Panther Creek Valley

The Lansford Historic District is a national historic district located at Lansford, Carbon County, Pennsylvania. It is part of the Lehigh Valley, which has a population of 861,899 and is the 68th most populated metropolitan area in the U.S. as of the 2020 census. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2012.

Lansford is a county-border borough (town) in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of Northeastern Pennsylvania. It is located 37 miles (60 km) northwest of Allentown and 19 miles south of Hazleton in the Panther Creek Valley about 72 miles (116 km) from Philadelphia and abutting the cross-county sister-city of Coaldale in Schuylkill County. The whole valley was owned and subdivided into separate lots by the historically important Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company, locally called the Old Company, which likely settled some structures on the lands by 1827.Lansford grew with the development of local anthracite coal mines and was named after Asa Lansford Foster, who was an advocate for merging the small patch towns that developed in the area surrounding the anthracite coal mines. The population was 3,941 at the 2010 census, a steep decline from a high of 9,632 at the 1930 census common to many mining towns in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

The Hauto Tunnel, dug in 1871–72, was a 1.1-mile-long (1.8 km) single-track railway tunnel crossing under the barrier ridge of Nesquehoning Mountain between Lansford, Pennsylvania, in the Panther Creek Valley and the Central Railroad of New Jersey trackage near the dam of the Hauto Reservoir impoundment about 1.3 miles (2.1 km) above Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania. The tunnel was significant for cutting nearly 15 difficult mountainous miles (24 km) off the trip to the Lehigh Canal terminal or, by rail, to other eastern coal companies, in the era when anthracite was the king of energy fuels. Built as a joint venture by the Central Railroad of New Jersey and landlords Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company (LC&N Co.) shortly after the LC&N board of directors had decided to opt out of the rail transportation business and leased all the railroads it owned or controlled under subsidiary Lehigh & Susquehanna Railroad to the CNJ. The tunnel began as a notion when LC&N Co. miners needed to drain water from a higher mine gallery under the Panther Creek Valley and so dug a drainage shaft from the other (north) side of Nesquehoning Ridge into the coal beds under Lansford. Once the tracks were in operation and proven, the tunnel allowed the CNJ to seek permission from LC&N Co. to cease coal shipments to the canal head on the iconic Summit Hill & Mauch Chunk Railroad, and to sell off the asset as a common carrier and tourist railway.

Summit Hill High School was an American high school that was located in Summit Hill, Pennsylvania in Carbon County, Pennsylvania in the commonwealth's Lehigh Valley region. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2001.

Pisgah Mountain, or Pisgah Ridge on older USGS maps, is a ridgeline running 12.5 miles (20.1 km) from Tamaqua to Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania from the Little Schuylkill River water gap to the Lehigh River water gap. The mountain runs north-northeast to south-southwest, and its north-side valley is followed by U.S. Route 209 from river gap to river gap. The ridge is a succession of peaks exceeding 1,440 feet (438.9 m) rising 300 to 540 feet (91 to 165 m) above the boroughs of Lansford, Coaldale, and Tamaqua in the Panther Creek valley. The highest point on Pisgah Mountain is at 1,611 feet (491 m) in the borough of Summit Hill, which sits atop the ridge. Near Summit Hill was the "Sharpe Mountain" (peak) where in 1791 Phillip Ginter is documented as having discovered anthracite, leading to the formation of the Lehigh Coal Mine Company. In 1818 the Lehigh Coal Company took over the mines, and the mining camp gradually became a settlement and grew into Summit Hill. Pisgah Ridge forms the left bank drainage divide of Panther Creek to its south and the stream's source in Summit Hill. The peak at the east end of the ridge is named Mount Pisgah and represents a hard rock knob that towers 800 feet (240 m) above the Lehigh River to the east.Pisgah Ridge is entirely in the Delaware River watershed. The western part of the north side of the ridge feeds Panther Creek running to the west as a Little Schuylkill River tributary, while the eastern part of the north side drains to Nesquehoning Creek, a tributary of the Lehigh River, which flows past the east end of the mountain. The eastern end of the south side of the mountain drains into the valley of Mauch Chunk Creek (White Bear Creek), while the western part of the south side drains to Owl Creek, which flows west to the Little Schuylkill. Mount Pisgah is joined by Nesquehoning Mountain, a ridge of similar height, near their eastern end, at a 1,540-foot (470 m) summit between the centers of Jim Thorpe and Nesquehoning. The bulk of Nesquehoning Mountain is separated from Mount Pisgah proper by a short and very steep valley that US-209 climbs from the borough of Nesquehoning westwards 2–3 miles (3–5 km) to reach the head of the Panther Creek valley in Lansford. The railroad tracks paralleling PA-54 also transiting the town of Nesquehoning's flat river-bank terrain takes over 16 miles (26 km) farther to climb and descend to once again reach an elevation where it can turn to enter the Panther Creek Valley near the confluence with the Little Schuylkill via the rail yard at Tamaqua in a longer more circuitous climb—and demonstration why dump trucks have replaced railroads in short-haul situations.

