Loading map...

1891 Map of Pottsville

Name: 1891 Topographic Map of Pottsville
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1898
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1898

About this map

Pottsville and its surrounding coal-region communities appear here at a peak of late-19th-century industrial expansion. The landscape is defined by the tight corridors of the Schuylkill River and its tributaries, which dictate the path of an intensive transportation network including the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad and the Pennsylvania Railroad. These rails connect numerous mining and manufacturing hubs such as St Clair, Port Carbon, and Schuylkill Haven.

Beyond the industrial core, the terrain rises sharply into the ridges of Sharp Mountain and Second Mountain, eventually reaching the southern boundary at Blue Mountain. The map captures the specialized geography of the era, where narrow valley settlements like Cumbola and New Philadelphia are hemmed in by steep ridges. To the south, the landscape opens slightly toward agricultural townships such as North Manheim and South Manheim, showing a shift from heavy extraction to rural crossroads like Orwigsburg and Shartlesville.