Lehigh Canal
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Lehigh Canal
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The Lehigh Canal as seen from Guard Lock 8 & Lockhouse, Island Park Road, Glendon, Northampton County, Pennsylvania
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Lower division of the Lehigh Canal, from Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania to Easton, Pennsylvania
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| Location |
Lehigh River Upper: Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania to White Haven, Pennsylvania Lower: Mauch Chunk (Jim Thorpe) to Delaware River at Easton, Pennsylvania |
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| Coordinates | 40°46′09″N 75°36′13″W / 40.76917°N 75.60361°WCoordinates: 40°46′09″N 75°36′13″W / 40.76917°N 75.60361°W |
| Built | 1818-1821; 24-27 upper: 1838-1843, Upper ruined & abandoned: 1862 |
| Architect | Canvass White, Josiah White |
| Architectural style | Fitted stone, iron and wood |
| NRHP Reference # | 78002437, 78002439, 79002179, 79002307, 80003553 |
| Added to NRHP | Earliest October 2, 1978 |
The Lehigh Canal was a 'navigation', the type of canal built along the line of a river and parallel to the of the fall of the watercourse, constructed 20 years apart that stretched over two parts of the Lehigh River and totaling 72-mile (116 km) along the Lehigh River in eastern Pennsylvania.
The lower canal (46.5 miles (74.8 km)) was built by the Lehigh Navigation Company as a coal road to service the Anthracite appetite of Eastern seaboard cities ahead of schedule, between 1818-1820 (down traffic only), and then gradually rebuilt (with locks fully supporting two way traffic) 1824-1827 by the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company and continued in operation as a key transportation canal until the 1931. The lower canal connected the Southern Coal Region to the Delaware River basin, connecting Mauch Chunk (now Jim Thorpe, PA) to Easton, PA using a specially designed canal boat capable of making the one-way trip on the River as well. It was used to carry anthracite gathered to the central Lehigh Valley to the urban markets of the northeast, especially Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Trenton, New Jersey, and Wilmington, Delaware, but supported new growth industries in Bristol, PA, Allentown and Bethlehem. The privately funded canal was joined as part of the Pennsylvania Canal System, a complex system of canals and tow paths—and eventually railroads. The canal was sold for recreation use in the 1960s. Today, many parts of the canal or railroads later constructed to flank it, have been converted to the Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor (known colloquially as the 'D & L Trail'), a multi-use rail trail.
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