Schuylkill County Fair (Pennsylvania)

August 3, 2011, was a rainy afternoon, but we wanted to visit the Schuylkill County Fair for the first time, so we drove down Rt. 61 to to PA-183 South, to PA-895, then East 1 mile on PA-895 thru Summit Station to the Fairgrounds.

The fair hosts horse shows, truck pulls, tractors displays, choir competitions, agricultural displays, rides, free entertainment, an agriculture museum and more. This year’s entertainment was the British group, “Paul Revere and the Raiders.”

Outside the Schuylkill County Agricultural Museum

We ate some delicious food there; and then on the way back, we stopped for the first time at the Summit View Restaurant & Pub. The restaurant’s views were amazing, and the food was excellent.

I would also recommend you attend the Bloomsburg Fair, to be held Sept. 24, 2011 to Oct. 1, 2011. It is stated this fair is the “…largest agricultural fair in Pennsylvania.” It is just off Rte. 80 in Columbia County. It has great food, ongoing competitions in various areas, craft and photography buildings, agricultural and horticultural displays, and oh, yes, more food! Our favorite was a booth with apple dumplings and ice cream!

While the weather is still warm and a good time to be outside and enjoy your county’s offerings, visit a fair soon. Fairs continue through the summer and into the fall, so I suggest you visit your favorite ones, and also some others in Pennsylvania counties.

Quilters at the Schuylkill County Fair

*www.schuylkillfair.com/
*www.summitviewrestaurant.com/pages/Pictures.php
*visitPA.com/fairs
*www.bloomsburgfair.com/
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Visiting Places of Pennsylvania’s Anthracite Coal Region: Third Installment

Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine & Steam Train

            After visiting the No. 9 Mine in Lansford, Pennsylvania, we wanted to visit the Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine and Steam Train located in Ashland. From PA Rte. 309 N, we followed the winding, two-lane Rte. 54 W through Hometown, Barnesville, Mahanoy City, and other small Pennsylvania towns, of which many were built to provide housing for the anthracite coal miners and their families. As we drove up Ashland’s hill lined with the wood row homes, we saw a small sign for the coal mine, turned left and followed the road up to the stone parking lot. There was a gift shop in which we purchased our tickets for the coal mine tour; and also for a later ride outside the mine, aboard the “Lokie Henry Clay” steam locomotive that once hauled mine cars filled with tons of black “diamonds.” The Gift Shop offers coal-related novelties, books, and a display of mining memorabilia.

We waited outside the mine tunnel entrance for our turn to ride on the mine cars powered by electric motors. As with our tour at the No. 9 Mine, we dressed with jackets and hats as it is just as cold and wet as it was in that mine. The Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine opened in the late 19^th Century and ceased operating in 1931, as electricity decreased the demand for coal.

When it was our turn for the tour, our mine cars clacked and clamored along the tracks inside the mine, as we passed the wet rock walls, scarred by the tools that dug out the coal. When our mine car train stopped, we got out to follow our guide (most of the guides are experienced miners) who described early mining techniques and stories about the miners. They pointed out the shafts that rose above wooden ladders that miners climbed and chiseled away the coal from a vein to drop into the cars below them. As we looked behind us, we also saw an occasional little brown bat flying in and around the tunnel, though in mining times, rats also infested the mines.

After the tour of the mine, we boarded the “John Henry,” that pulled us along the side of the Mahanoy Mountain. We also learned about the later form of coal mining, strip mining that mainly replaced deep hole mining. We saw a typical “bootleg” hole where men dug out coal on their own to sell; and could see the town of Ashland below us. Afterwards, we enjoyed shopping for some unique items in the gift shop. Nearby is a park to which you can walk and have a picnic lunch. We also toured the Pennsylvania Museum of Anthracite Mining, which is located only 100 yards from Pioneer Tunnel.

"Henry Clay" Steam Train

As my grandfather was a WWI veteran and a miner, I gained a little appreciation of the hard work these men did, day in and day out, to make a living. He, like many miners, did develop “black lung,” disease” or coal workers’ pneumoconiosis (CWP) from his exposure to coal mine dust (he was also gassed in WWI battles). There are other coal mining regions in the U. S., but many of Europe’s immigrants who came to this region in the last two centuries, worked these mines and contributed their customs to the area that created the rich heritage it is today for their descendants and visitors to this area.

Plan a trip to coincide with the annual Pioneer Day Celebration held every third Saturday in August to enjoy the fun activities and sample the ethnic foods like haluski, halupi, pierogies, sausage sandwiches and other delicious foods. This year the celebration will be on August 20^th.

Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine and Steam Train, 19^th & Oak Sts., Ashland, PA 17921 www.pioneertunnel.com/

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No. 9 Coal Mine and Museum, Lansford, Pennsylvania

Just four miles from Tamaqua (PA-intersection of Rts. 309 and 209), on the left of Rte. 209, is the No. 9 Coal Mine and Museum located in Lansford, Pennsylvania. Known as the world’s oldest and continuously-operated anthracite coal mine, it opened in 1855 and closed in 1972. In 2002, the mine was re-opened again as part of the anthracite mine heritage tour.

