Why Down by the River?--Chapter 1

Living on the Lehigh

If you are wondering why I named this blog “Down by the River,” the simple answer is that's where my wife and I live, in a house down by the Lehigh River. The complete answer is a lot more involved, so I'll stick with the simple one for now. The Lehigh begins amid some bogs and streams in the Pocono Mountains of eastern Pennsylvania. It flows south until it widens and slows upon reaching the relatively flat land of the Lehigh Valley. After flowing through Allentown, the largest city in the valley, it swings eastward through the neighboring next largest city of Bethlehem, eventually meeting the Delaware River in Easton. On the other side of the Delaware is New Jersey.

When large deposits of anthracite coal were discovered in the upper Lehigh Valley in the early 1800s, mining company owners knew the fastest way to get the coal the cities, their biggest markets, was via river. Because the Lehigh was not navigable by boats big enough to carry large quantities of coal economically, they decided to construct a canal that would connect to the Pennsylvania Canal in Easton. From here, the boats carried the coal south to Philadelphia.

The Lehigh Canal was constructed during the 1820s and -30s. It was largely hand-dug by local farmers and Irish immigrants using picks, shovels, and wheelbarrows. The canal ran from White Haven to Easton, a distance of 72 miles. A connection across the Delaware River to the Morris Canal through New Jersey allowed the coal from the Lehigh Canal to be shipped more directly to New York City.

Though it reached its peak in 1855 (carrying one million tons of coal), the canal was used until the 1942, making it the last fully functioning towpath canal in North America. In 1962, most of the canal was sold to private and public organizations for recreational use. From Allentown to Easton the canal towpath was converted to a 20-mile multi-use trail.

Our home is between Lock #44 and Lock #45, which are between Freemansburg and Easton. A section of road about a mile long runs between the canal, now overgrown, and the old railroad bed. The railroad tracks were moved across the river some time after the canal closed. About a dozen houses stand along this road, all of them facing the the canal and the river. Ours is one of them.