National Canal Museum

09/02/2026

Our former Historian and Archivist, Lance Metz, loved preserving history, and one of the ways he did that was by taking and collecting pictures of everything industrial. In our collection we have a few images of the ruins of the Wapwallopen Powder Mill, a mill along Big Wapwallopen Creek that produced black powder for anthracite coal mining. The mill opened in 1855 and used water power from the creek to power the mill. It was purchased in 1859 by The DuPont Company, which continued producing the blasting powder until dismantling the mill in about 1912. In a November 1911 newspaper article, ‘The Powder Hole’ was being abandoned due to insufficient water supply and excessive freight rates.

08/26/2026

Maria T. Zuber’s fascination with space exploration carried her from the little Carbon County town of Summit Hill to being the first woman to head a NASA mission to the moon. The unmanned Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) spacecraft, launched in 2011, allowed Zuber and a team of scientists to measure the structure of the moon’s surface and crust as well as its gravity under its surface for the first time. At the Goddard Space Center, she participated in several studies of planets and other bodies in the solar system, and has an asteroid named after her.

Zuber’s fascination with space and the planets began early. According to her mother, as a toddler she was excited by watching rocket launches on television. At 8, the granddaughter of two coal miners built her own telescope. After graduating from Panther Valley High School in 1976, Zuber earned degrees in astronomy and geology at the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in geophysics from Brown University. She joined the faculty of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1995 and was the first woman to head a science department there.

Zuber served as the chair of the National Science Board during the Obama administration and served on the Board during the first Trump administration. She was co-chair of President Biden’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Currently she teaches courses at MIT in geophysics, planetary science, and in the joint MIT/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute program and serves as the advisor to MIT’s president for Science and Technology Policy. Dr. Zuber was one of the many people we researched for this year’s exhibition, Dynamo! We just wish we had space to include them all! Image: https://www.flickr.com/people/mitmedialab/

08/21/2026

📀 What a CD of Old Photos Revealed About Bethlehem Steel

While cataloging a CD of Bethlehem Steel photographs, we expected to find images of steel production, workers, and major construction projects. What we didn't expect was a fascinating collection of documents revealing Bethlehem Steel's role in building components for a massive cyclotron at Columbia University.

From skyscrapers and bridges to particle accelerators, Bethlehem Steel's legacy reached further than many realize.

Learn more about Bethlehem Steel's surprising connection to the building blocks of matter, link in the comments! 👇

08/20/2026

Dynamo has arrived at Lehigh Gap Nature Center!🌿

Our traveling exhibition, Dynamo! The Innovators, Inventors and Architects of Revolutionary Change, is now on display and ready to welcome visitors. Explore the stories of the bold thinkers, creative problem-solvers, and groundbreaking innovators whose ideas helped shape the world around us.

If you missed Dynamo at its previous location, now is your chance to experience this unique exhibition in a new setting surrounded by the region's stunning natural landscape. Stop by Lehigh Gap Nature Center between now and September 4th, and discover the people who powered revolutionary change in our region! ⚙️✨

08/19/2026

Coal Country Twisters! At 5:20 PM on August 19, 1890, a violent tornado touched down in Wilkes-Barre. In eleven terrifying minutes, it derailed a Delaware & Hudson locomotive and its passenger cars, and damaged or destroyed over 260 industrial and commercial buildings and houses. Sixteen people died, including four children, as well as at least three horses. Sixty people were injured. The modern Enhanced Fugita Score rates the tornado an F3, with speeds of 136-165 mph. Costs of the damage exceeded $240,000 (over $8.8 million today). It was the worst non-flood disaster ever to hit the city.

On August 20, 1914, a second tornado struck Wilkes-Barre. Though the twister - also rated an F3 - lasted only four minutes and missed the most densely populated part of the city, seven people were killed, including four female workers who died when the Laurel Silk Mill was leveled.

08/17/2026

In this postcard of a ship entering a lock on the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal from 1917, Ursula tells her friend Maud that she’s going fishing and is enjoying her summer break. Before school’s back in session, celebrate the last few weeks of summer and American Adventures Month by checking out a fishing spot, trail, or ice cream shop you’ve never been to before with your friends and family!

08/10/2026

🎉 Happy 30th Anniversary to the Crayola Experience!

Did you know that the National Canal Museum and the original Crayola Factory visitor attraction were neighbors when they opened at Two Rivers Landing in Downtown Easton in 1996?

Congratulations to our friends at Crayola on 30 years of sparking imagination for generations of visitors! 🖍️❤️

The interactive attraction has drawn millions of visitors since opening in 1996, evolving from a factory tour into a 65,000-square-foot destination with dozens of hands-on activities that inspired additional locations nationwide.

08/07/2026

The recent Front Street fire in Allentown has brought renewed attention to the region's industrial past. Long before the blaze, important artifacts, machinery, and records from the Gottlieb Buehler & Company furniture factory were preserved through the efforts of National Canal Museum industrial historian Lance Metz and the Buehler family. Today, those pieces help tell the story of the workers, businesses, and communities that shaped the Lehigh Valley. We’re proud to help preserve these connections to our shared past for future generations. 🏭📚

On a recent June night, residents of Allentown's old industrial waterfront wards were awakened by a fire that swept through the remains of the old Buehler Furniture factory, which was

08/05/2026

Have you ever heard of Walter D. Edmonds? He’s the author of the famous novel, Drums Along the Mohawk, and he also wrote multiple novels that took place along the Erie Canal. These early books are dramatizations of life on the canal; they include romantic plotlines and battles for property, offering a window into the interests of readers of the early 20th century and the ways they witnessed and interpreted canal life as they looked back on it with nostalgia. His debut novel, Rome Haul, highlights the Erie Canal and eventually became the inspiration for the play and later film The Farmer Takes a Wife. Despite taking place on the Erie Canal, parts of the 1935 film were actually shot around Lock 44 in the Lehigh Canal in Freemansburg, PA.

Edmonds’ historical writing was instrumental in keeping canals alive through culture as the industry faded. If you have an interest in canal life and historical perceptions of canals, check out one of Edmond’s novels from your local library to learn more. If you want to learn more about the film, visit https://canals.org/2023/02/07/rom-com-on-the-canals/

08/03/2026

August is American Adventures Month, and it’s all about getting out there and exploring what America has to offer! To celebrate, we’re sharing some postcards from our collection about taking trips! In 1920, May sent a postcard to Ella Ludlam about how she is enjoying her trip in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. She sent this postcard of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal and Potomac River to West Cape May, New Jersey. We hope May enjoyed the rest of her trip, and we hope that all of you are finding some time to explore by taking a day trip, hike in the woods, day at the beach, or longer vacation to a new destination!