Entering No. 9 Mine

We paid for our tickets and sat on benches, waiting for the previous tour to exit the mine in a train with open yellow, metal cars. When it was our turn, we took our place in one of the coal cars and with a noisy and bump clatter of the train’s cars rolling along the tracks, entered the mine, going some 1600 feet into the mountainside. Once inside, we exited the train’s cars and went on a guided walking tour. Visitors to other mines know to take sweaters in the summer, because inside these coal region mines, temperatures in the cool fifties and the air is damp from the water that constantly drips down the mine’s sides.

Our tour guides were retired miners themselves and shared stories and the history of the mine as we followed along. They showed us the path the mules took to carry the coal and a miner’s hospital carved into the side of the mountain. At one point in the tour, our guides turned off the lights to demonstrate just how dark it would be. They told about mine rats (there is a fake one on a wall) and bats that came down the shafts. You could tell our guides loved their mine and were proud of its history and to be part of it.

No. 9 Mine "Rat"

Afterwards, we visited the mine’s museum filled with tools, hats with oil lamps and other related  items used by miners of anthracite coal. Our granddaughter who was in fourth grade at the time loved the tour and the museum so much that she took brochures to give  to her school principal, so her class might come here on a field trip.

No.9 Mine Museum

Check the web site for tour times and events held here like their Annual Coal Miners Heritage Festival. If you go, bring a sweater and a packed lunch to eat on the outside picnic tables.

www.no.9mine.com

(click on photos for larger view; guest bloggers welcome)

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Visiting Places of Pennsylvania’s Anthracite Coal Region: Eckley Miner’s Village

Pennsylvania’s anthracite coal regions were important sources of our nation’s coal supplies in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; plus it employed many immigrants from Great Britain and Eastern Europe.  Located in the Appalachian Mountains of Northeast Pennsylvania, is Eckley Miner’s Village, a “living”** museum of one of the coal “patches” or coal mining towns that operated in the nineteenth century. Most of the miners were immigrants and they and their families lived in the housing built by the coal companies. These miners and families who lived in Eckley bought most everything they needed to live from the company’s store, making them dependent on the company for just about all their needs.*** In addition to the company store, were churches, schools (though only 2% of miners’ children graduated from high school), and a doctor’s office.                                    **Called “living” as some of the descendants of the original residents still live in houses here.                                                                                                                                ***Remember Tennessee Ernie Ford’s recording, “Sixteen Tons” (“I owe my soul to the company store…”)?

In Eckley and other coal patches around the area, boys as young as seven years of age worked as “breaker boys,” in buildings called Breakers that sorted the coal in types and sizes. These young boys, as well as those miners that were disabled and considered too old to work in or above the mines, picked out dirt and slate out by hand as the coal removed by miners ran down the shutes. New boys were called “Red Tops” because the tips of their hands were raw until they would develop callouses. Coal dust never left any cuts and they would have blue lines in their hands for the rest of their lives. To toughen their fingers and stop any bleeding, they would dip their hands into sulfur or urinate on their cuts.  They could lose fingertips or even hands. They could also fall into the coal coming down because they sat on wooden rails as the coal slid down, stopping it with their boots to pick out the debris. In 1901 it is estimated that 6400 boys under the age of 14 worked in and around the anthracite mines.

Here is a related folk ballad from that time:

DOWN IN THE BOWELS OF THE EARTH”

“I’m a little collier lad                                                                                                            Hardworking all the day,                                                                                                         From early morn ‘til late at night                                                                                                 No time to leave and play.

 Down in the bowels of the earth                                                                                                Where no bright sun rays shine,                                                                                              You’ll find me being at my work                                                                                                      A white slave of the mine.” – Folk Ballad

The 1968 movie, The Molly Maguires, starring Sean Connery, Richard Harris, and Samantha Eggar, was filmed here. The movie studio built a smaller breaker near the original one that burnt down and hid the electrical boxes to re-create what Eckley once looked like.

Strip-mining and new equipment changed the way coal was basically obtained, and residents at Eckley Village went to other jobs. The village was sold and deeded to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in 1971 and is now administered by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission

Before you tour the buildings of Eckley, be sure to view the short film about its history in the visitors’ center auditorium and follow that with the walk through the museum part that includes photos, artifacts and details the everyday life of the village residents. Though, you can walk down the main street on your own, I suggest you call ahead to see when there are guided tours that take you into various buildings and churches. Afterwards, be sure to stop in the Museum Gift Shop (originally the village’s rectory for the Catholic Church) for books about this time in history and other unique items.

http://www.eckleyminers.org/about.html           http://www.eckleyminersvillagemuseum.com/

(Click on photos for larger view. Boomers are welcome to contribute to this blog!)

