Editing Scranton, Pennsylvania (section)

===19th century===
{{See also|Pennsylvania in the American Civil War}}
[[File:George Inness - The Lackawanna Valley - Google Art Project.jpg|thumb|''The Lackawanna Valley'', an 1855 portrait by [[George Inness]] depicting 19th century Scranton and the [[Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad]]'s [[Railway roundhouse|roundhouse]]]]
[[File:Scranton-1.jpg|thumb|upright=1|An 1890 panoramic map of Scranton]]
[[File:D.L. & W. R.R. yards, Scranton, Pa. between 1890 and 1901.jpg|thumb|[[Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad]] yards in Scranton, {{Circa|1895}}]]
Though [[anthracite|anthracite coal]] was being mined in [[Carbondale, Pennsylvania|Carbondale]] to the north and [[Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania|Wilkes-Barre]] to the south, the industries that precipitated the city's early rapid growth were [[iron]] and [[steel]]. In the 1840s, brothers Selden T. and [[George W. Scranton]], who had worked at [[Oxford Furnace]] in Oxford, New Jersey, founded what became Lackawanna Iron & Coal, later developing as the [[Lackawanna Steel Company]]. It initially started producing iron nails, but that venture failed due to low-quality iron. The [[Erie Railroad]]'s construction in New York State was delayed by its having to acquire iron rails as imports from England. The Scrantons' firm decided to switch its focus to producing [[Rail profile|T-rails]] for the Erie; the company soon became a major producer of rails for the rapidly expanding railroads.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Scranton, PA : Pennsylvania Postal History Society |url=https://paphs.org/scranton-pa/ |access-date=2025-04-14 |language=en-US}}</ref>

In 1851, the Scrantons built the [[Lackawanna and Western Railroad]] (L&W) northward, with recent Irish immigrants supplying most of the labor, to meet the Erie Railroad in [[Great Bend, Pennsylvania]]. Thus they could transport manufactured rails from the Lackawanna Valley to New York and the Midwest. They also invested in coal mining operations in the city to fuel their steel operations, and to market it to businesses. In 1856, they expanded the railroad eastward as the [[Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad]] (DL&W), to tap into the New York City metropolitan market. This railroad, with its hub in Scranton, was Scranton's largest employer for almost one hundred years.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Collection: Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad Company records {{!}} Hagley Museum and Library Archives |url=https://findingaids.hagley.org/repositories/3/resources/891 |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=findingaids.hagley.org}}</ref>

The Pennsylvania Coal Company built a [[gravity railroad]] in the 1850s through the city for the purpose of transporting coal. The gravity railroad was replaced by a steam railroad built in 1886 by the Erie and Wyoming Valley Railroad (later absorbed by the Erie Railroad).  The [[Delaware and Hudson]] (D&H) Canal Company, which had its own gravity railroad from Carbondale to [[Honesdale]], built a [[steam railroad]] that entered Scranton in 1863.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=1-A-1BD |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=explorepahistory.com}}</ref>

During this short period of time, the city rapidly transformed from a small, agrarian-based village of people with New England roots to a multicultural, industrial-based city. From 1860 to 1900, the city's population increased more than tenfold. Most new immigrants, such as the Irish, Italians, and south Germans and Polish, were Catholic, a contrast to the majority-Protestant early settlers of colonial descent. National, ethnic, religious and class differences were wrapped into political affiliations, with many new immigrants joining the [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]], and, for a time in the late 1870s, the [[Greenback Party|Greenbacker-Labor Party]].<ref>{{Cite web |date=2022-10-07 |title=American Sign Language (ASL) & CART Services In Scranton - Home Page |url=https://www.alsglobal.net/pages/services-offered/american-sign-language-asl-cart-services-in-scranton/ |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=www.alsglobal.net |language=en-US}}</ref>

In 1856, the borough of Scranton was officially incorporated. It was incorporated as a city of 35,000 in 1866 in Luzerne County, when the surrounding boroughs of Hyde Park (now part of the city's West Side) and Providence (now part of North Scranton) were merged with Scranton. Twelve years later in 1878, the state passed a law enabling creation of new counties where a county's population surpassed 150,000, as did Luzerne's. The law appeared to enable the creation of [[Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania|Lackawanna County]], and there was considerable political agitation around the authorizing process. Scranton was designated by the state legislature as the county seat of the newly formed county, which was also established as a separate judicial district, with state judges moving over from Luzerne County after courts were organized in October 1878. This was the last county in the state to be organized.<ref>{{Cite web |title=About Scranton – City of Scranton |url=https://scrantonpa.gov/our-community/work-from-here/ |access-date=2025-04-14 |language=en-US}}</ref>

Creation of the new county, which enabled both more local control and political patronage, helped begin the [[Scranton General Strike]] of 1877. This was in part due to the larger [[Great Railroad Strike of 1877|Great Railroad Strike]], in which railroad workers began to organize and participate in walkouts after wage cuts in [[Martinsburg, West Virginia]]. The national economy had lagged since the Panic of 1873, and workers in many industries struggled with low wages and intermittent work. In Scranton, mineworkers followed the railroad men off the job, as did others. A protest of 5,000 strikers ended in violence, with a total of four men killed, and 20 to 50 injured, including the mayor. He had established a militia, but called for help from the governor and state militia. Governor [[John Hartranft]] eventually brought in federal troops to quell the strike. The workers gained nothing in wages, but began to organize more purposefully into labor unions that could wield more power.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Little |first=Becky |date=2022-09-19 |title=The 1877 Strike That Brought US Railroads to a Standstill |url=https://www.history.com/articles/1877-railroad-strike-trains |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=HISTORY |language=en}}</ref>

