BENNINGTON

NAME: Bennington
COUNTY: Cambria/ Blair
ROADS: 2WD
GRID: 5
CLIMATE: Snow in winter. Hot in the summer
BEST TIME TO VISIT: Late Spring, Summer, or early Fall
COMMENTS: Follow route22 to Gallitzen take the exit to Gallitzenthen take the first road to your right.Take the second left on to a dirt road.Park and follow the rest of the way on foot. Follow the railtracks for about 300 feet, you will seea Flag in the woods off to your left. Follow the dirt path on your left it leads to the Bennington Cemetery.
REMAINS: Old family cemetery.

The town of Bennington was a railroad town during the Late 1880's and early 1900's. It was abandoned in the early 1900's.When the Red Arrow train jumped the tracks in the 1930's the town was already finished. The only remains are the cemetery, and a few old Coke furnaces.There are no current residents Submitted by: B A Sanders

Bennington a coal mining and railroad village was located one half mile east of the Gallitzin tunnels, on the Pennsylvania Railroads mainline.  The village of Bennington was first erected during the construction of the Gallitzin tunnels.  Bennington began as a shantytown.  Irish and other immigrant labor erected these shelters in order to have a place to live near the tunnel project.  These tunnels were hand dug by Irish laborers for a distance of 3,650 feet through the Allegheny Mountains.  Bennington was also home to coal miners who dug coal across the valley from Bennington. The Pennsylvania Railroad at that time owned a coal mining operations in order to supply coal for the railroad.  There was coke ovens located in Bennington and the iron ore was smelted in glowing coke ovens that line the country road running from Bennington to present day Gallitzin.  You can still see them, in place, to this day.  The winters are severe on the Allegheny Mountains of Central Pennsylvania.  Particularly difficult to life in Bennington was the remoteness of the village.  In the 1947s, the only way to Bennington and Gallitzin was by railroad.  The old Sugar Run Road was impassable due to the severity of the winters in this region.   On Feb.18, 1947.  Twenty-four people lost their lives and 131 were injuring  when the Red Arrow, a Pennsylvania Railroad express passenger train, jumped off the track on the Bennington Curve near Altoona, Pennsylvania and tumbled down a large hill.. After a brief inquire in to the accident there was no official explanation of the wreck. However, a doctor who examined the Red Arrow's 62-year-old Engineman F. B. Yentzler after the wreck reported that he was suffering from what appeared to be a cataract, and from all initial tests, was virtually blind in his right eye.  He did see the Philadelphia-bound Pittsburgh Night Express—which was running 48 minutes late on the same track—had been stopped up ahead by a block signal near the station at Bryn Mawr. The town died out soon after this incident. Submitted by Kent and Julia.


Flagpole at Bennington Cemetery
Courtesy Steven Biter


Flagpole at Bennington
Courtesy Steven Biter

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