COKEBURG, PA
After industrialist James Ellsworth built the model coal company town
of Ellsworth, PA, he then began to construct another patch town and coal & coke colliery a few miles away. Ellsworth
Coal Co. called this Ellsworth No. 3, but we now know it as Cokeburg. In 1902 the first coal was shipped from
Cokeburg. Lackawanna Steel Co. purchased the Cokeburg and Ellsworth mines in 1907. Then in 1922 Lackawanna Steel
and Bethlehem Steel merged, and Bethlehem operated the mines under some of their mining subsidiaries like Bethlehem Mines Corp. and
Industrial Collieries. (Bethlehem also owned Marianna No. 58 and, later, Somerset No. 60 coal mines in the vicinity.) Bethlehem
designated Cokeburg their No. 53 mine, and they closed it in 1953. By then Cokeburg had become one of the few coal company
towns in Western PA to become a borough. Like all the other patches Cokeburg was an immigrant magnet, and, as recently as
the 1990's, had many Croatian families.
Aerial photo of Cokeburg shows the "progressive" layout of the model patch town, as opposed
to the grid layout of most other patches.
Great view of Cokeburg from an adjacent hillside.
As this picture illustrated, Cokeburg is the quintessential Western Pennsylvania "patch town."
These deteriorated coke ovens are all that remain at Cokeburg to remind us where the town got it's name. Note
the ladder made out of round bar.
James Ellsworth built more conventional coal company housing at Cokeburg than he did with the brick
miners' cottages at nearby Ellworth, PA.
This structure was the company store at Cokeburg. At the time of this photo it was the home of Royal Hydraulics.
View of Cokeburg from a long, long time
ago. The beehive coke ovens, seen in the center of the picture, appear to have been idled by then.
Coal tipple complex at Cokeburg, with the company
store in the background at left.
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Image taken from a plane by Chris H.
Image courtesy of Jon Dawson
Nov. 2002 image by author
Nov. 2003 image by author
Nov. 2003 image by author
Nov. 2003 image by author
1939 image courtesy Penn State Digital Collections, T.R. Johns Collection
1939 image courtesy Penn State Digital Collections, T.R. Johns Collection
WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA COALFIELDS