Mar 21, 2016

Allentown's First Waterfront


Although cheerleaders for the current waterfront NIZ think that they're inventing the Lehigh River, Allentonians already had a river port in the 1800's. As this section of the 1899 map shows, Wharf Street, which is still partically there, led to a man made river port, with two channels back to the river. The Lehigh Port was dug out in 1829, and was used in conjunction with the canal on the other side of the river. In the early 20th century, as the canal commerce was replaced by the railroads,  the port was filled in,  by an expanding Arbogast & Bastian Meat Packing.  Currently, a private boat club utilizes the river front near that location.  I exhibited the map at a recent session of Molovinsky University.

 molovinsky on allentown will be shortly changing the comment policy. Anonymous comments, per se, will no longer be hosted. Commenters will be using or creating a blogger/google/Open ID. The identity need not be your real name, pseudonyms are permitted. The registration is with google or such, and I have no access to the information provided.  It is my hope that regular contributors to this blog get such a registered handle, to both help elevate the dialogue here, and protect the integrity of their input.

The riverport was slightly north of the current America On Wheels Museum, by the Hamilton Street Bridge, going over the Lehigh River to East Allentown.

4 comments:

  1. I'll bet it didn't have bicycle paths, though. But I digress; I've learned a lot from reading this blog after having come across it several months ago. Allentown was truly a city of visionaries once upon a time. It's unfortunate that they seem to be gone forever.

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  2. Paul Fiske says:
    I remember the wife and I, with the family, visiting Adam's Island years ago, to visit with friends (who have since passed on) The view across the river towards Bucky Boyle Park was beautiful and serene, from an equally bucolic setting. Talk back then was also about increasing recreation along the stretch from Tilghman St. south/east along the river.....Thanks Michael!
    "The Old Allentown Curmudgeon"

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  3. MM,
    One man's VISION/DESIGN is another man's demise¿!)$ The true Vision's of those that ReFuse to partake in this circus arena agenda are negated like the facts and calculated misscalculations of those that are now in the indictable beginings of there own demise¿!)$ Most will need more than just a legal mouthpiece when meeting there maker and the seven circles of HELL that they will rezide in til than¿!)$
    Hopefully they are holding secret gatherings in white boxes built in the bowells of hell of there own designing abilities of taking advantage of the disadvantaged truely there only skill set employed by these tools of implimentation¿!)$
    redd for independant Republican
    patent pending

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  4. redd@12:56, i suggest that you click on the "create blog" link in the right hand corner and start your own blog. on your own blog you will be entitled to write anything you choose, and be repetitive, if you so desire. as for this blog, i will no longer be accepting comments which are not concise, and on topic.

    ReplyDelete

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