Джим Торптың қабірі және мансаптық тарихы

Borough and county seat of Carbon County, Pennsylvania

Mauch Chunk was the location of one of the trials of the Molly Maguires in 1876, which resulted in the hanging of four men found guilty of murder. The population of the borough in 1900 was 4,020; in 1910, it was 3,952. Following the 1953 death of athlete and Olympic medal winner Jim Thorpe, Thorpe's widow and third wife, Patricia, was impatient when, after five months, the planned memorial in Shawnee, Oklahoma had yet to raise the $100,000 to honor him. The town's citizens had paid for her, a Thorpe son and Jim's body to be shipped from California, paid and arranged for the funeral service at St. Benedict's Catholic church, and paid for the mausoleum costs at Fairview Cemetery. Then Gov. Johnston Murray vetoed a bill which would contribute funds to the erection of the memorial at Athletic Park. On Sept. 1st Mrs. Thorpe, saying she feared Jim would be buried in a potter's field, shipped the body to Tulsa where she said the Chamber of Commerce was going to build a proper memorial, which was not true. When she heard that the boroughs of Mauch Chunk and East Mauch Chunk were desperately seeking to attract business, she made a deal with civic officials. According to Jim Thorpe's son, Jack, Patricia was motivated by money in seeking the deal.

The two cross river boroughs merged in 1954 and renamed the new municipality Jim Thorpe in his honor, despite Thorpe never setting foot in the Borough while alive. The municipality then obtained the athlete's remains from his wife and erected a monument to the Oklahoma native, who began his sports career southwest, as a student at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The monument site contains his tomb, two statues of him in athletic poses, and historical markers describing his life story. The grave rests on mounds of soil from Thorpe's native Oklahoma and from the Stockholm Olympic Stadium in which he won his Olympic medals. On June 24, 2010, one of Jim Thorpe's sons, Jack Thorpe, sued the town for his father's remains, citing the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, which is designed to return Native American artifacts to their tribal homelands. On February 11, 2011, Judge Richard Caputo ruled that Jack Thorpe could not gain any monetary award, nor any amount for attorney's fees in the lawsuit and that for the lawsuit to continue other members of the Thorpe family and the Sac and Fox Nation would have to join him as plaintiffs. Before Jack Thorpe could respond to the ruling he died at the age of 73 on February 22, 2011. Because of his death his representatives were given more time to respond to the ruling. On May 2, 2011, William and Richard Thorpe, Jim Thorpe's remaining sons and the Sac & Fox Nation of Oklahoma joined the lawsuit, allowing it to continue. On April 19, 2013, Caputo ruled in favor of William and Richard Thorpe, ruling that the borough amounts to a museum under the law. This ruling was reversed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on October 23, 2014. The US Supreme Court refused to hear their appeal on October 5, 2015, assuring that Jim Thorpe's remains will stay in Carbon County. The decision to rename the borough saw a mixed reaction by the borough's residents, many of whom still refer to the borough as Mauch Chunk. Detractors to the new name claim that the renaming was a "Tourist Lure" and protested that Jim Thorpe had never even set eyes on the borough while he was alive. There were several movements to rename the borough back to Mauch Chunk, first in 1964 after the expected boost in tourism never came and another in 1992 as Jim Thorpe's popularity waned and locals referred to renaming the borough after a dead Native American to boost tourism revenues as "crass commercialism" while Thorpe's family called for his remains to be returned to Oklahoma. Jim Thorpe tourism is based on its vintage architecture, and recreation such as hiking, paintball and white water rafting.

The Carbon County Section of the Lehigh Canal, Old Mauch Chunk Historic District, Mauch Chunk Switchback Railway, Asa Packer Mansion, Harry Packer Mansion, Carbon County Jail, Central Railroad of New Jersey Station, and St. Mark's Episcopal Church are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The former Central Railroad of New Jersey railroad line through the Lehigh gorge and through Jim Thorpe is now operated as a summer tourist railroad by Reading Blue Mountain & Northern Railroad. The former New York City to Buffalo Lehigh Valley Railroad across the river is a present day very active freight hauling railroad operated by Norfolk Southern.

