When the area widened to a more obvious industrial site, with some ruins and such. John and I went up to have a look around. There were footings for structures, and one basement type area that I could get inside of. There was a tributary coming down the hill which obviously was runoff from a mine. It had a bright orange hue, maybe brighter than any acid mine runoff site I’d ever seen before, cascading down the hill. We climbed further up from the tracks to find a private house beyond the top, and what we assume to be the mine itself in a fenced off but open area. We didn’t try to go much further.

Acid mine runoff

We passed another coal mining area to the right after some woods, crossed a road, and then started to more closely parallel Rt 209. Except for the prospect of seeing the little mine patch towns more closely along the way, I was so glad that we were not walking this long stretch of highway with no shoulder. I really hope as we continue with this series that there are no long road walks that we can’t find ways around like this.
We walked further, and the settlement of Palo Alto began to appear to the left. The larger settlement of Port Carbon was off to the right of us, and we soon passed some industry. The first was still in operation, at a crossing, but the second was abandoned across the Schuykill.

Abandoned tee shirt factory

Palo Alto is another patch town, which means “high hill”. Port Carbon was the more noteworthy, earlier settlement.
The first settlers date back to the earliest days of the 1800s, who erected saw mills and log homes. Although the area was already inhabited, the credit with founding the town is given to Abraham Pott, son of John Pott who founded Pottsville. He set up another sawmill and some tenement homes, as well as laid out the main streets of the town.
Anthracite coal is claimed to have been found in the late 1700s in the area, the same as Philip Ginder had done in Summit Hill in 1791, and each story has the same ending, with the hopeful businessmen failing to sell their product.

1867 engraving of Schuykill Canal at Port Carbon

In 1827 the Schuykill Canal was extended to Port Carbon. As early as 1822, downstream navigation on flat boats was used to haul coal from the mines down stream, but that was a clumsy process. The canal extended to the confluence of the Schuykill River and Mill Creek.

1890 view of Port Carbon with the canal

Wharves were built all along the canal, and the first lock was somewhere just to the west of the Mill Creek confluence. Working with the canal, Abraham Pott also developed the first railroad in 1827, which used strap rail for a half mile between the mines and the wharves.

The days of the canal were short lived. Even by 1850, the basin at Port Carbon was nearly abandoned because maintenance was too much a burden. Debris from up stream would constantly plague it, and so loading areas were used from the Palo Alto side.
Even this development was rather short lived. The entire Schuykill Canal system was abandoned from Schuykill Haven north in 1870 because the damage could not be kept up with. The railroads were quickly established, and the Mill Creek Railroad, later part of the Reading, opened to St. Clair in 1846 further opening up the arteries of coal.
The canal was filled in from Port Carbon to Pottsville slowly over time, with a lot of it being done in the 1950s. I watched closely for any clues of it’s existence, but there wasn’t much.

Crossing

Everyone in the group was getting hungry, and it looked like Port Carbon was the best choice to stop, because it was around lunch time. There was a bridge over the river for Coal Street but that was a ways up, so most of the group went over to cross the railroad bridge (there are actually two at a wye for east and westbound connections). Captain Soup, James, and I headed to an undecked old bridge that carries some sort of pipe over the Schuykill. Directly on the other side, we turned to the right under the Coal Street bridge.

abandoned

I wanted to see the industrial ruins and let the others know I would catch up with them in town. I asked Delotto to find a spot for us to eat lunch, while we reached the back and entered the building.
It was pretty beat up inside, with the part closer to the river being the worst. There were giant containers lining walls, and I figured it was some kind of paint factory or something. Diane let us know after we got out that I wasn’t too far off: it was a tee shirt factory, and that was where pigments and dyes were made for them.

abandoned

The back portion of the building was mostly in better shape, but it showed evidence of some fire damage. It looked like a bit of the structure was being used for storage, but some parts of it had pipes and such falling from the ceiling.
We continued through, and Jen appeared from behind us. She found her way away from the group and in the way we had come, and we all headed to the opposite side of the building to find a way out. All of those doors were locked, so we were forced to go to the back anyway.

