Altoona and Back

 A friend, Byron Smail recently released a new book that he wrote (Blair County Iron) and was going to give a talk about it. Ann Marie and I were going to go and also spend a little time roaming around the area. His talk was taking place at the Altoona Railroaders Memorial Museum, being a railroad fanatic; I wasn’t going to miss that! We had been to another of Byron’s talks when he had printed his first book and we enjoyed his talk immensely. We were looking forward to both the talk and the trip!

    As is always the case, when we are going somewhere, I look for a few things to do on our trip, a couple little things which might make the ride a bit more enjoyable.

    Of course, there were a couple geocaches on our route. Since we were going to hear a talk about iron furnaces, I also added 3 furnaces that we hadn’t visited yet to our itinerary. We also would stop at a couple quilt shops and a new to us, restaurant. Then, there were the sites we would just run across, we never know what we will find!

    Our start was a little after sunrise, hoping to avoid some of the heat of the day. We ended up in Gallitzin around 9. There was a cache that we hadn’t found a few weeks ago and we were going to try to find it again. Unfortunately, after 15-20 minutes of searching around, we couldn’t locate it. We weren’t too concerned, it is only a game, chances are, we will be back.

    About a mile or two away, just below the railroad tracks coming out of Altoona, there used to be a furnace. The town of Bennington sat here, now all that remains are a couple foundations and a cemetery. My hopes were to find the stack from the furnace. I had only a rough idea of its location; it was below the tracks and above a large slag pile. A couple friends had been there but we hadn’t…yet.

    We drove along a dirt road, searching for where a path/road might have once been, leading down to the site.  We passed a long line of coke ovens; we counted over 40 of them. Hundreds used to be here. The fronts are all broken. I’ve heard that the owners would take the doors and fronts off of them after they were no longer used to avoid taxation.

    We got out of the car and walked back and forth searching for a possible route down to the furnace. At one spot, the slope was extremely steep and almost all of the edges were covered in thick, high Bind weed. Driving back I found what I believed was the trail, I stopped the car and went down over the hill. Fighting through high weeds and jagger bushes I went down a couple hundred yards. AMB stayed in the car and not wanting to continue on by myself and possibly get hurt, I returned to the car. I marked the spot with my GPS, I WILL be back to explore further!

We meandered around the Hollidaysburg area, checking out a couple quilt shops, a roadside veggie stand and then stopped for lunch at a Pennsylvania Dutch style restaurant. A little further down the road we came into the town of Woodbury. The Elizabeth Iron Furnace used to sit here. Peter Shoenberger had a furnace built here in 1827. It operated through 1843 and then it was dismantled and moved. We looked at the field where it once stood but didn’t bother going over to explore. There are no ruins there.

The furnace was moved to Bloomfield Township where it became the Bloomfield Furnace. After operating for a few years, it was once again dismantled and moved to Rodman where it became the Middle Martha Furnace.

    I stopped in a small business and asked if they knew anything about the furnace. Bryan, the owner didn’t know anything about it but he did give me some directions to a near-by limestone kiln. We drove over and stopped to take some pictures.

    Limestone kilns were used to burn limestone to produce lime which was spread on fields to help improve crop yields. They were operated much the same as iron furnaces. Limestone and charcoal, or a similar heat source was loaded from the top and the finished product sunk to the bottom where it was taken out. These kilns can be found all over the state.

    After looking around the kiln and photographing it, we drove to the outskirts of Bellwood, a bit north of Altoona. There we searched for a set of ruins, another Elizabeth Furnace. The first one we looked for was in Bedford County, this one was in Blair. Once again, I only had an idea of where they might be located. I tried coming in from one side of Sandy Run Creek but saw nothing, the land was too flat. The furnace had to be on the opposite side of the stream, up against the hillside.

    We drove across a near-by bridge and tried again. Ann Marie decided to hang out in the car while I searched. My “search” took me through thick weeds and across hundreds of fallen trees. I walked through mud bogs and had mosquitoes feeding off me. I tried my best to avoid the poison ivy. I had shorts on, not the best clothing for bushwhacking and my legs were bleeding from scratches. I followed the stream and didn’t see anything and eventually backtracked. I found a small deer trail and followed it in closer to the hillside and then... all of a sudden, it appeared in front of me. Like a vision it became apparent to me, I could discern between the trees and leaves and the rock ruins behind them.

    The furnace had partially collapsed though one corner was still standing sharp and straight. I didn’t see any openings; they had been covered when the sides collapsed. Older pictures show that there were 3 openings. I climbed up the hillside to the top where I could see the chimney. Looking in, I could see the bricks which lined it and some trash that other “explorers” had tossed inside. Parts of a wall connected the top to the hillside. Numerous animal holes were visible between the stones. After taking a few more pictures, I took the easy way out by sneaking through the yard of a house above it and returned to the car and Ann Marie. She told me that 2 people had stopped to inquire if she needed any help. Nice people in this area!

    We then returned to Hollidaysburg where we checked into a “low priced” motel. We showered and got dressed for the lecture.

    Held in a lecture room in the Railroaders Memorial Museum, Byron kept us enthralled for about an hour and a half. He told about the various iron furnaces situated around Blair County and showed us pictures, both old and present day. He explained some things about how the iron ore was mined and also about some of the limestone quarries in the county. A little bit about the Portage Railroad and the canals was presented also. A little over 50 people were in attendance.

    Leaving the building after the talk we were presented with a wide rainbow that stretched across the sky. The sun was just setting and that added even more color to the view. Driving back to Hollidaysburg, we watched the sky turn orange. The mountains above Altoona showed all the various hills and valleys, all dark, underneath a spectacular reddish orange sky. There was no place to pull over and take a picture, but there is no doubt, it will always be in our memories.

    The next morning, I was up at dawn and went out to find a couple geocaches before I returned with coffee. We returned to Altoona for breakfast at a great diner called Tom and Joes. Opened originally in 1933 it reflects the way diners used to be. The tables and chairs are vintage styled, a counter is available and the food was both flavorful and plenty. Best breakfast I’ve had in a long time!

    We walked down to the RR tracks and watched the east-bound Amtrak train pull into the station. We found another geocache and then headed up towards the Horseshoe Curve. We did another cache there and then went under the tracks, past the coke ovens located in the ghost town of Glen White and then to Gallitzin where we attempted again to find the cache we couldn’t find the day before. NO LUCK! I’d like to think it is gone, how could we have missed it, THREE TIMES?

    We did one more cache in the town and then got onto rt.22 and headed west towards home. We had only been here for two days but we kept saying that it felt as if we’d been on the road for a week. We managed to squeeze a lot into this short little trip; I’d have to say it was another complete success!