Scranton, Pennsylvania

Everything Scranton is known for

5 songs mention this city 4 artists from here

Scranton, Pennsylvania, located in the Lackawanna River Valley, is known as "The Electric City" due to its early adoption of electric streetcars. While not widely known as a music hub, the city has a notable connection to several artists and songs. Metal band Motionless in White and indie bands The Menzingers and Tigers Jaw all call Scranton home.

The city is also mentioned in songs like "Send My Picture to Scranton, PA" by B.J. Thomas and "Entitlement Crew" by The Hold Steady.

Music in Scranton

Songs About Scranton

Send My Picture to Scranton, PA
B.J. Thomas
81%
"Send my picture to Scranton, PA"
Entitlement Crew
The Hold Steady
55%
"Or maybe still in Scranton like it's 1999"
The Office Theme
Jay Ferguson
30%
the office theme
piano kingdom
24%
crazy train
ozzy osbourne
10%

Artists From Scranton

M
Motionless in White
metal Pop: 72
T
The Menzingers
indie Pop: 50
T
Tigers Jaw
indie Pop: 42
C
Cabinet
americana Pop: 33

History of Scranton

The Coal Fires That Burn for Decades RoadyGoat

1962

Coal is so packed with stored energy that once a buried seam catches fire, it can burn for decades -- even generations. Underground, a coal seam has its own slow supply of fuel and just enough air seeping through cracks to keep smoldering. Without water or oxygen starvation to stop it, the fire creeps along the seam underground, almost impossible to put out. Pennsylvania's most famous example is Centralia, a coal town not far from these hills. A fire there ignited in 1962 and is still burning beneath the ground today, decades later. It hollowed the town out: smoke seeped from the soil, the highway cracked, and most residents left. It's an eerie reminder of just how much fuel sits in a coal seam -- enough to feed a fire for a human lifetime and keep going.

13.7 mi away

The Coal Ladder: Why Anthracite Rules RoadyGoat

Not all coal is created equal -- there's a ladder, and Carbondale sits at the very top. It starts as peat, a soggy mush of half-rotted swamp plants you could dig with a shovel. Bury it longer, squeeze it harder, and it climbs the ranks: peat becomes lignite, the soft brown coal. Lignite hardens into bituminous, the common black coal. And at the summit sits anthracite, the kind these hills are famous for. Each rung up the ladder means more pressure, more time, and crucially more carbon. Peat is maybe half carbon; anthracite runs about eighty-five to ninety-five percent. That carbon is the fuel. The more of it packed in, the hotter and cleaner the coal burns. Anthracite is the hardest, highest-ranked coal on Earth -- the rock that took the longest and the deepest squeeze to make.

13.9 mi away

Carbondale: The Town Named for Coal RoadyGoat

1828

Carbondale wears its fortune in its name. Split it open and you get "carbon" plus "dale" -- literally a coal valley. The Wurts brothers founded the town in the 1820s around the hard, glassy anthracite buried in these Lackawanna hills, and their Delaware and Hudson Canal Company built a town from scratch to dig it. In 1831 the first deep underground anthracite mine in America opened right here, and in 1851 Carbondale became the first chartered city in the Lackawanna Valley. To haul the coal over the mountains toward New York, the company built the Delaware and Hudson Gravity Railroad, which started running in 1829 -- one of the earliest railroads on the continent. Locals still call it "the Pioneer City." Few American towns can claim a name that doubles as a geology lesson.

14.0 mi away

Everything Near Scranton

14 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

Explore Scranton on the Map
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