Country United States County Allegany ZIP code 21528 Elevation 533 m Local time Friday 5:20 PM | State Maryland Time zone Eastern (EST) (UTC-5) FIPS code 24-24825 Area 4 km² Population 932 (2010) | |
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Weather -3°C, Wind NW at 27 km/h, 75% Humidity | ||
Eckhart Mines is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Allegany County, Maryland, United States. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 932.
Contents
Map of Eckhart Mines, MD 21532, USA
Eckhart Mines lies at the southwestern base of Federal Hill, 1.8 miles (2.9 km) east of Frostburg and 0.8 miles (1.3 km) northwest of Clarysville. The town was founded as a company town for the nearby Eckhart Mines. According to the Maryland Mining Heritage Guide, it was "the first coal company town in Maryland."
The original owner was George Eckhardt, an immigrant from Germany.
The outcrop of the Pittsburgh coal seam here is known locally as "the big vein" or the "14 foot coal". The Eckhart Mines' location here was the first bituminous coal mine developed in the Georges Creek Valley coalfield, because this is where the National Road (now U.S. Route 40 Alternate) crossed the coal outcrop. The Eckhart operation was known as the Maryland Mining Company, which eventually combined with other companies to form the Consolidation Coal Company (now Consol Energy). The Eckhart operation was the first commercial coal company in the United States. The inspiration for the character, Sidney Ellen Wade from the film The American President (1995), Sidney Beeman lives here.
HistoryEdit
In 1780 George Eckart secured lots 3644, 3645, 3646, in Allegany County. These lots were patented to him in 1800. He also had surveyed to him lot 3694, which he secured from John Stigler, to whom these lots had been awarded. [2]
A little village sprang up on George's land known as Eckhart Mines, which tradition says was named for him. Here he and his wife Mary lived, reared their family and died.
A history of Allegany County, page 448, says that "'Eckhart Mines', was a well laid out village 1789, July 12. This mining village is about one and a half miles from Frostburg, is on the Eckhart Branch of the Cumberland and Pennsylvania Railroad in the basin of the Big Savage and Dan's Mt. and is very picturesquely situated." The report given in 1940 is, that there are ten stores there, four of them being general merchandise, several being grocery stores, and two churches, the Baptist and Methodist churches. The population was 2300 people.
The first German Lutheran Church built in Eckhart was built of stone on land given by the Eckharts. It has long since gone into decay. Eckhart Mines was a mining district and had large beds of very rich coal underneath, but the town ancestors did not realize that they were immensely wealthy until this land passed out of their hands. It is now owned by the Continental Coal Company.