The Lehigh Tannery and the village of Lehigh Tannery stood in woods beside the river, where more than 100 families lived and two railroads, an ice house, steam saw mill, hotel, and school supported a thriving community. Bark from the valley's giant hemlocks supplied the tannic acid used to cure as many as 50,000 hides a year, making it the second largest tannery in America during this era. Its success came at enormous cost to the river and forest: wastes dumped into the river turned it black, and logging left a landscape strewn with abandoned trees cut only for their bark. In 1875, an uncontrollable fire swept across the forest floor and forever destroyed the tannery. Only decades earlier, naturalist and artist John James Audubon had visited, sketched native birds, and sadly noted the deforestation in his journal. Today, the industry is largely gone, and rejuvenated forests again shelter native birds.