Editing Mount Carbon, Pennsylvania (section)

==Early Mt. Carbon History==
Among the first inhabitants of the settlement of Mt. Carbon were Lewis Murphy and Joseph Porter.<ref>History of Schuylkill County, Pa: W. W. Munsell, Mcnamara Press: New York, 1881, p. 250</ref>  The first dam for the Schuylkill Canal was built at Mount Carbon on the Schuylkill River in the spring of 1817.<ref>SCHUYLKILL CANAL BOOSTED KING COAL by WALTER KRAUS, The Morning Call, Allentown, Pa., February 2, 1984</ref> The entire canal was in operation by 1824.<ref name="Kraus, Morning Call, 1982">Kraus, Morning Call, 1982</ref>

By 1818, Necho Allen resided here, engaged in lumbering, and built a saw-mill.<ref name="Munsell, 1881, p. 250">Munsell, 1881, p. 250</ref> Although coal was to become the principal commodity transported on the canal, the company conveyed lumber and merchandise as well.<ref name="Kraus, Morning Call, 1982"/>  By 1828 the village consisted of six homes, one store, an office building and a large stone warehouse, used to store produce, which was brought in wagons  from surrounding counties to be sent to market in Philadelphia.<ref name="Munsell, 1881, p. 250"/>

In 1829 John White (President of the Mt. Carbon Railroad) began the Mansion House construction here.<ref>Munsell 1881, p. 250</ref>  During this same year, the Norwegian and Mount Carbon Railroad was incorporated and by April 1831, coal was being conveyed through Mt. Carbon from the rich coalfields north and west of present day Pottsville to Philadelphia.<ref>GROUP V, The Mt. Carbon Railroad, THE DANVILLE &  POTTSVILLE R. R., by EARL J. HEYDINGER, The Railway and Locomotive Historical Society Bulletin, No. 107 (OCTOBER 1962), pp. 34-39</ref>

In 1842, the Philadelphia and Reading Railway Company had made Mt. Carbon the termination point of its railroad line from Philadelphia in direct competition with the Schuylkill Canal.<ref name="Kraus, Morning Call, 1982"/> The canal company was leased by the railroad in 1870 and the canal north of Port Clinton was abandoned at the signing of the lease.<ref name="Kraus, Morning Call, 1982"/> The Philadelphia and Reading Company leased the Mt. Carbon Railroad on May 16, 1862, and merged the line into the parent organization on June 13, 1872.<ref>Heydinger, October 1962, P. 34</ref>

In 1849, geologist [[Isaac Lea]] discovered fossilized footprints of ''[[Sauropus (ichnogenus)|Sauropus]]'' in red sandstone in Mount Carbon.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Youmans |first1=William Jay |title=Pioneers of Science in America |date=1896 |publisher=D. Appleton and Company |page=264 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SB8SAAAAYAAJ |access-date=30 September 2022}}</ref> Lea contended the tracks were reptilian and that due to the level of strata where the footprints were found, they were from the [[Devonian]] Period between 360 and 408 million years old and constituted a new species that he named ''Sauropus primaevus''. The footprints have since been identified as coming from an amphibian now known as ''Palaeosauropus primaevus'' from the [[Mississippian (geology)|Mississippian Age]] over 330 million years ago.<ref name=Fillmore>{{cite web |last1=Fillmore |first1=David |last2=Simpson |first2=Edward |last3=Sullivan |first3=Robert |last4=Lucas |first4=Spencer |title=Following in the Footsteps of Isaac Lea's Historic Footprints |url=http://paheritage.wpengine.com/article/following-in-footsteps-isaac-leas-historic-footprints/ |website=www.paheritage.wpengine.com |publisher=Pennsylvania Heritage |access-date=27 September 2022}}</ref>