Mauch Chunk, Carbon County, Pennsylvania in the 1840s

Work

Coal sets the rhythm

The town’s work turned on anthracite mining and transport³, with coal moving from Summit Hill, nine miles northwest⁴, down rail lines to the Lehigh. County work also included coal and lumber⁴, not broad-field farming.

Law & power

Company and courthouse

Company power was visible in stone and paperwork: the LC&N Company donated its Old Store at Susquehanna and Broadway¹ for public use. From December 1843, county authority sat there too, in offices below and a courtroom above¹.

What people feared

Fire and flood

Water could wreck the works: 1841 freshets damaged the company’s system² and helped push it into trust for creditors. Fire was just as real, since the courthouse, jail, and business area burned on July 15, 1849¹.

Home & table

Fast-growing, not settled

Mauch Chunk grew from about 1,200 people in 1840⁶ to more than 2,500 by 1849⁵. It still was not a borough for most of the decade; incorporation came on January 26, 1850⁵.

Money

A transport economy

The Lehigh Canal carried value out of town, since coal moved from Mauch Chunk to Easton³ and onward to larger markets. But ordinary prices are harder to pin down: no local wage, rent, or grocery list was found online here.

Who lived here

A new county seat

People here lived in a newly made county: Carbon County was created on March 13, 1843^4,1. The first townships around them included Mauch Chunk, East Penn, the Towamensings, Lausanne, and Penn Forest⁴.

Roads & news

Canal, court, newspaper

News arrived with the traffic of a transport town: the canal linked Mauch Chunk to Easton³, and the new courthouse pulled legal business into the streets. A local paper, the Carbon County Transit, was active enough in 1843 to complain about coal dust and the town’s colliery look.

In the air

County-making and expansion

The local political question at mid-decade was county-making itself, settled when Carbon County was created in 1843^4,1 and Mauch Chunk became the seat. Wider arguments over Texas, Mexico, slavery’s expansion, and Europe’s 1848 revolutions would have reached Pennsylvania readers.

Year by year

1. 1841Freshets badly damaged the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company’s works, forcing repairs and canal-deepening expenses. here²
2. 1842The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company’s property was placed in trust for creditors after the cost of repairs and improvements. here²
3. 1843Carbon County was created from parts of Northampton and Monroe Counties, with Mauch Chunk becoming the county seat. here^4,1
4. 1843The first Carbon County court session met in the converted company store on December 18. here¹
5. 1844The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company began its first important underground mining. nearby³
6. 1846War began between the United States and Mexico, raising questions about territory, patriotism, and slavery’s expansion. the country
7. 1848Revolutions broke out across Europe, news that would have reached Pennsylvania through newspapers and immigrant networks. the world
8. 1849A fire on July 15 destroyed the first courthouse, the jail behind it, and Mauch Chunk’s business area. here¹

Pictures from the time

What the sources say

• Mauch Chunk stood on the west bank of the Lehigh River, about forty-six miles from the river’s mouth. from the sources⁴
• A 1876 county history described early Mauch Chunk as hemmed in by high and steep mountains, with wagon-road access once seeming nearly impossible. from the sources⁴
• Carbon County was created by act of the Pennsylvania Assembly on March 13, 1843, from parts of Northampton and Monroe Counties. from the sources^4,1
• The original Carbon County townships included Mauch Chunk, East Penn, Upper Towamensing, Lower Towamensing, Lausanne, and Penn Forest. from the sources⁴
• Mauch Chunk was still unincorporated during most of the 1840s and was incorporated as a borough on January 26, 1850. from the sources⁵
• In 1843 the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company’s Old Store stood at the northeast corner of Susquehanna Street and Broadway. from the sources¹
• In 1843 the Old Store was repaired and converted into Carbon County’s first courthouse, with county offices on the first floor and a courtroom on the second. from the sources¹
• The first Carbon County court session was held in Mauch Chunk on Monday, December 18, 1843. from the sources¹
• The first courthouse and the jail behind it burned on July 15, 1849, in a fire that laid Mauch Chunk’s business area in ashes. from the sources¹
• The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company was formed in 1820 and incorporated in 1822, and its work centered on anthracite mining and transport. inferred³
• By the late 1820s the company had completed the Lehigh Canal from Mauch Chunk to Easton to move coal toward larger markets. inferred³
• The company laid rails from its mines to the river landing at Mauch Chunk and built the Summit Hill railroad in the late 1820s. inferred³
• Coal at Summit Hill lay about nine miles northwest of Mauch Chunk, on Sharp Mountain. from the sources⁴
• In 1844 the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company began its first important underground mining. inferred³
• A federal census history says the company’s works were badly damaged by 1841 freshets, and repair and canal-deepening costs helped put the property in trust for creditors in 1842. from the sources²
• On June 20, 1843, the Carbon County Transit complained that coal dust gave Mauch Chunk, though miles from the mines, the look of a colliery. inferred
• In 1849, when residents petitioned for borough status, Mauch Chunk’s population had reached more than 2,500. from the sources⁵
• A local history states that Mauch Chunk had about 700 people in 1830 and about 1,200 in 1840. inferred⁶
• Carbon County was roughly twenty miles square, mountainous and wild, and only about one-third of its land was adapted to agriculture. from the sources⁴
• Coal and lumber were described as Carbon County’s principal productions in the nineteenth-century county history. from the sources⁴
• The county’s market outlets were the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company canal and, later, the Lehigh Valley and Lehigh and Susquehanna railroads. from the sources⁴
• No online source found in this quick search gives a street-by-street list of Mauch Chunk churches operating during the 1840s. not known
• No online source found in this quick search gives ordinary Mauch Chunk wages, rents, or grocery prices for the 1840s. not known
• As in Pennsylvania generally before the Civil War, political power in local elections rested mainly with adult white male citizens, not women or most Black residents. inferred
• The 1840s brought national arguments over Texas annexation, the Mexican War, slavery’s expansion, and the 1848 revolutions in Europe into newspapers and political talk across Pennsylvania. inferred

Sources

1. Report on the Agencies of Transportation in the United States, 1880 Census, Chapter 10. U.S. Census Office, 1883
2. Guide to the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company Records. Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of American History, 2016
3. History — Lower Towamensing Township. Lower Towamensing Township
4. Koons' Illustrated History of the Lehigh Valley. Lehigh University Digital Collections
5. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Internet Archive scan
6. Mauch Chunk Switchback Railroad. Rgusrail.com

Mauch Chunk in other decades

Nearby, about the same time