When we got out and made our way into a residential lot to the north, the others were all along the main street apparently waiting for us. We headed into town, and then came across Brody’s Bar on the left. It looked like a good location, so we headed in for lunch.
It was kind of a long break, but no one seemed to mind, and everyone liked hanging out. I had some really delicious quasadillas. There was only one person preparing the food, so it took quite a bit longer than I’d have liked it to, but I suppose it was only about an hour behind it put us.
We made our way back through town, and crossed the Coal Street bridge back over to the Palo Alto side, then climbed steeply down the slope to get back to the former Reading Railroad tracks. Once there, I wanted to have a closer look at the bridges from the former Mill Creek Junction, and see if I could find any remnants of the Schuykill Canal. John seemed to know a bit about the canal, as did Diane, but I don’t think any of us really had an exact idea of what we were looking for or where. I assumed that the canal in this area was actually canalized river. I’m still not totally sure.

Historic 1950s image of the former Schuykill Canal and wharves

The railroad bridges in place today would have been the same ones when the historic 1950s photo of the remnants of the wharves was taken, so I may have figured out the layout.

Schuykill River, possible canal at Port Carbon

Once on the other side of the bridge, we simply turned back on the other bridge that connected to the westbound line. That was where we were provided with the views. I had seen a 1986 photo Greg Pawelewski had posted on a then and now thing, and took my own of the same from the site. This railroad was at one time abandoned.

1940s image of the Mill Creek junction area

It had been re-opened apparently in order to reach a brewery.
Off to the down stream side of teh bridge, I could see substantial masonry ruins along the edge of the river. I figured this must have had something to do with the canal, and seems to play well with the historic photo from the site.
Once on the other side of the bridge again, I decided we would try to trace where the canal was, or maybe where the towpath was or something, along the Schuykill River down stream. When the canal was first built in this area, it was built without a towpath, and canal captains were forced to pole their way into town. A rather haphazard operation!

1986 photo from Greg Pawelewski's collection with tracks gone

We continued walking downs stream, and I hoped to find remnants of a lock or something. We did find plenty more masonry ruins, but nothing I could really identify.

The same site today

The path along the river was pretty good for a while. I spotted what might have been remnants of a dam across the river a bit further down stream.

Former canal remnant?

The path got a bit more rough from that point. We had to follow a slope more closely, which could be difficult at times. Eventually, we chose to head up hill a bit more. The canal and the river must have been one at this point.
At the top of the hill, it appeared to be like an old railroad yard. All black cinder dirt base, but clear ATV paths we were able to follow to the west without getting on the active tracks. I even spotted some rails protruding from the surface dirt at a couple of locations. We followed this for a while.

Old tower

We passed an old Reading Railroad signal tower along the way, which looked similar to ones I’d seen further to the east and south in Lehigh Valley.
We eventually moved to closer to teh river again. Some of what we followed might have been filled in canal. We crossed a sort of overgrown former parking lot, and passed a couple of old truss bridges, which I think were for water lines or something, but I’m not sure. We had to regroup in this area because some of the others were having a tough time getting up to the rail yard.

Old bridge

We took a little break when we got to Collins Street, which was an interesting metal framework bridge over the Schuykill and the former canal, which is obviously filled through his area.
In the area up ahead, there was construction going on for Rt 61. Diane said she recalled when she was little that there used to be a tunnel for the road to go through there, but that it had been blasted away. It was in that area we would be switching from following the Reading Railroad line to the former Pennsyvania Railroad.

Collins Street bridge

We moved ahead along the tracks for just a bit further, and when we got to the road underpass, there was an abandoned tunnel beneath off to the left, with some rails still in it. Construction had removed the section to where it connected to the main former Reading line.
We waited at this point for the group to catch up; some of them were hanging around over by the Collins Street Bridge climbing around or something. I started going on through the tunnel ahead of everyone to get some photograps. It was a sort of long box shaped thing.

Big culvert

Once everyone was caught up, we passed through the thing and continued on the abandoned tracks heading to the south. This was apparently a siding for a sewerage treatment plant or something. I’m not totally sure. It might have once been a connection for the Pennsylvania Railroad, which went over top of this.
Not too long after coming out the other side and fighting through some weeds, we turned to the left and began climbing the slope up to the former Pennsylvania Railroad bed.

Culvert

We had to find a good spot that we wouldn’t slip too much, and there was a lot of stone wall along the way, so it had to be a place without a vertical climb.
We waited at the top for everyone to catch up, then continued on the rail bed heading to the south.
It was a bit overgrown, but then it started to open up into a wide scrap yard.
The redevelopment of adjacent Rt 61 had overtaken the railroad bed in this area, and so rather than go down into the scrap yard, we had to climb up again to the highway level.

