Bradenville is a

census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

and

coal town A coal town, also known as a coal camp or patch, is a type of company town or mining community established by the employer, a mining company, which imports workers to the site to work the mineral find. The company develops it and provides reside ...

in Derry Township in Westmoreland County,

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...

, United States. The community is located within two miles of the city of Latrobe and is three miles from the borough of

Derry Derry, officially Londonderry, is the second-largest City status in the United Kingdom, city in Northern Ireland, and the fifth-largest on the island of Ireland. Located in County Londonderry, the city now covers both banks of the River Fo ...

. It has a total area of 0.4 square mile. Bradenville has its own post office, with zip code 15620.

Demographics

According to 2018 estimates, Bradenville has 396 residents. The estimated median household income is $38,551, compared to the national average of $61,937. The estimated poverty rate is 26.3%, compared to the national average of 13.1%. 100% of Bradenville residents are white, and 85.6% are high school graduates or higher.

History

The town was originally called St. Clair City. Served by the Pennsylvania Railroad, it supported coal mining and coking operations beginning in 1886, operated under the names St. Clair Mine & Coke Works, Bradenville Mine & Coke Works and Duquesne Mine & Coke Works. Mathias W. Saxman's Bradenville Mine & Coke Works built about 40 company houses and a store in the town around 1914. By 1915, its Bradenville Mine employed 195 persons, produced over 110,000 tons of coal and operated 194 beehive coke ovens. The Bradenville Mine ceased operations in 1951. Researchers in 1994 found that while the store (see Gallery section) and company houses survived, no mine structures remained.

Mine subsidence

There were 17 mine subsidence events in Bradenville over the approximately 20 years prior to 2018. Mine subsidence can occur when the ground above an underground (often abandoned) mine collapses into the mine cavity below. This creates the potential for structural damage to surface infrastructure such as homes, buildings and roads. Bradenville's subsidence problems are believed to be related to the Derry No. 1 Deep Mine owned by Marcus W. Saxman's Latrobe-Connellsville Coal & Coke Company, which mined the area beneath the town. In 2020, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection began a $5.8 million project to stabilize about 150 homes in the town affected by this problem.THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF PENNSYLVANIA HOUSE BILL No. 401 Session of 2001
SENATOR THOMPSON, APPROPRIATIONS, IN SENATE, RE-REPORTED AS AMENDED, NOVEMBER 26, 2002
Accessed August 19, 2022. Abandoned coal mine subsidence stablization project

Gallery

Bradenville post office cropped.jpg, Post office, High Street Bradenville PA store.jpg, Former company store, Bradenville Mine & Coke Works, High Street Bradenville war memorial.jpg, War memorial

References

{{authority control Census-designated places in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania Coal towns in Pennsylvania Census-designated places in Pennsylvania