BLOOMSBURG  , a

town and the county-seat of Columbia county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., on Fishing Creek, 2 M. from its confluence with the Susquehanna, and about 4o m . S.W. of Wilkes-Barre . Pop . (1890) 4635; (1900) 6170 (213 foreign-born); (191o) 7413 . It is served by the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, the Philadelphia & Reading, and the Bloomsburg & Sullivan and .the Susquehanna, Bloomsburg & Berwick railways (the last two only 30 M. and 39 M. long respectively); and is connected with Berwick, Catawissa and Danville by electric lines . The town is built on a bluff commanding extensive views . Among the manufactures of Bloomsburg are railway cars, carriages, silk and woollen goods, furniture, carpets, wire-drawing machines and gun carriages . Iron ore was formerly obtained from the neighbouring hills . The town is the seat of a state normal school, established as such in 1869 . Bloomsburg was laid out as a town in 1802, became the county-seat in 1846, and was incorporated in 187o .