Document 3
The city in 1856

The manufactures of Pittsburgh are immense, and capable of being extended almost indefinitely. Indeed, there are no known limits to the elements necessary to their augmentation. Wood, coal, ores, and agricultural resources, all abound in the utmost profusion, and may be obtained with scarcely any expenditure of labor or of capital. In England it requires an immense outlay of capital to mine coal, which there lies from 500 to 2500 feet below the surface; but in Western Pennsylvania, enough coal to turn all the machinery ever constructed, may be found in rich beds underlying the hills, at an elevation above the ordinary level of the country. Millions of bushels of coal are annually shipped from Pittsburgh to the West and South.

Boats are built here in great numbers. Some of the fastest boats afloat on the Western waters were built at Pittsburgh.

Lloyd’s Steamboat Directory