Nineteenth-century businessman J. Warner Erwin traveled across Pennsylvania as a conveyancer, a term for a writer of deeds, leases, property transfers, and other legal matters. He kept a detailed diary of his travels, including a descriptive account of a November 1851 trip through several towns in the Susquehanna Valley.
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Born in Danville, Montour County, Daniel M. Sechler made his living building carriages. At seventeen, he left for Port Deposit, Maryland, to learn the carriage maker’s trade. Four years later, that trade brought him back to the Susquehanna Valley. Eventually, heading west, he built large manufacturing facilities in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Moline, Illinois.
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Stephen Girard owned extensive coal lands in Schuylkill and Columbia counties and pledged $200,000 to the Danville and Pottsville Railroad in 1831. Daniel Montgomery of Danville also contributed to the venture. However, Construction produced two disconnected sections, while Danville lost its intended place as the Susquehanna terminus.
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The Hard Coal Navy was a nickname for the boats, barges, and crews that recovered waste anthracite from the bottom of the Susquehanna River. The documented industry stretched from the Luzerne County coal region through Columbia, Montour, and Northumberland, downstream toward Harrisburg, and into the lower river. One historical account describes about 20 companies and 300 workers along the Shickshinny–Harrisburg stretch.
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