An undated photograph of a pair of railroad tracks used to move coal up and down a mountain. The system was known as a “plane.”
The photo appeared in the “Looking Back” feature of the Pottsville Republican, July 7, 1979, which was presented by Joseph M. Hanney, who was the vice president of the Schuylkill County Historical Society. The photo is from the historical society’s collection. The text was written by Hanney:
PLANE ENGINEERING
Robert Fulton’s geometry was applied in the construction of these marvels of engineering. Stated simply, it was a method of hauling coal by track and car up one side of a mountain, and in some instances down the other, using a system of steam engines with some ballast. Broad Mountain facing northward fields of coal in Mahanoy Valley and elsewhere used mainly the Mahanoy and Gordon planes, which was a more direct point to shipment down over the Schuylkill Canal and later the Reading and Pennsylvania railroads. Earlier railroads with elevation problems used water tank ballast, loaded and unloaded at stationary tanks located along the way – such as was proposed to be used on the Pottsville-Danville railroad cars. Incidentally, Fulton’s plane geometry was used in the construction of the Reading Railroad bed from Philadelphia to Pottsville, and the Anthracite coalfields – still a marvel of precise engineering.
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Article & photo from Newspapers.com.
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