Spruce Creek township

They Lived In Tunneltown

Did you know? More than 200 immigrant Italian and southern Black laborers dug the second railroad tunnel at Spruce Creek, and they lived in a collection of shanties known as Tunneltown.

The Pennsylvania Railroad built the tunnel in 1899 and 1900, boring through a spur of Tussey Mountain north of the original 1850 tunnel and nearly parallel to it. It was part of the work that gave the main line four tracks. The new tunnel is 1,075 feet long, lined with brick, and 32 feet wide, built for two tracks. At the western end the openings of the two tunnels are joined in a double portal.

The shanties of Tunneltown stood west of the site.

Checked and confirmed. CONFIRMED 2026-10-03 against the sources listed: every factual sentence was tied to a verbatim passage and a script confirmed each passage is in its source. Where sources disagreed on a number, the number was left out.

Sources

Nancy S. Shedd, Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania: An Inventory of Historic Engineering and Industrial Sites (HABS/HAER, 1991)

Checked 2026-10-03 · County histories and primary sources, read in full

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