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Kayaking on Locust Lake State Park & Tuscarora State Park

I am late to the sport of kayaking, but I first tried it several years ago when we had our granddaughter up here in the NE Pennsylvania Mountains for a visit. Having been kayaking on a school camp-out, my granddaughter knew the basics…and more, as I watched her change directions in one swift move.

For the past several years we rented kayaks once at Locust Lake State Park; and twice at Tuscarora State Park, each park is only approximately six miles apart and both located in Schuylkill County. Both parks have camping sites, and thus during the summer season, it is more crowded on the lakes. Locust Lake also has a paved walkway that runs around the lake. Campers of all ages bike, walk, and jog on its path; and swim at its designated area. The park also holds regular nature talks and other presentations.

Both Tuscarora State Park’s lake and Locust Lake were man-made with earthen dams, visible at the ends of each lake. My granddaughter and I preferred kayaking on the Tuscarora Lake as it is larger and not as crowded; but both lakes are excellent for water craft, especially for those learning to kayak.

If you decide to go: Check the age limitations for permitting children to have their own kayak (there are two-person kayaks to rent, as well as other water craft). Wear a hat, apply sunscreen and bring water to drink as it gets hot out on the lake; and of course, always wear flotation devices. I was a Red Cross Swimming Instructor for years; and my granddaughter is an excellent swimmer; but we respect what I call “wild water” – any water that is not a chlorine swimming pool. These lakes ARE VERY deep and too wide for most people to swim across. When you rent any of the boats or other water craft, the staff provides you with whistles to use if you are in trouble.

Check the weather conditions, too, before you go. I like an early morning or later afternoon times to go  and prefer it to be not too windy (no “white caps”,) because it makes it easier and more fun when it is not so hot nor the current so strong that you get exhausted having to paddle against it.

Kayaking is quiet, so much so, that often you can get close to wading birds, turtles basking in the sun, or other wildlife taking drinks along the shore. Bring your camera for those special shots.

For more information:

Tuscarora State Park:

www.stateparks.com/tuscarora_schuylkill.html

 www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/parks/tuscarora.aspx

 Locust Lake State Park:

www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/parks/locustlake.aspx

www.stateparks.com/locust_lake.html

Bird Watching from Lofty Places: Hawk Mountain Sanctuary; Bake Oven Knob

Hawk Mountain Sanctuary http://hawkmountain.org/

Its web site states: “Hawk Mountain is part of the Kittatinny Ridge or Blue Mountain, the prominent, southeastern most Appalachian ridge in the Ridge-and-Valley Province” of Pennsylvania.

Each summer, we have our granddaughter, Sierra, spend a week with us up here in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. Two summers ago we traveled to the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary. We drove there and paid the fee to take one of the trails. Sierra was twelve years old at the time, and enjoys a challenge. She loved hiking the trail so much that she made it to the top in half the time that it took us! Though it was past time for the spring migration of the hawks and other migratory birds, the views were spectacular and worth the visit. Afterwards, we visited the gift shop that has photographs of its history; various nature-related books and gifts (including owl pellets); and a small auditorium for its various educational nature programs that are held there throughout the year.

Wear shoes appropriate for hiking, use insect repellant, and always bring water with you to stay hydrated. No pets are allowed.

Here is a link for additional information: http://hawkmountain.org/index.php?pr=Visiting_Us

Bake Oven Knob

This is also part of the the Blue Mountain ridge, located where Bake Oven Knob Road intersects the Appalachian Trail (the AT passes through Pennsylvania Game Commission parking lots). This is also a popular trail and outlook for migrating birds with a spectacular view. Our granddaughter, now fourteen years old also enjoyed the hike up to the outlook, though it was much shorter than the Hawk Mountain trail.

Unfortunately, because this trail is not monitored by any foundation like Hawk Mountain’s is, there is broken glass and trash all along the trail. When you reach the outlook, it is breathtaking, but the rocks are covered with spray-painted graffiti and inappropriate epithets. Even worse, is that pets are allowed. When we started back down the trail to our car, a young man and woman brought their two (unleashed) dogs with them. One of their dogs, a pit-bull mix, blocked our path down, growling and barking at us. We asked the young man to put a leash on his dog, but he just laughed. I would not recommend you bring young children on this hike due to the broken glass hazard; and-or possible threats by unsupervised dogs or unruly people. Hawk Mountain Sanctuary is not much further in distance and worth the fee to hike and bird watch.

http://www.dvoc.org/Directions/Directions.htm#Bake

View from Hawk Mountain

BOOMERS-TRAVELS

As freelance writer and author, I have been blessed with being able to travel throughout the U. S., parts of Europe and the Caribbean.  As many of my fellow baby boomers are also traveling with friends, and family, I want us to share our journeys to entertain, enlighten, and encourage our readers to do the same. Whether you travel in your own area or to faraway places, remember life is short, so enjoy the fascinating people you will meet and this beautiful world that God has given us.