Centralia and the underground mine fire
Couple weeks ago Darrel, Sam, Jeremy, and I set out on a Sunday roadtrip to the Anthracite coal mining region of Pennsylvania about two hours to the east.
We traveled by old two lane highways through valleys, over mountains, and across rivers.
We drove through a dozen old coal-mining towns that were unlike any places I've seen before. Places like Shenendoah (pronounced "Shen-doh"), Mt. Vernon, Ashland, and Shamokin. These are little towns in the mountains but they are very urban. They boast dense street grids and 3- and 4-floor buildings. They resemble parts of dense cities like San Francisco and New York. They also boast a distinctively ethnic feel, with many churches and synagogues pointing to the Eastern European roots of these communities - Slovakian, Slovenian, Ukranian, Greek, Russian, Lithuanian. Unfortunately the towns aren't doing so hot these days. The coal mines are all but shut down. And the mines of yesteryear have left their sad, black mark upon the hillslopes surrounding these towns.
Our ultimate destination, however, was the town of Centralia. Or "ghost town", is more like it. In the 1960s the mine seam underneath Centralia caught on fire, and it is still burning today and will continue to do so for another 150 years. The town was finally evacuated in the 1980s once they realized what a health hazard it was (with the carbon monoxide pouring out of the ground and the whole town prone to collapse in on itself at any moment). A few holdouts still remain, though. And visitors can still take a look around, as we did. We saw the smoke rising out of the ground. We saw where the old highway was closed down (and a new bypass built around it) because it was totally buckled up from the heat.
We traveled by old two lane highways through valleys, over mountains, and across rivers.
We drove through a dozen old coal-mining towns that were unlike any places I've seen before. Places like Shenendoah (pronounced "Shen-doh"), Mt. Vernon, Ashland, and Shamokin. These are little towns in the mountains but they are very urban. They boast dense street grids and 3- and 4-floor buildings. They resemble parts of dense cities like San Francisco and New York. They also boast a distinctively ethnic feel, with many churches and synagogues pointing to the Eastern European roots of these communities - Slovakian, Slovenian, Ukranian, Greek, Russian, Lithuanian. Unfortunately the towns aren't doing so hot these days. The coal mines are all but shut down. And the mines of yesteryear have left their sad, black mark upon the hillslopes surrounding these towns.
Our ultimate destination, however, was the town of Centralia. Or "ghost town", is more like it. In the 1960s the mine seam underneath Centralia caught on fire, and it is still burning today and will continue to do so for another 150 years. The town was finally evacuated in the 1980s once they realized what a health hazard it was (with the carbon monoxide pouring out of the ground and the whole town prone to collapse in on itself at any moment). A few holdouts still remain, though. And visitors can still take a look around, as we did. We saw the smoke rising out of the ground. We saw where the old highway was closed down (and a new bypass built around it) because it was totally buckled up from the heat.
posted by Matthew Hartzell at 11:37 AM
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