Lehigh Canal
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 Delaware 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 long. Although the canal was used to transport a variety of products, its most significant cargo was anthracite coal, the highest quality energy source then available in the United States, and pig iron, a vital input product used in manufacturing steel. Both proved cornerstones of the Lehigh Valley's ascent as a central hub of the American Industrial Revolution, and their mining and transportation defined the rugged blue collar character of the Lehigh Valley towns that surrounded the canal. The route initially consisted of canals and dammed-off sections of the Lehigh River. Boatmen had to navigate barges periodically from the canal through a lock onto the river or vice versa. This design saved time and money and made the canal functional while it was being built, although it made for a slower, more difficult trip for canal-boat captains. History Early history The Lehigh Coal Mine Company (LCMC) was founded in 1792, a few months after anthracite was discovered at Sharp Mountain (a peak of the Pisgah Ridge near present-day Summit Hill, Pennsylvania); Its principals secured rights to over before the Lehigh Canal was built. The company found it fairly easy to find and mine coal from a pit on the mountainside. The coal had to be loaded into sacks and then onto pack animals, which carried the coal at least to the Lehigh shore. Disposable skiffs known as arks were built from local timber, which were manned along the lower Lehigh River rapids. Despite many politically connected stockholders and officers, the operation was unsupervised by upper management. With no officer willing to manage from the field, the LCMC hired contractors or sent out teams, which was only sporadically successful in getting coal to Philadelphia. Firewood and charcoal were expensive and hard to find in the eastern U.S. by the War of 1812. Before the war, the LCMC's record of getting coal to market was so dismal that coal imported from England was cheaper and more readily available. The War of 1812 gave the company an incentive to send another expedition by independent contractors in 1813. After a year, they had built five boats but brought only two to market. This resulted in another financial loss for the company and proved the last straw for many of the company's backers, who were unwilling to fund more expeditions. The Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company, its founder Josiah White and White's protégé and partner Erskine Hazard (operations managers into the mid-1860s) established a reputation for innovation.