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City) is a borough located 50 miles (80 km) north by west of Reading in northern Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania or the southern Coal Region. The name "Mahanoy" is believed to be a variation of the Native American word 'Maghonioy', or "the salt deposits".
Mahanoy City, originally a part of Mahanoy township was settled in 1859 and incorporated as a borough in 1863. The borough was a major center of anthracite coal production and the region was embroiled in the Molly Maguires incidents. It is served by branches of the Lehigh Valley and the Philadelphia & Reading railways. The borough is situated in the valley of Mahanoy Creek, approximately 4 miles southeast of Shenandoah, PA. Mahanoy City has an elevation of 1240 ft. above the sea; Broad Mountain (1795 ft), a ridge extending through Schuylkill county, overlooks it on the S.E. The valley is also part of the anthracite Coal Region of Pennsylvania, fire clay abounds in the vicinity, and the borough's principal industries are still the mining and shipping of coal although the demand for it has steadily declined since its peak in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Aside from coal, the manufacturing of shirts, bedding and foundry products is also fairly prominent.
In 1948, Mahanoy City became the first municipality in the country to have Cable TV.
The population in 1900 was 13,504 people; in 1910, 15,936 people; and in 1920, 15,599 people. The number of people working as coal miners had declined by 1940 when 13,442 people lived in the borough. The population was 4,647 at the 2000 census.