{"nrhp_refnum":"95000883","name":"Whitsett Historic District","other_names":[],"category":"district","location":{"address":"Roughly bounded by the Youghiogheny R., the former Elwell Branch of the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie RR tracks and Elwell Run","address_restricted":false,"city":"Whitsett","county":"Fayette County","state":"PA","lat":40.10813473200005,"lon":-79.7560958181133,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1995-07-21","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture","Industry","European","Black","Community Planning and Development"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A company-built bituminous coal mining community in northern Perry Township, Fayette County, Pennsylvania, about a mile north of Perryopolis, extending along the floodplain and hillside of the Youghiogheny River valley. It comprises workers' and managers' houses, mine service buildings, mine entrance remains, a tipple foundation, a slate dump, and beehive coke oven remains built by the Pittsburgh Coal Company and its predecessors.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the district is a well-preserved example of a company-owned coal mining town, with a planned orthogonal layout and a stock of standardized miners' houses built in phases between 1891 and 1918. It also cites the community's history of ethnically and racially diverse labor, including Eastern European immigrants and African American miners, and the Pittsburgh Coal Company's 1925 open shop policy that opened skilled mine jobs to African American miners.","narrative":"Whitsett is a company-built bituminous coal mining community on the Youghiogheny River in northern Perry Township, Fayette County, about a mile north of Perryopolis. Most of its houses were built between 1891 and 1917 by the Pittsburgh Coal Company and its predecessors, and the district includes managers' and workers' duplexes laid out in uniform rows, mine entrance remains, a tipple foundation, a slate dump, and beehive coke ovens. The town was planned on an orthogonal grid, and its surviving plan and house stock are regarded as a typical example of a mining community of the period. Its residents included Eastern European immigrants, many recruited by company agents, and African American miners who came from the south. In 1925 the company adopted an open shop policy that gave African American miners access to skilled mine jobs for the first time. Banning No. 2 mine closed in 1944, and the community is now primarily residential.","period_of_significance":"1891-1944","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"NO STYLE","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":"Residential community; Banning No. 2 mine ceased operations in 1944 and most mine buildings are remnants, with some converted to dwellings.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:11:37.494177-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_PA/95000883.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/95000883/8647b3086f-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/95000883/8647b3086f-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":"VitaleBaby at English Wikipedia","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Whitsettpatch.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">VitaleBaby at English Wikipedia</a>, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Whitsettpatch.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71992920","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitsett_Historic_District_(Whitsett,_Pennsylvania)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7996792"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/pennsylvania/fayette-county/whitsett-historic-district-95000883/"}