First School Slate Factory
Slatington, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
The first factory to produce blackboard and school slates common in U.S. classrooms opened nearby in 1847. Slate production peaked at over one million pieces early in the 20th century, leading to Slatington's distinction as the nation's top slate and blackboard producer.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
In 1847 a small factory near this spot in the Lehigh Valley began turning locally quarried slate into the blackboards and writing slates that would become fixtures of the American classroom. The trade boomed alongside the nation's expanding public schools, and by the early 20th century Slatington's works were churning out more than a million pieces a year, crowning the borough as the country's leading producer of slate and blackboards.
Why it matters
The humble school slate literally furnished the rooms where generations of Americans learned to read and write, and this valley's quarries supplied the tools of that mass education.
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Nearby & related markers
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Trucker's Mill
Slatington, PA · est. 1952
A sawmill standing here before 1755 turned the forests of the Lehigh Valley into lumber for a growing frontier. When the French and Indian War set the backcountry ablaze, the sturdy mill — also called Kern's Fort — became a defensive station and shelter for troops. Sitting at the crossing of two pioneer roads, it commanded a position of real military value in a dangerous borderland.
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The region around Slatington grew into one of the largest slate-producing centers in the United States after Welsh entrepreneur William Roberts spotted slate near a local barn in 1844. He and fellow Welsh immigrants opened a cluster of quarries, including the vast "Big Franklin" and the "Williams" quarry famous for making school slates. Their work helped fuel the popularity of slate roofing across America in the later 19th century.