View into the gap

Once on the highway, we had to walk it to the south for just a little bit to the intersection with Tumbling Run Road, just south of Pottsville.
We didn’t really see any of Potsville on this trip. The route we took kept us mostly to the south of town, and we had no real experience with it. Hopefully one day we’ll head back and visit the Youngling Brewery there, but for this trip the rail beds were all sort of bypassing it.
The rail bed became obvious again when we got below Tumbling Run, and it was no longer overtaken by the highway. Although our maps didn’t show it, this section was already developed as a section of the Schuykill River Trail.

Ice along the trail

Maps didn’t show it as completed, but it was very nicely done. We started following it from near a parking area to the south, on a high shelf in an area known as Mt. Carbon. We made some really good time in this section because it was so pleasant and easy.
I started asking Mr. Buckett ridiculous scenarios which helped to make the time go by even faster. Rt 61 was always pretty close, but we were at the right elevation that it was still far more enjoyable than the section of trail along side of Rt 209 back in Middleport.

Trail section

The ice formations on the cliffs along the trail were outstanding. We could also see across the valley to the “Indian Head” on a rock on the other side. The rock is painted I think red and white to look like a Native American’s face.
The route continued as a good trail until we got to a former bridge site at 7 Stars Road. There, we had to carefully climb down, and then head up the other side onto a non-trail section of the right of way. It really wasn’t that much different because it was still easy walking, just with more grasses growing.

Pennsylvania RR bed

When we came to an exit off of Rt 61, the right of way became somewhat obliterated, so we had to bushwhack slightly up to 7 Stars Road to parallel it on the left. Walking along 61 wouldn’t have been nice.
Right where we got off the highway, there was a really nice old stone hotel type of building. This was clearly the older main highway route. We continued along it to the south, and could kind of see the remnants of the railroad bed either in people’s back yards or as non clear grades between us and 61.

Pennsylvania RR bed nearing Schuykill Haven

We continued past 2nd Mountain Road, passed some kind of “Cotton Club” that was advertising Seven Up, and then passed the entrance to the Cressona Mall.
The settlement of Cressona is named for Philadelphia Civil Engineer John Chapman Cresson. Cresson was manager of the Schuykill Navigation Company (the canal), as well as President of the Mine Hill and Schuykill Haven Railroad. He was also the Cheif Engineer of the great Fairmount Park in Philadelpha, the world’s largest city park. The town itself was pretty much just a patch town and a suburb of the much larger Schuykill Haven.

Schuykill Canal at Pottsville

Where we had last seen the remnants of the Schuykill Canal was on the east side of Pottsville. From there, it remained along the river, which we were further away from, heading to the south. I tried to watch for remnants from the rail bed to no avail. The only remnant of anything was an apparent former rail bridge crossing site. The former Reading Railroad on the opposite side of the Schuykill is still active.

Schuykill Haven was once the northern end of navigation on the canal as well. When it was truncated in 1870, this was the end of navigation for a while.

Schuykill Canal, Port Carbon

I believe the canal was parallel with present day Lilly Street to Dock Street.
We remained on the Pennsylvania Railroad, or as close as we could to it. From the intersection with the entrance to Cressona Mall, the rail bed was discernible once more, so we got back on it and headed south.

Schuykill Canal near Broadway Bridge

We followed it for a bit to where there were typical Pennsylvania Railroad railings, and then an old bridge site that had been removed. We had to climb down the slope to where 7 Stars Road used to come out to Rt 61 again. 7 Stars was the name of a settlement of land early on.

Schuykill Canal in Schuykill Haven. Broadway Bridge, 1878.

Only one bridge abutment remained at the site, and we had to go down and around. The Schuykill River was closer here, and it was apparently the site of Locks #10 and 11 on the canal. Most all of that is apparently obliterated by Rt 61.

Schuykill Canal in Schuykill Haven

The railroad bed became more discernible above us beyond where it went by a private house, but it’d have been tough to get back up on it. We headed up on the road to where a parking lot apparently had been put over some of it, as well as a jughandle for a highway exit.

Connor's Crossing Trestle

I didn’t know it at the time, but where we crossed 7 Stars Road, where the road is dead ended today at 61, the Lehigh Valley Railroad used to go over head on an enormous trestle.

Construction of Connor's Crossing trestle

I was watching a right of way over head of us, thinking it was the Pennsylvania Railroad, but it was not. I hadn’t consulted a good enough map to show the Lehigh Valley line coming in, but I almost led us out to cross the Penn State Campus thinking that was the way.

Connors Crossing trestle

That was the way the Lehigh Valley line went. It’s kind of easy to get confused if not constantly consulting maps on these areas. The old Lehigh Valley line is just another of many I have to try to trace through this area on a future trip.

