History of anthracite coal mining in Pennsylvania railroad system made transporting the anthracite exponentially easier, and by the 1860s anthracite coal was regularly supplying urban centers like Philadelphia and New York City and was helping to fuel the American Industrial Revolution. Anthracite and bituminous coal were formed in the eastern and western regions of Pennsylvania respectively during the Pennsylvanian time in the Carboniferous Geological Period (“History of Anthracite Coal Mining”). The Pennsylvania Anthracite Region is in the Valley and Ridge Province of the Appalachian Mountains, with the coal located in the folded and faulted terrain of the Province. The anthracite fields are maintained in synclinal basins that
Anthracite February 1808, by Judge Jesse Fell in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on an open grate in a fireplace. Anthracite differs from wood in that it needs a draft from the bottom, and Judge Fell proved with his grate design that it was a viable heating fuel. In spring 1808, John and Abijah Smith shipped the first commercially mined load of anthracite down the Susquehanna River from Plymouth, Pennsylvania, marking the birth of commercial anthracite mining in the United States. From that first mine, production rose to an all-time high of over 100 million tons in 1917. Anthracite usage was inhibited by the