In 1827, the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company, a coal mining and shipping company with operations in Summit Hill, constructed an 8.7 mile (14 km) downhill track, known as a gravity railroad, to deliver coal (and a miner to operate the mine train's brake) to the Lehigh Canal in Mauch Chunk. This helped open up the area to commerce, and helped to fuel the Industrial Revolution in the United States. By the 1850s, the "Gravity Road" (as it became known) was providing rides to thrill seekers for 50 cents a ride (equal to $ today). It is often cited as the first roller coaster in the United States. The Switchback Gravity Railroad Foundation was formed to study the feasibility of preserving and interpreting the remains of the Switchback Gravity Railroad on top of Mount Pisgah.

Jim Thorpe is located near the center of Carbon County at
In the deeps of the geologic timescale the two shorelines of the Lehigh River occupied by the 19th century towns of Mauch Chunk and East Mauch Chunk were situated on the bottom of an ancient river fed tarn, a mountain lake which filled the valley on the west bank and covered the relative flatlands on the east bank. The muddy bottom of that high tarn (the range then rivaling the Himalayas in size), where the waters pooled at a lower elevation amongst the twisted folds of four near parallel ridgelines, created a level region whose settlements became the relatively flat lands on either bank of the Lehigh. The ridgelines, which run east northeast to west southwest, are (from north to south) Broad, Nesquehoning, Pisgah, and Mauch Chunk ridges (or Mountains)—each of which runs over 15 mile (24 km) west to the gaps cut by the Schuylkill River. According to the United States Census Bureau, the borough of Jim Thorpe has a total area of , of which is land and , or 2.15%, is water. Jim Thorpe is 3 mile (5 km) north and upstream of Lehighton, below the Lehigh Gap which sunders Bear Mountain on the east bank from the extended ridge of Mauch Chunk Mountain. The town is 4 mile (6 km) east of Nesquehoning, which is up a steep grade and around the bend along U. S. 209 South, and also butting up against the slopes of Mount Pisgah. This was a key element in the LC&N's planning, for the grade from the mountain ridge down to the river enabled them to fill barges quickly, using chutes and an elevated entry from a road down the ridge face. Jim Thorpe's developed elevations range between the river slack water at 540 feet (165 m) above sea level—720 feet (219 m) to the town's upper streets, all below the western peak of Mount Pisgah, which tops out at 1519 feet (463 m) above sea level. The elevation of the Borough of Jim Thorpe ranges from 540 feet (165 m) at Broadway and Hazard Square downtown to 1700 feet (518 m) above sea level 3 mile (5 km) northeast of the borough center near the Penn Forest Township line. It has a warm summer humid continental climate (Dfb) and average downtown monthly temperatures range from 26.5 °F in January to 71.2 °F in July. PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State U The local hardiness zone is 6a.

As of 2019, there were 30.08 mile (48 km) of public roads in Jim Thorpe, of which 10.95 mile (18 km) were maintained by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) and 19.13 mile (31 km) were maintained by the borough. U. S. Route 209, although signed as a north–south route, tends to follow an east–west route in Pennsylvania. In Jim Thorpe and Lehighton, U. S. 209 runs in directions opposite its signage—i. e., northbound U. S. 209 runs southwards and vice versa. It intersects the Pennsylvania Turnpike Northeast Extension (Interstate 476) east of Lehighton, about 6 mile (10 km) southeast of Jim Thorpe. Pennsylvania Route 903 has its southern terminus at U. S. 209 in Jim Thorpe. It is a north–south route that runs northeast of town, connecting to PA 115 near the Pocono Raceway, Interstate 476, and PA 534 in Penn Forest Township. Carbon Transit provides bus service to Jim Thorpe along Route 701, which runs between Coaldale and Palmerton on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and Route 702, which runs between Nesquehoning and Palmerton Monday Friday. Carbon Transit also operates CT Flex service in Jim Thorpe, Penn Forest Township, and Kidder Township. The town is served by the Reading, Blue Mountain, and Northern Railroad with year round freight service. Seasonal passenger excursions to and from the town is provided by its subsidiary, the Lehigh Gorge Scenic Railway.