USA > Indiana > Sullivan County > A history of Sullivan County, Indiana, closing of the first century's history of the county, and showing the growth of its people, institutions, industries and wealth, Volume I > Part 19
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Jan. 8, 1903-U. S. Steel Corporation is engaged in securing 2,000 acres between Farmersburg and Shelburn. The most serious obstacle now with operators is scarcity of miners.
Jan. 22, 1903-Manufacturers and Consumers Fuel Co. of Anderson has purchased 2,700 acres of coal land in Hamilton town- ship. The coal is badly needed in the gas-belt factories, and shafts will be sunk at once.
Jan. 22, 1903-The Fairbanks Coal Co. has been organized to supply that township, whose residents now have to go east of the E. & T. H. R. R. for their coal, sometimes waiting 24 or 48 hours for their turn. The capital of $6,000 is all subscribed, and the drill- ing commenced Monday.
March 5, 1903-The Indiana Harbor R. R. Co. buys 1,980 acres
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west of Farmersburg ; must mean that that railroad is coming to the county ( ?).
April 16, 1903-Shaft to be sunk for the E. & T. H. R. R. five miles northeast of Sullivan. New York capitalists buy 6,000 acres in Cass and Haddon townships, and four mines to be opened at once. It is expected that the Monon will run its Summit-Vincennes exten- sion through this tract.
May 28, 1903-James Epperson, state mine inspector, estimates that the mining capacity of coal mines will be increased about 20 per cent this year, due to the increase of facilities. This increase is almost entirely confined to Greene and Sullivan counties.
July 16, 1903-J. K. Dering of Chicago gets 4,000 acres from Paxton to the Jefferson township line .- County Assessor Francis E. Walters estimates that 50,000 acres of mineral land in this county have been sold at an average of $30 per acre. In nearly all the deeds inflated values have been assigned, and according to the considera- tion named in the deeds about $3,000,000 has been paid into the county. At the present time the sales average about 2,000 acres a week.
Aug. 13, 1903-Eleven mines are now under construction within a radius of seven miles north and east of Sullivan.
Aug. 20, 1903-J. Smith Talley, Charles J. Barnes, F. T. Dicka- son and others have incoporated the Shirley Coal Co., $650,000 capi- tal, to work in Cass township.
Sept. 10, 1903-According to the state mine inspector, Mr. Epperson, nine-tenths of the coal development in the state is in Sullivan and Greene counties, though fourteen counties ship coal. The Southern Indiana Railroad has done much to give facilities. The annual output in these two counties reaches about 5,000,000 tons.
Oct. 15, 1903-The coal company of Fairbanks have laid out a town of 26 lots, and have voted to call it Dixie, but as there is another postoffice of that name in the state it will have to be changed.
Nov. 19, 1903-Mining operations handicapped by great scarcity of cars, especially on the Southern Indiana.
March 3, 1904-The Indiana & Chicago Coal Co. will sink two shafts to veins 3 and 4. One shaft north of Dugger will ship over the I. C. and Southern Indiana, while the one south of Dugger will Vol. 1-17
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use the Indianapolis Southern and the Indianapolis and Vincennes. The sinking of so many shafts puts Sullivan county in good condi- tion to stand a strike.
Aug. II, 1904-The Fairbanks Coal Co. about ready for busi- ness. Their coal is surpassed in point of combustible matter by only one mine in the state.
Jan. 12, 1905-The largest deal in coal mines yet consummated in Indiana has been or will be closed within the next few days. Twelve or more big mines along the C. & E. I. and the E. & T. H. railroads have been acquired by the Dering Coal Co. of Chicago, formed under the corporation laws of Delaware and capitalized at $5,000,000. It is understood that the Frisco System is back of the enterprise. Nearly every mine acquired has a capacity of two thousand tons a day. Some of the mines lie near Clinton, and two are in Illinois.
