Delano, PA

Delano, Pennsylvania - A former Leigh Valley Railroad village

Delano is located at the eastern edge of the coalfield and was named for Warren Delano who, when he wasn't smuggling opium into China, was an early investor in the mines and railroads in the area. (He was also the grandfather of future president Franklin Delano Roosevelt.) The town was once the location of the locomotive, car repair, and machine shops of the Lehigh Valley Railroad, Mahanoy Division. Delano was also the headquarters for that division, which included all of the anthracite coal pouring out of the Mahanony City, Shenandoah, Centralia, and Mount Carmel areas. After division superintendent Alonzo Blakslee retired in 1899, the railroad shops were closed and moved about 14 miles away to Weatherly, Pa.

April 2025 image by author Reading and Northern coal cars being stored on a rail siding in Delano.
April 2025 image by author These foundations are some of the only remains of the original Lehigh Valley shops and rail yard that was built in the 1860s and closed in 1900. Even passenger cars were once repaired at Delano.
April 2025 image by author The houses in Delano were built by the Delano Land Company and leased to the Lehigh Valley Railroad for their employees.
April 2025 image by author Many of the houses in Delano look like typical coal company duplexes, but were in fact for railroad workers. Although the Park No. 7 slope of Lehigh Valley Coal Co. was located a short distance away. Only the Silver Brook mines were further east than Delano in this coalfield.
April 2025 image by author Delano is a once-bustling town that has now grown quiet and is now known more for being an exit on I-81 rather than for its industrial history.
April 2025 image by author Foundations of the "coal chutes" of the former Lehigh Valley rail yard.
April 2025 image by author At the edge of Delano sits the possibly defunct plant of the Carbonite Filter Corp. I include this photo to show another use for anthracite coal - as a filter media for water purification. This plant must have been the last customer on this rail spur. The railroad past it that once went to the big collieries at Trenton, Park Place, and Shoemakers has been removed.