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Monday, September 27th, 2010

We Didn’t Start the Fire….

This week’s focus was on the socio-economic effects on the watershed. Coal mining and logging have been the historic socio-economic boom and busts of the area, and now Marcellus Shale is looking like it will be the next commodity to take the same course. This week has been full of field trips to Centralia, Pioneer Coal Mine and the Lumber Museum in Galeton, Pa. This was my second trip to Centralia and the Pioneer Coal Mine, but it wasn’t any easier emotionally to walk through Centralia. Centralia has had a coal fire burning beneath the town since the 60s. Slowly […]

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Monday, September 27th, 2010

…burning since the world’s been turning: mine fires and coal in Central Pennsylvania

There is no other state I know with such a wide-spread affinity for burning things as is found in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. But on May 27, 1962, instead of simply burning up trash and debris in the Centralia town dump,  several firefighters accidentally set the ground beneath their feet on fire. The fire escaped from the surface, into a seam of anthracite coal, the very resource that established both town of Centralia all the towns all across the Hard Coal region of Pennsylvania. The fire burns on, decades later, as proved by the steam and smoke still escaping from […]

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