Feb. 2, 1905-Report of state geologist: New shafts sunk in Indiana, 37; in Sullivan county, 10; Clay county, 6; Greene county, 6; abandoned in Indiana, II; in Sullivan county, o. Tons mined in Sullivan county for past year, 1,553,338, giving this county third place. Powder used in Greene county, 51,633 kegs; in Vigo county, 71,669 kegs; in Sullivan county, 23,526 kegs. One keg mines 43 tons in Greene county, 24 tons in Vigo, and 65 tons in Sullivan. Sullivan county employs 275 pick miners, 178 machine miners and helpers, 908 loaders, 476 inside day and monthly men, and 283 outside day men. Seventeen mines in operation in Sul- livan county. Nine fatal accidents in this county, out of 55 in the entire state.
Feb. 16, 1905-Dering Coal Co. absorbs the Willfred mine in Jackson township, of which Paul Wright was president and largest stockholder.
Feb. 23, 1905-A Chicago syndicate has closed deal for 1,500 acres of land in Curry township, northeast of Shelburn. Market for coal lands is now very dull, owing to the depressed condition of the coal trade.
March 30, 1905-The mining company at Alum Cave is pre- paring to move its property. The mine has now been burning for three years.
April 6, 1905-Nine mines owned by a company of which J.
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K. Seifert of Chicago is the head have been transferred to the In- diana Southern Coal Company of which D. W. Cummins is presi- dent. Rumored that John R. Walsh is at the head of the new company. The nine mines, which brought $2,000,000, include the Shelburn, Citizens, Cummins, Alum Cave, Gilmour, Green Hill, In- diana Hocking and the mines of the Forest Coal Company and the Pittsburg Coal Co .- The mines of the Dering Company have contracts to furnish coal to the C. & E. I., Frisco, part of the Rock Island System, and some plants of the U. S. Steel Corporation.
May 4, 1905-A New York syndicate has bought seven of the largest mines in the county for about $2,500,000, John S. Bays having managed the deal. The properties include the St. Clair mine of the North Jackson Hill Coal and Mining Co., the White Ash mine of the Hymera Coal and Mining Co., the Star City mine of the Harder and Hafer Coal Mining Co., the Union Coal Co., the Glendora mine of the W. S. Bogle Coal and Mining Co., and the Kellar Coal Co. Ten thousand acres are involved in the trans- action, with an annual output of about two million tons. It is certain that the railroads are behind the deal.
May 4, 1905-Indiana Southern Coal Co., of which D. W. Cummins is president and J. K. Seifert secretary and treasurer, has closed deal for 2,200 acres of undeveloped coal land lying south of Jackson Hill in Cass and Jackson townships.
May 19, 1905-John S. Bays is named as the Indiana agent of the Consolidated Coal Co., a Maine corporation capitalized at $4,000,000, of which $3,400,000 is the amount represented in In- diana. The company owns eight Sullivan county mines in opera- tion and has leases over several thousand acres in the county. This company is one of three large ones which have been fighting the past year for control of that field. (Indianapolis News.)
May 19, 1905-R. B. Harder and Hymera Coal Co. pay out more than $80,000 to farmers for coal lands in Jackson township.
May 25, 1905-Thousands of acres in Haddon, Turman, Fair- banks and Gill townships have been optioned for coal in the last few months.
June 22, 1905-Lattas Creek Coal Co. buys out Keystone Coal Co. and about $80,000 worth of coal lands besides, all in northern Cass township. Indiana Southern Coal Co. supposed to be back of the transaction.
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July 13. 1905-The Vandalia Coal Co., the largest of six big combinations and capitalized at $7,000,000, is buying in Sullivan county the Island Valley Coal Co., the Indiana & Chicago, the In- dianapolis and Sullivan, the Superior mine, and the property of the J. Smith Talley Coal Co., containing 2,200 acres of undeveloped land.
July 20, 1905-Seventy mines in Indiana have now been merged into six big operating companies.
July 27. 1905-Pennsylvania capitalists have drill at work on the Joe Akin farm near Carlisle. The Frisco System has leased 2,000 acres near there.
Sept. 7, 1905-Mines Nos. 1 and 2, or Consolidated 31 and 32, at Hymera, were shut down a day or two ago, and it is reported they will not resume work for thirty days. The only reason so far as the public knows is that there is no market for the coal and that the company can not get it hauled into Chicago. The Hymera people hope that when Walsh gets his road into Chicago that such difficulties will be solved.
