CRESSON — Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site on Saturday will celebrate the 175th anniversary of the completion of the railroad, an early link for public and commercial transport to the West.
Visitors to the park will be transported to an earlier day.
“We have a lot of good stuff going on,” said Keith Newlin, deputy director of the national parks in western Pennsylvania.
“The railroad was the commonwealth’s answer to the Erie Canal. It was the main east-west transportation system In Pennsylvania.”
The railroad, completed in 1834, was a system of tracks on inclined planes that crossed the summit of the Allegheny Mountains. Considered an engineering marvel, the railroad was the precursor to the Pennsylvania Railroad. It allowed people to travel between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia in four days, a trip that until then took 23 days.
It was considered the start of the transportation era in America, said Megan O’Malley, chief of interpretation at the National Park Service site.
The focus will be on the daily lives of workers, many Irish, who spent three years building the railroad. Some stayed to help operate the system, she said.
Some of those immigrants were the Welsh ancestors of Chris J. Lewie, a central Ohio city planner who spent a decade researching the role of his ancestors and the Allegheny Portage Railroad.
In 2001 Lewie wrote “Two Generations on the Allegheny Portage Railroad.”
The book came about after he spoke to visitors at the national historic site, and an audience member told Lewie the story was good enough for print.
Lewie said some of his ancestors by the surname Humphreys helped build the railroad, operate it and dismantle it in 1857.
Many then went down the mountain to work for the newly formed Pennsylvania Railroad. By then, railroad technology improved to the point that the Allegheny Portage Railroad became obsolete.
Lewie will address visitors to Saturday’s celebration and give a slide presentation.
“He’s going to kind of take our story to another level,” O’Malley said.
The day will be packed with events including log hewing, stone cutting, coal mining and a cooking demonstration. The mining will be from a seam that was in operation during the days of the railroad, O’Malley said.
A program will show medical treatments and demonstrate how workers were cared for at the time.
Discussions will be held about Samuel and Jean Moore Lemon, described as the wealthiest people in Cambria and Blair counties at that time.
The Lemons were owners of the land at the Summit and the still-standing Lemon House, an inn and tavern catering to travelers on the Allegheny Portage.
The American Highlanders, a local militia, will re-enact life at the time, and musket firing will be demonstrated by park staff, O’Malley said.
The celebration will close with a concert by Aran, a Johnstown-based group that will pay tribute to the Irish.
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Allegheny Portage Railroad marking 175th anniversary
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