 The Sunbury and Erie Railroad , renamed the Philadelphia and Erie Railroad in 1861 , reached Lock Haven in 1859 , and with it came a building boom . <unk> that the area 's coal , iron ore , white pine , and high @-@ quality clay would produce significant future wealth , railroad investors led by Christopher and John Fallon financed a line to Lock Haven . On the strength of the railroad 's potential value to the city , local residents had invested heavily in housing , building large homes between 1854 and 1856 . Although the <unk> ' coal and iron ventures failed , Gothic Revival , Greek Revival , and Italianate mansions and commercial buildings such as the Fallon House , a large hotel , remained , and the railroad provided a new mode of transport for the ongoing timber era . A second rail line , the Bald Eagle Valley Railroad , originally organized as the Tyrone and Lock Haven Railroad and completed in the 1860s , linked Lock Haven to Tyrone , 56 miles ( 90 km ) to the southwest . The two rail lines soon became part of the network controlled by the Pennsylvania Railroad . 
