PITTSBURGH COALFIELD

PITTSBURGH COALFIELD

This is the grandaddy of the Western Pennsylvania Coalfields. Coal was mined in Pittsburgh in the mid-18th Century, and in the 19th Century the Monongahela Valley was dotted with numerous mines. Not many beehive coke oven plants were constructed in the Pittsburgh field. However, U.S. Steel, National Steel, and Betheleham Steel owned such metallurgical coal mines as Maple Creek, Mathies, and Ellsworth, respectively. One of the primary companies in this field was the Pittsburgh Coal Company. This company went bankrupt fighting the UMWA, merged with Consoldiation Coal Co., and became Consol. Coal mining in this coalfield continued into the twenty-first century with the opening of Murray Energy's High Quality Mine in 2003 (which clashed with the DEP and closed in 2004). And Consol's mine No. 84 was one of the last major coal mines in the Pittsburgh Field when it closed in 2009.

I know that the Pittsburgh Field has been subdivided into smaller fields, such as the Panhandle field, as is illustrated on some maps like the one I saw on the wall in the Heinz History Center back in 2003. But my 1916 USGS map treats the whole area as one big Pittsburgh Field and so shall I. It basically contains the coal mines under the city of Pittsburgh, the South Hills of Pittsburgh, the Burgettstown District, the lower Monongahela valley (downstream of Newell), the Pigeon Creek district of Washington County, and the lower Youghiogheny River valley (below Perryopolis).