With the commercial development of the anthracite coal fields in eastern Pennsylvania and with the completion of the canal system by which the coal could be transported at low rates to populated regions of the state, it was now possible to provide low-cost fuel to steam engines. This was extremely important as it freed industry from having to rely on water-power to perform mechanical tasks such as turning a shaft that could, for example, pull a cable attached to empty coal cars up an incline or drive a blower that could provide blast-air to an iron furnace. Or the engine shaft could turn the wheels of a self-propelled vehicle – a steam locomotive, for example, operating on a rail system using iron rails to be produced by the anthracite iron industry which burgeoned in the early 1840s. Or the engine could turn a shaft driving the propeller of a boat – the “steamboat”.