Summit Hill is a borough in Carbon County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of Northeastern Pennsylvania. The population was 3,034 at the 2010 census.Summit Hill was the western terminus of the United States' second operational railway, the Mauch Chunk Switchback Railway. It was the site of some of the earliest coal mines developed in North America, where the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company began mining in 1792, establishing the town initially as little more than a mining camp with stables and paddocks.

Coaldale is a borough in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania, United States. Initially settled in 1827, it was incorporated in 1906 from part of the former Rahn Township; it is named for the coal industry—wherein, it was one of the principal early mining centers. Coaldale is in the southern Anthracite Coal region in the Panther Creek Valley, a tributary of the Little Schuylkill River, along which U.S. Route 209 was eventually built between the steep climb up Pisgah Mountain from Nesquehoning (easterly) and its outlet in Tamaqua, approximately five miles to the west. The town is virtually joined at the hip to nearby Lansford, to its immediate east—as both were founded as company towns on lands owned by and mined by the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company (LC&N) while technically on opposite sides of the county lines. The history, business situation, and fortunes of not just the two, but of three towns, the third being the nearby Summit Hill, located a few thousand feet upslope, were tied in decades of co-development because the LC&N had built the western terminus of the nation's second railroad, the Summit Hill and Mauch Chunk Gravity Railway to ship coal out, and opened multiple mines throughout Coaldale and Lansford and the rest of the Panther Creek Valley in the days when railroads were coming into their own. The town has a bus stop with a mural on one side reading: "Everybody's Goal Is Mine More Coal" and the other side reading: "A Car More a Day Means More Pay". The area on the western border of the borough is known as Seek. There is a historical marker for Mother Jones located in Coaldale, as she organized many strikes and protests on behalf of coal miners around the country for improved pay, safer work environment and child labor laws. She organized a march for child workers that started in Coaldale and proceeded to McAdoo. At one trial for Mary Jones, a prosecution lawyer famously said, "there sits the most dangerous woman in America... to put down their tools and walk out". Herbert Whildin was elected mayor in 2017.

Nesquehoning Mountain or Nesquehoning Ridge is a 15–17-mile-long (24–27 km) coal bearing ridge dividing the waters of Lehigh Valley to the north from the Schuylkill River valley and the several near parallel ridgelines of the Ridge-and-valley Appalachians barrier range all local members of which run generally WSW-ENE in the greater overall area. Nestled above a creek sculpted ravine across from the even less negotiable sides of Broad Mountain the flanks above Nesquehoning Creek reach a sharp bend cut by the water gap of the Lehigh River and merge with the ridge of Pisgah Ridge to the south into a common terminal mountain, Mount Pisgah within sight of the Poconos in a region once touted as "The Switzerland of America" along the eastern edge of the Southern Anthracite Region, all several ridge lines north of Blue Mountain, which in part provides the source waters for Nesquehoning Creek, a tributary of the Lehigh River in the Poconos in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

Panther Valley High School is a small public high school providing grades 7 to 12, in Summit Hill, Pennsylvania, in Carbon County, Pennsylvania. Although its mailing address shows Lansford, PA the high school is physically located within the borough limits of Summit Hill, PA. It is the only high school for the Panther Valley School District and serves students from both Carbon County and Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the school reported an enrollment of 730 pupils in grades 7 through 12 in the 2020-21 school year.

Broad Run Reservoir, or Fourth Hollow Reservoir, is a reservoir located in the Broad Mountain within the Borough of Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania. It was built between 1970-1971. The reservoir can hold approximately 127 million US gallons (480,000 m3) of water and is approximately 35 feet deep at its deepest point. It provides drinking water for the Borough of Nesquehoning. Water released from the reservoir flows into the Nesquehoning Creek.

WLSH (1410 AM) is a radio station broadcasting an adult standards music format. Licensed to Lansford, Pennsylvania, the station is owned by CC Broadcasting, LLC and features programming from USA Radio Network and Westwood One. WLSH has a daytime power of 5,000 watts, serving portions of seven counties in East Central Pennsylvania including significant portions of the Allentown / Bethlehem market and the Wilkes-Barre / Scranton market. WLSH signed-on December 24, 1952.

Sharp Mountain or Sharp Ridge (historically also spelled Sharpe) in eastern central Pennsylvania in the United States is a ridgeline (fold) of the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians cut through on its east-side in the Tamaqua gap by the Little Schuylkill River which sunders it from the eastern extension of the ridgeline, the Nesquehoning Ridge. The ridgeline, located in the heart of Pennsylvania's anthracite Coal Region, drains to the Schuylkill River along its western slopes and into the Little Schuylkill River tributary of the Schuylkill River on its east. The heavily forested, relatively steep slopes of the Sharp and Nesquehoning Mountains characterize the landscapes within Pennsylvania's Anthracite Upland. Sharp Mountain is reported as the first locale where the coal of the region was discovered by a man hunting in 1788. When another hunter found and reported anthracite five to six miles to the east of Tamaqua in what ultimately became Summit Hill, the Lehigh Coal Mining Company was formed in 1792 and began exploiting these finds. Large areas in the valley to the northwest have been disturbed by coal mining-related activities. Much of the runoff from strip mines is retained in abandoned pits and therefore lesser amounts of surface runoff is discharged into the local creeks.