The Lehigh Canal
Glendon, Northampton County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
This canal's 47 miles from Mauch Chunk to Easton were constructed 1827-1829. Here the Lehigh Canal connected with the Delaware Canal to Philadelphia, and with the Morris Canal to New York. Vital to the transport of anthracite coal and to the rise of the anthracite iron industry, the Lehigh Canal was in full operation until 1932, and in partial operation 10 years longer. This section was fully restored, 1976.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
Dug between 1827 and 1829, the Lehigh Canal ran 47 miles from Mauch Chunk to Easton, where it met the Delaware Canal to Philadelphia and the Morris Canal to New York. It was a vital artery for hauling anthracite coal out of Pennsylvania's hard-coal region, fueling the rise of the anthracite iron industry that powered the young nation's growth. The canal ran in full operation until 1932, and this restored section reopened in 1976.
Why it matters
The Lehigh Canal helped launch America's industrial economy by moving the anthracite coal that heated cities and fired the furnaces of early heavy industry.
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Nearby & related markers
Delaware Canal
Williams Township, PA · est. 1949
Just below the highway runs the channel of the Delaware Canal, the towpath waterway that once carried anthracite coal and freight along the Delaware River. Here stand Locks No. 22 and 23, the final lift locks in the 60-mile run from Bristol up to the Lehigh River at Easton. In the canal era, such locks stepped boats up and down the changing elevations, letting mule-drawn barges move heavy cargo before the railroads took over.
Pennsylvania Canal
Williams Township, PA · est. 1949
The Pennsylvania Canal was an ambitious system of state-built public works meant to bind Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Lake Erie together with water. Its Delaware Division, running from Bristol to Easton, was begun in 1827 and operated by the state from 1831 to 1858 before passing to private owners who ran it until 1931. In 1940 the corridor was preserved as a state park, saving a rare working relic of the internal-improvements era.
Delaware Canal
Durham Township, PA · est. 1949
Here at Lock No. 21, one of twenty-three lift locks numbered from Bristol to Easton, the Delaware Canal carried boats over Cooks Creek by aqueduct. The nine aqueducts along the route floated both water and freight across the streams feeding the Delaware River. In the canal's heyday, mule teams plodded the towpath hauling coal and goods through this quiet stretch of Bucks County.
Robert H. Sayre
Bethlehem, PA · est. 1993
In the decades after the Civil War, Bethlehem was reshaped by the twin engines of railroading and iron, and Robert H. Sayre stood at the center of both. As the driving force behind construction of the Lehigh Valley Railroad and a founder of the Bethlehem Iron Company, he helped turn the Lehigh Valley into one of the industrial powerhouses of Gilded Age America. His wealth flowed back into the community through a hospital, a church, a girls' school, and the young Lehigh University he helped charter.