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Miners Museum
Keystone Foundry
Coke Ovens
Capt. Phillips Memorial
Warrior Path State Park
Trough Creek State Park
Sunday Rock
Saxton Nuclear Plant
Evans Cemetary
Weavers Falls
EBT Railroad
Italian Cemetary
Broad Top Cemetary


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| Broad Top Area Coal Miners Museum |
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The history of the Broad Top Coal
Field comes alive at Robertsdale where the Miners Museum/Entertainment
Center is open Friday and Saturday from 10am-5pm and Sundays from 1-5pm
and
by appointment at other times. The Museum is located in the former Reality
Theater. Mining exhibits and special events call 814-635-3807 weekends
or 814-635-3220
Originally opened in 1857 as a
repair shop for the Huntingdon and Broad Top Rail Road, the Keystone
Foundry and Machine Works
also produced mining tools and equipment mine cars, stoves and numerous
cast metal objects. The foundry today is just the way the workmen left
it one day in 1935, never to return again. The Keystone Foundry Museum
is located in the Borough of Hopewell. Hours of operation are, June
- September, Saturdays and Sundays 1-4 p.m. For more information call
814-928-5322 or 928-5111 or Write to: Hopewell Area Senior Citizens,
Keystone Foundry Committee, P.O. Box 12, Hopewell, Pa. 16650.
Located in Riddlesburg, the 48
brick, beehive coke ovens were a part
of a much larger iron-making industry. They were constructed in 1912.
The 1929 depression forced the closing of the Riddlesburg operations.
In 1939 the complex was reopened by US Pipe and Foundry Company, however
labor disputes forced the closing in 1943. The largest-surviving section
of Riddlesburg coke ovens has undergone restoration and is currently
owned by the Broad Top Township Supervisors.
| Captain Phillips Memorial |
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Graves
of 10 of Captain Phillip's milita that were stationed to protect the
woodcock valley area from Native Americans. They were captured and killed
by Native Americans on July 16, 1780.
The 334-acre park is located in
Liberty Township, Bedford County, approximately two miles south of the
Borough of Saxton. Warriors Path State Park lies very near the famous
path used by the Iroquois
in raids and wars with the Cherokees and other American Indians in southern
Pennsylvania. The 349-acre park is located in Liberty Township, Bedford
County, approximately two miles south of the Borough of Saxton. Boating:
A boat ramp for canoes, rafts and small boats is available as a take
out or launch site for floating the river. Boating or rafting can be
enjoyed during the spring or late fall. The water level of the river
is usually too shallow for summer boating. Picnicking: Two, reservable
picnic pavilions, with nearby restrooms, are available. Numerous picnic
tables lie throughout the park. The Raystown Branch of the Juniata River
meanders around the finger of land that is Warriors Path State Park.
Unique habitats exist as a result of the river formation. A freshwater
swamp and weathered shale cliffs are examples of the unique natural
wonders this park offers More information available at www.dcnr.pa.us
Located along a scenic gorge created
as Great Trough Creek cuts through Terrace Mountain and empties into
Raystown Lake, Trough Creek State Park was recognized for its natural
and geological
beauty during the mid-1930s when the CCC constructed park trails and
facilities. This park offers beautiful hiking trails, scenic picnicking
and is a quiet place to relax. Trough Creek State Park is along a scenic
gorge created as Great Trough Creek cuts through Terrace Mountain and
empties into Raystown Lake. This 554-acre park is bordered by Rothrock
State Forest and Raystown Lake Recreation Area. The park can be accessed
by traveling 16 miles south from Huntingdon along PA Route 26, then
5 miles east along PA Route 994 near the village of Entriken. More information
available at www.dcnr.pa.us
As you enter through the Borough
of Saxton from the north west you can see a sandstone out crop along
the ridge to the east. The history of the name Sunday rock came about
when local residents would hike to the rock on Sundays with family and
friends. I am not sure if this is true but it sounds good.
| Saxton Nuclear Power Plant |
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From 1962 to 1972, the Saxton
Nuclear Power Plant was the second privately owned nuclear reactor in
the United States. It was a power and research reactor that was used
to develop a number of technologies used today in the nuclear power
industry. Saxton pioneered the use of boron in cooling water to control
the chain reaction, and was also the first privately owned power reactor
to use plutonium as fuel. Today the plant is being decommissioned and
the site will return to its natural state.
Evans Cemetery is the burial site
of Thomas White. Mr. White participated in the Boston Tea Party and
Revolutionary War solider who settled on the Broad Top Mountain after
the war. This marker can be reached by turning onto Washington Street
from State Route 913 in Dudley, and proceeding two miles to the graveyard.
Weavers
Falls is located at the south end of Raystown Lake. It is a United States
Army Corps of Engineers owned boat ramp facility. It also has picnic
grounds and an accompanying playground area.
The East Broad Top Railroad and
Coal Company was a short line narrow gauge railroad built in 1872-74
to service the coal fields of
the Broad Top Mountain area of southwestern Pennsylvania, and haul the
coal to the Pennsylvania Railroad at Mount Union or to on-line iron
furnaces. The EBT dutifully and, for the most part, profitably performed
this duty for over eighty years. The Broad Top coal business faded in
the mid 1950's as oil and gas replaced coal power in many applications
and the need for Broad Top coal haulers came to an end.
On April 14 1956, the line officially
ceased operations Even at that time the EBT was the last original narrow
gauge east of the Rockies. As with it's contemporaries, the EBT was
closed and was sold for dimantlement and salvage. Unlike them, the EBT
was never dismantled. Nick Kovalchick of Kovalchick Salvage purchased
the line in 1956, but did not dismantle it immediately. The entire line
lie dormant until 1960, when at the request of the Orbisonia Bicentennial
committee, the EBT began operating excursions on a portion of the line.
Since then 5 miles of the line has served
as tourist hauler while the remainder of the road went into a kind of
stasis for the next 40 years. It is a complete, intact 19th and early
20th century railroad and infrastructure. The entire 33-mile, 3-foot
gauge main line is intact as are seven steam locomotives (four operable)
built for the EBT, over 200 steel freight cars built by and for the
EBT, a complete, belt-driven shops complex that has no equal in North
America, and a living history from the people who worked the road and
the industries it served.
All of the EBT has been a National Historic
Landmark since 1964, which is the highest rating on the US National
Register of Historic Places. As far back as the 1930's the EBT was recognized
as a unique railroad when the National Railway Historical Society began
sponsoring excursion trips on the road. The remoteness that made the
EBT special then has helped to save it for today.
Alas, time has taken its toll on
the EBT, taking many structures and endangering many more. Public efforts
to preserve and restore the EBT began in ernest with the founding of
the Friends of the EBT in 1982 and the publishing of Study of Alternatives
in 1989. Since then the effort has been gaining momentum. Most recently
published, Full Steam Ahead is a framework plan for preserving and restoring
the EBT.
The East Broad Top is the greatest untapped
historical resource of the Industrial Age. It is a unique time capsule
of the life and times of the rural industrial culture, one waiting to
be opened and shown to the world. All it needs is some help.
| Robertsdale Italian Cemetery
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Burial site for Italian immigrants
that settled in Robertsdale and the Broad Top area. The site has been
restored and is listed on the National Historical Sites list.
Location
of the headless horseman. Broad Top Cemetery is also the burial site
of Vaughn Horton, the famous country singer and songwriter. Vaughn Horton
was native of Broad Top City. His famous song - "Mockin' Bird Hill",
was written on JC Blair Memorial Hospital hill while his father was
a patient at the hospital.

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