Pittston, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania in the 1880s

Work

Coal sets the day

The strongest fact about work is scale: Pittston was the seat of Pennsylvania Coal Company operations², and its coal shipments were counted in millions of tons. Around that sat knitting, foundry, planing, pottery, gas, water, and stove works², but coal and rail freight dominated the town’s rhythm.

Who lived here

Immigration changes the borough

The older Yankee settlement was being remade because coal brought an influx of European nationalities¹. Local history names Scotch, Welsh, English, Irish, and German residents¹, while the wider county was drawing tens of thousands of European newcomers to the coal fields.

Faith

Many churches, many calendars

By 1879 Pittston had twelve churches², enough for denominational difference to structure Sundays, schooling, marriages, burials, and neighborhood loyalties. The sources opened do not list all twelve congregations for the 1880s, so their exact names are left out here.

Law & power

Companies and borough officers

Power was partly municipal and partly industrial: Pittston was still a borough⁷, while the Pennsylvania Coal Company operated a large proportion of the collieries around Pittston¹. Borough officers governed streets and policing, but wages, housing near mines, and working risk depended heavily on employers.

What people feared

Work underground is dangerous

The most ordinary danger was occupational: as across the anthracite counties, mine work exposed men and boys to falls, explosions, flooding, fires, machinery, and bad air. One nearby older Butler working even had abandoned coal and pillars burning¹, though the opened source says the company continued below the fire.

Home & table

Crowded growth, few interiors

The borough grew from 7,472 people in 1880 to 10,302 in 1890^4,5, so streets, boarding places, and family houses had to absorb rapid change. No opened source gives reliable room layouts or building materials for ordinary miners’ houses in this decade.

Money

Banks, but missing prices

Money was visible in institutions: Pittston had three banks with $900,000 aggregate capital². Yet the opened sources do not give ordinary Pittston rents, grocery prices, or miner wages for the 1880s.

Roads & news

Papers, bridges, railroads

News arrived by print and rail: the Pittston Gazette and Evening Gazette³ were available in the decade. Travel outward was easy for the period because Pittston stood on three railroads² and had two bridges to West Pittston².

Year by year

1. 1880Pittston borough counted 7,472 people in the federal census. here^4,5
2. 1881A Pittston freight station on the south side of Water Street was built or replaced. here⁸
3. 1882The Evening Gazette appeared in Pittston, adding a daily or evening newspaper presence to the town’s print life. here³
4. 1886A combination railroad station was built at Broad and Law Streets in Pittston. here⁸
5. 1886The Haymarket bombing and trial in Chicago made labor radicalism and public order national subjects of argument. the country
6. 1888The Great Blizzard of March 1888 paralyzed rail and telegraph lines across the Northeast and would have been read about in anthracite Pennsylvania. the country
7. 1889The Johnstown Flood killed thousands in Pennsylvania and became a statewide disaster story. nearby
8. 1890Pittston borough’s population reached 10,302 in the federal census. here^4,5

Pictures from the time

What the sources say

• Pittston was a borough in Luzerne County in the 1880s; it did not become a city until 1894. inferred⁷
• A 1879 reference placed Pittston on the east bank of the Susquehanna River, just below the mouth of the Lackawanna River. from the sources²
• The same 1879 reference put Pittston on the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg, Lehigh and Susquehanna, and Lehigh Valley railroads. from the sources²
• In 1879 Pittston was described as the seat of the Pennsylvania Coal Company’s operations, with coal shipments of 2,500,000 to 3,000,000 tons a year. from the sources²
• The Pennsylvania Coal Company operated a large proportion of the collieries around Pittston in the early 1880s. from the sources¹
• Coal companies named around Pittston in an 1880 county history included the Lehigh Valley Coal Company, Pittston Coal Company, Grove Brothers at the Columbia mine, Phoenix Coal Company, Tompkins colliery, and Butler Coal Company. from the sources¹
• Pittston Coal Company, organized in 1875, operated the Seneca slope, the Ravine shaft, and the Twins. from the sources¹
• By 1879 Pittston had two bridges to West Pittston, a street railroad, an opera house, three banks with $900,000 aggregate capital, good schools, two weekly newspapers, a public library, and twelve churches. from the sources²
• Manufacturing named in Pittston in 1879 included a knitting mill, foundry and machine shop, two planing mills, pottery and terra-cotta works, gas works, water works, and extensive stove works. from the sources²
• A county history said Pittston’s Yankee population had predominated for about sixty years, but coal brought an influx of European nationalities. from the sources¹
• The same county history named Scotch, Welsh, English, Irish, and German residents in Pittston’s nineteenth-century coal-era population. from the sources¹
• Luzerne County history says that from 1870 to 1915 as many as 100,000 European immigrants ended up in Luzerne County coal fields. from the sources⁶
• Pittston had a Pittston Gazette run in the 1880s, and the Evening Gazette is listed for 1882 and 1883–1889 as the Pittston Evening Gazette. from the sources³
• The 1880 federal census reported Pittston borough with 7,472 people, and the 1890 census reported 10,302. from the sources^4,5
• Before later grading, a deep ravine crossed Main Street near the Pennsylvania Coal Company office; by the county history’s account, it had become a paved street with substantial buildings. from the sources¹
• The Pittston and Wilkes-Barre plank road, built in 1851, crossed a ravine by a large trestle near Patterson’s lumber yard before grading replaced the trestle. from the sources¹
• A two-story wooden depot stood on the south side of Water Street in the 1880s, and its freight station was built or replaced in 1881. from the sources⁸
• A combination station at Broad and Law Streets was built in 1886. from the sources⁸
• A joint Lehigh Valley and Delaware, Lackawanna & Western passenger station at Pittston Junction had been built in 1868 and served Upper Pittston near Main and Union Streets. from the sources⁸
• As across the anthracite counties, mine work exposed men and boys to falls of roof, explosions, flooding, fires, machinery, and black damp, though a Pittston accident list for the 1880s was not opened here. inferred
• Pennsylvania borough government in the 1880s centered on elected local officers such as burgess, councilmen, justices, and constables; adult male citizenship and property-tax rules shaped voting before later reforms. inferred
• No online source opened here gave ordinary Pittston household rents, grocery prices, or miner wages specifically for the 1880s. not known
• No detailed online description found here fixes the materials, size, or room layout of ordinary Pittston miners’ houses in the 1880s. not known

Sources

1. History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming Counties, Pa., Part 99. W. W. Munsell & Co.; transcribed at LDS Genealogy, 1880
2. The American Cyclopædia: Pittston. D. Appleton and Company; Wikisource transcription, 1879
3. Newspapers by County: Luzerne County. State Library of Pennsylvania
4. 1880 Census: Statistics of the Population of the United States. United States Census Office, 1880
5. Report on Population of the United States at the Eleventh Census: 1890. United States Census Office, 1890
6. History of Luzerne County. Luzerne County, Pennsylvania
7. Pittston City: History, Culture and a Reputation. City of Pittston
8. Luzerne County Pennsylvania Railroad Stations. West2K

Pittston in other decades

Nearby, about the same time