14 | LEHIGH ALUMNI BULLETIN YOU Mark Connar ’84 MBA asks the question, launching a years-long effort to preserve a piece of world heritage on Lehigh’s Stabler Pathways property. WHAT HERE?’ HAVE IN HIS MIND’S EYE, MARK CONNAR ’84 MBA CAN SEE IT ALL VERY CLEARLY. He can see the imposing 19th-century stone castle-like structure on Lehigh’s Stabler Pathways property—near Center Valley Parkway in Upper Saucon Township, Pennsylvania—come to life as an interpretive museum and industrial heritage park for children, families and students. He can see the debris cleared, and the thick walls of local stone cleaned, repointed and stabilized so future generations can go inside and learn about its past as the home of The President Pumping Engine—the world’s largest and most powerful single-cylinder stationary rotative steam engine ever, which drew massive amounts of water from the zinc mine so the rich ore could be extracted. Connar can see a circular viewing stand the size of the engine’s cylinder, over 9 feet in diameter, inside the once three-story building, an architectural achievement itself and the only pumping engine house still standing in the United States built in the style of the Cornish from Great Britain. And as he walks around the perimeter of the mining pit, now a picturesque small lake, Connar can see people strolling on a nature trail, enjoying the present as they contemplate the time when this 20-acre area was teeming with activity. Connar has made it his retired life’s work— with Lehigh as ally—to turn his vision into reality. The former purchasing director for Air Products has built a coalition of support that includes the university and organizations and people both locally and globally. In the process, he has become a leading expert in the area’s important zinc mining history. So much zinc was mined on the property in the village of Friedensville and others nearby in the late 1800s that the Lehigh Valley was once a birthplace of America’s zinc industry and the producer of one half the nation’s supply of zinc in the period following the Civil War. ‘DO YOU KNOW Story by Jodi Duckett Photography by Christa Neu
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