Moween No.1 Mine (ca.1906-1950's),
Located on the Pennsylvania Railroad, Conemaugh Division, the town is located off of PA Rt.981, near Saltsburg, Moween Road, Village of Moween, Loyalhanna Twp., Westmoreland Co., PA
Owners: (ca.1906-  ?  ), Keystone Coal Company, Moween, PA
              (ca.1917-  ?  ), Keystone Coal Company, Moween, PA
              (ca.1920-  ?  ), Keystone Coal Company, Moween, PA

Moween No. 2 Mine (ca.1906-1950's),
Located on the Pennsylvania Railroad, Conemaugh Division, the town is located off of PA Rt.981, near Saltsburg, Moween Road, Village of Moween, Loyalhanna Twp., Westmoreland Co., PA
Owners: (ca.1906-  ?  ), Keystone Coal Company, Moween, PA
              (ca.1917-  ?  ), Keystone Coal Company, Moween, PA
              (ca.1920-  ?  ), Keystone Coal Company, Moween, PA

The former Coal Company store is an L-shaped building, part of which contained the store managers residence.  The exterior of the store features vertical wood siding painted white.  The buiding contains two stories and a hipped roof, and measures 98 feet x 68 feet. The building rests on a coursed rubble stone foundation. The store front windows have been infilled with a stone wall, and the porches has been reconstructed.  The attached two-story house has four bays and a hipped roof.  Its original windows have been replaced and a recent one-story addition was constructed along with new porches.

The coal company built dwellings include single-family and double-family houses, all of wood frame construction.  The single-family houses are one-story structures.  The double-family houses are typical of those found in the region's mining communities and contain two-stories, gable roofs, double brick chimneys, and rubble stone foundations.

The largest house in Moween is the mine superintendent's residence, a two-and-a-half story building.  Its first-floor walls are of ashlar stone construction and its second story has wood frame walls covered with wood shingles.  The multi-gables roof is covered with slate.  The front and rear porches feature well-crafted wood columns.  The mine superintendent's house in Moween is one of the most elaborate found in the region's coal company patch towns and remains in good condition.

A bridge across the Conemaugh River once connected the company patch town of Moween and the Moween Mines.  The houses in Moween are now all privately owned, and the coal company store is now a shop and residence of a contractor.

The Moween Mines exploited the Upper Freeport coal seam which had an average thickness of 42 inches in this area.  By ca.1910 the Moween Mines employed eighty-three men and boys in the mines, who produced over 78,000 tons of coal.  The miners extracted the coal by pick and shovel and loaded it by hand.  Most of the coal produced at the Moween Mines was shipped to steam-coal markets via the Pennsylvania Railroad's Conemaugh Division.

By ca.1913 Keystone Coal Company had opened a second mine at Moween, though it was not operated until the following year.  Although the company continued to mine the coal largely by hand, it added three Sullivan electric mining machines and employed three electric trolley mine locomotives for haulage of the coal from the mines.  A boiler house and powerhouse at the mine, contained one 150 kilowatt generator, and supplied the electricity for the mine and the coal company town of Moween.  During the First World War coal from the Moween Mine was extracted exclusively using electric mining machines.  In ca.1917 the Moween Mines employed 142 men and boys, and produced 152,368 tons of coal.  By ca.1918 Keystone Coal Company employed 127 miners at the Moween Mines and they produced over 144,000 tons of coal.

During the First World War the Keystone Coal Company moved its field offices from Meyersdale, Somerset County to Moween, Westmoreland County.  Edward Bytheway oversaw the company's operations at Moween during the 1910's when it built many of the miners houses in Moween.  The coal company store in Moween was operated by B. Straths and Brothers Company.  Although Keystone Coal Company was one of the smallest coal companies in the region it remained an independent producer and continued to operate mines in Westmoreland and Somerset counties.  In ca.1918 Keystone Coal Company, having abandoned the Glen McClaren mine, opened Keystone No. 4 Mine near Meyersdale.  However, the Moween Mines remained the larger of the two mining operations.  By the mid 1920's the Moween Mines were regularly producing over 120,000 tons of coal each year.  The mines employed 130 miners.  Edward Bytheway continued to serve as superintendent of the Moween Mines and the company was headed by J. E. Baker of York, Pennsylvania.

J. E. Baker led the Keystone Coal Company through the great depression years of the 1930's.  Having shed the Meyersdale mine property, the company operated only the Moween Mines.  Employment at the Moween Mines remained relatively stable with about 120 miners working single shifts.  During the Second World War the Keystone Coal Company employed as many as 211 miners at the Moween Mines.  In ca.1943 the Moween Mines produced about 122,000 tons of coal.  The mine's preparation plant included a coal crusher, bar screens, a picking table, and loading booms.  Six electric trolley locomotives hauled the coal from the mine.  By the 1940's the company had dispensed with the powerhouse and purchased electricity from outside the town.  About ca.1950, the Keystone Coal Company ceased operations at the Moween Mines.

(History and description of the Moween Mines, with additional data and pictures adapted from "Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania: An Inventory of Historic Engineering and Industrial Sites, 1994,"  America's Industrial Heitage Project, National Park Service, Historic American Buildings Survey / Historic American Engineering Record, U.S. Department of the Interior, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.)

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