Historic image of the station

We had to walk through the parking lots of stores and such heading to the east for a bit, because it had overtaken the railroad bed. The canal went over a swath of land a bit to the south of there. I believe this area must have been where the station was. If not where the stores are, just a little bit further to the east because the slope seems right.

Map detailing Schuykill Canal and more

We stopped in a little mini mart for snacks and to take a short break. I was able to use this time to figure out exactly where the Pennsylvania Railroad went from here.

Old PA RR arch

Where the crossing used to be in town, there was once a handsome stone arch. It was removed in favor of a more typical metal bridge, but that too is long gone now.

Old crossing in Schuykill Haven

The development at the site today makes it pretty hard to tell exactly where we needed to be. We had to head south from Center Ave toward Dock Street and Haven Street.

The rail bed behind the high school

The railroad was obliterated where buildings are now, but some contours of the land can still be seen to show us the way. We made our way to where a path went into the woods and the railroad bed was more or less intact heading to behind the Schuykill Haven high school. It was a bit washed out, and we spotted what was probably some kind of siding right of way as well. The section was a very pleasant and enjoyable walk, but Mr. Buckett and Eric fell behind us when we ran across the highway earlier. Pershouse and Honey walked ahead, but didn’t know where “ahead” was for us, so they had gone the wrong way.

PA Railroad cut

Near the end of the high school property, there was a cut with a sewer line or something placed in it. We took a path to the left, which took us out in a large parking lot we could cross to get to the former bridge site at Main Street. The cut the railroad went through on the other side of the road where the bridge site was filled was dramatic. It was one of the deepest railroad cuts I’ve seen. I’d imagine they would have tunneled it if the rock was harder. The fact that this was a single track area made it seem that much narrower.
We directed Pershouse and Honey to the right of way, and Mr. Buckett and Eric found their way to them, so they soon caught up and we were on our way.

PA RR cut

I at first considered following above the railroad cut to the left, but that looked like it turned to bad private land too soon and we might get stuck. On the south side, there was a church property along the cut, and I felt more welcome with God, so we went that way.

PA RR east of Schuykill Haven

We paralleled the deep cut, followed above in the church parking lot and then through woods on the other side gradually down hill to the level of the railroad. I backtracked into the cut, because I just had to experience walking through it. In retrospect, we all should have descended from the road crossing into the cut and walked it’s entire length. Only the first section of it had trash and debris in it, and it wouldn’t have been that hard to navigate. The section to the east of the cut would be much worse.

The rail bed approaching the house in the cut

Once we were beyond the cut, we went directly onto a high fill. It was fine at first walking on it, and we passed over Memorial Drive which utilizes a culvert below, but just past that it got pretty badly overgrown. It was probably the toughest part of the entire hike, between the church and Adamsdale Road.
There were stretches that got pretty easy, but a lot of it was bad. We remained on the grade until we got to where a house had been built right into the cut, utilizing it for the basement. I didn’t want to intrude there, although we likely could have walked right on through because it didn’t look like anyone was living there.
We instead bushwhacked steeply down the grade to Adamsdale Road to follow it east.

Briar Road culvert

Once everyone was safely down, which was a bit of a time consuming process, we followed Adamsdale Road to the east. We passed a lovely old log cabin that’s now a restaurant called the Nutty Pear, and continued parallel with the old railroad. There was a good old culvert still in placed to carry it over Briar Road we could see from the intersection. We didn’t try to get back on it because aerial images show someone has their swimming pool in it just ahead. We kept to the road past a couple of stately old farm houses and it opened up to fields.

Where Pennsylvania Railroad crossed. Barely discernible.

I walked right by where the railroad used to come across the road at first. The site has a line of trees on the left, but to the right it is only a couple of little trees, and a slight ditch in the middle of a field. I held up here to get our group shot, since it was getting dark and we were pretty close to the end.
We followed Adamsdale Road to a right on Greenview Road. We eventually got to where the tracks had crossed, and it’s a trail on the opposite side. This would be where we’d turn on the next hike in this series, but we had to continue straight on the road to get into Landingville. The section after this one is much more trail than what we had on this hike, but this one was not bad at all.

Canal lock in Schuykill Haven

The areas we passed through still have so much more to see. It’s mind boggling, so I’ll have to go back on countless more trips to explore it all, one of these days.
I’ll never get to it all, and that’s one of the tormentors I’ll always have to deal with. Just have to keep trying and see how far we get.