The nation's first successful, continuously operating electrified [[streetcar]] (trolley) system was established in the city in 1886, inspiring the nickname "The Electric City". In 1896, the city's various streetcar companies were consolidated into the [[Scranton Railway|Scranton Railway Company]], which ran trolleys until 1954. By 1890, three other railroads had built lines to tap into the rich supply of coal in and around the city, including the Erie Railroad, the [[Central Railroad of New Jersey]] and finally the [[New York, Ontario and Western Railway]] (NYO&W).

As the vast rail network spread above ground, an even larger network of railways served the rapidly expanding system of coal veins underground. Miners, who in the early years were typically Welsh and Irish, were hired as cheaply as possible by the coal barons. The workers endured low pay, long hours and unsafe working conditions. Children as young as eight or nine worked 14-hour days separating slate from coal in the [[coal breaker|breakers]]. Often, the workers were forced to use company-provided housing and purchase food and other goods from stores owned by the coal companies. With hundreds of thousands of immigrants arriving in the industrial cities, mine owners did not have to search for labor and workers struggled to keep their positions. Later miners came from Italy and eastern Europe, which people fled because of poverty and lack of jobs.<ref>{{Cite news |title=سكرانتون، پنسلڤانيا - المعرفة |url=https://www.marefa.org/%D8%B3%D9%83%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%AA%D9%88%D9%86%D8%8C_%D9%BE%D9%86%D8%B3%D9%84%DA%A4%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A7 |access-date=2025-04-14 |work=المعرفة |language=ar}}</ref>

Business was booming at the end of the 19th century. The tonnage of coal mined increased virtually every year, as did the steel manufactured by the Lackawanna Steel Company. At one point the company had the largest steel plant in the United States, and it was still the second largest producer at the turn of the 20th century. By 1900, the city had a population of more than 100,000.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Salay |first=David L. |date=1988 |title=Review of Rusted Dreams: Hard Times in a Steel Community; From Fire to Rust: Business, Technology and Work at the Lackawanna Steel Plant, 1889-1983; Crisis in Bethlehem: Big Steel's Battle to Survive |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40968156 |journal=IA. The Journal of the Society for Industrial Archeology |volume=14 |issue=2 |pages=69–72 |jstor=40968156 |issn=0160-1040}}</ref>

Scranton has had a notable labor history; various coal worker unions struggled throughout the coal-mining era to improve working conditions, raise wages, and guarantee fair treatment for workers.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Azzarelli, Margo L.|author2=Marnie Azzarelli|title=Labor Unrest in Scranton|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sy4LDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT7|year=2016|publisher=Arcadia Publishing|isbn=9781625856814|access-date=November 3, 2016|archive-date=March 26, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210326233408/https://books.google.com/books?id=sy4LDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT7|url-status=live}}</ref>  The Panic of 1873 and other economic difficulties caused a national recession and loss of business. As the economy contracted, the railroad companies reduced wages of workers in most classes (while sometimes reserving raises for their top management). A major strike of railroad workers in August 1877, part of the [[Great Railroad Strike]], attracted workers from the steel industry and mining as well, and developed as the [[Scranton General Strike]]. Four rioters were killed during unrest during the strike, after the mayor mustered a militia. With violence suppressed by militia and federal troops, workers finally returned to their jobs, not able to gain any economic relief. [[William Walker Scranton]], from the prominent family, was then general manager of Lackawanna Iron and Coal. He later founded Scranton Steel Company.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Scranton's Story, Our Nation's Story |url=https://www.scranton.edu/scrantonstory/themes/industrial-revolution/ |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=www.scranton.edu |language=en}}</ref>

The labor issues and growth of industry in Scranton contributed to Lackawanna County being established by the state legislature in 1878, with territory taken from Luzerne County. Scranton was designated as the county seat. This strengthened its local government.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Welcome to Lackawanna County, PA |url=https://www.lackawannacounty.org/about/about_lackawanna_county/history_of_lackawanna_county.php |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=www.lackawannacounty.org |language=en}}</ref>

The unions failed to gain higher wages that year, but in 1878 they elected labor leader [[Terence V. Powderly]] of the [[Knights of Labor]] as mayor of Scranton. After that, he became national leader of the KoL, a predominately{{dubious|Perhaps a bare majority, although the situation may have been different in Scranton.|date=May 2016}} Catholic organization that had a peak membership of 700,000 circa 1880.<ref>Vincent J. Falzone, "Terence V. Powderly: Politician and Progressive Mayor of Scranton, 1878–1884," ''Pennsylvania History'' 41.3 (1974): 289–309.</ref> While the Catholic Church had prohibited membership in secret organizations since the mid-18th century, by the late 1880s with the influence of Archbishop [[James Gibbons]] of [[Baltimore, Maryland]], it supported the Knights of Labor as representing workingmen and union organizing.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Terence Powderly and the Knights ofLabor {{!}} Social History Portal |url=https://socialhistoryportal.org/news/articles/109338 |access-date=2025-04-14 |website=socialhistoryportal.org}}</ref>