Sept. 14, 1905-Better times are predicted as result of merger. The Vandalia Coal Co., which is the holding company of the Van- dalia Railroad, assumes control of eighteen coal companies dis- tributed in Vigo, Clay, Greene, Sullivan and Knox counties.
Nov. 20, 1905-Coal mining industry looks brighter at Dugger. Keeley mine, which has been closed since last August for repairs, has opened with a small force. New shaker screens and endless rope system of haulage have been installed so that capacity of mine has been increased. New steel tipple at Caledonia soon to be com- pleted.
Dec. 21, 1905-Secretary of the U. M. W. of A. reports that the mines in the IIth district work only about four days a week.
Jan. 6, 1906-The blockades are lifted and car shortage felt at only a few places. The railroads handled more Indiana coal in December than in the same month last year.
Jan. II, 1906-The Paragon Coal Co., capitalized at $5,000,- 000, has been organized at Terre Haute with headquarters there. To operate mines about Shelburn and Farmersburg.
Jan. 25, 1906-The coal trade in Illinois and Indiana less satisfactory than last year. The shot-firers bill caused a shut-
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down of eight days throughout the state, the first general shut. down since 1897.
Feb. 1, 1906-Government tests at St. Louis show that Indiana coal is the greatest steam-producing coal in the country.
Feb. 15, 1906-The Consolidated Indiana Coal Co. sell some . large mines in this county to the Dering Coal Co. Understood to mean that the Rock Island interests have assumed control of botli companies.
The Strike of 1906.
April 5. 1906-The miners working in the mines owned by members of the operators' association were all out on a holiday April 2. Many were in town making the most of what is expected to be a few days' strike. No Sullivan county operators have yet signed the 1903 scale, but some have signified their willingness, and operators in other parts of the state are signing.
April 19, 1906-Miners have been idle two weeks, and business men complain. There is not the usual amount of drunkenness. Squire High of Fontanet asked the brewing companies not to fol- low their former custom of sending free beer to aid the miners, and the brewers heeded the request. In former years there was much carousing during a period of idleness among the miners. The Sullivan County Coal Co. at Dugger has signed the scale, being the third member of the operators association to do so, and for this it will probably be expelled from the association. The Carlisle Clay and Coal Co. had signed previously, and both mines are open and a full force at work.
May 10, 1906-The fear that the railroads would refuse to furnish cars deters many small operators from signing scale. Dis- trict President O'Connor furnishes statement to show that at least ten large owners have signed.
May 24, 1906-The joint convention of miners and operators fails to agree. The miners declare that it would be unfair to arbi- trate as long as enough operators have signed to produce one-fourth of the regular output of the state.
June 14, 1906-Agreement is reached by the strike committee of the Indiana miners and the operators on June 13th, after a ses-
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sion of 17 days. Four hours after signing of the agreement the whistle of Citizens Mine announced work to begin following day. The men to get the 1903 scale, but agree to some changes of con- ditions. The 1903 scale means an increase of five and a half per- cent over the scale of 1904-05. About 52 mines had agreed to the scale between April I and June I, and about 3,000 miners were at work before the final agreement.
July 19, 1906-The Carlisle mine resumes work after being closed two weeks, new machinery having been installed to increase the output from 200 tons to 2,000 tons a day.
Aug. 2, 1906-There is no demand for coal, and the miners of the IIth district are practically without work. The only mines working are those under contract to supply manufacturing concerns.
Oct. 4, 1906-The government reports five important mining consolidations in Indiana during 1905. The Vandalia took the Island Coal Co. in Sullivan and Greene counties, the Indiana & Chicago Coal Co. in Sullivan county, as well as many mines in other counties. The Dering company bought the J. Wooley Coal Co., Brouillets Creek Coal Co., Wilfred Coal Co., Indian Fuel Co., W. S. Bogle Coal and Mining Co., Willow Grove Coal Co., in Sul- livan, Vigo and Vermillion counties. The Consolidated Indiana Coal Co. merged the properties of the North Jackson Hill Coal Mining Co., the Sullivan County Coal Mining Co., the Union Coal Co., Harder and Hafer Coal Mining Co., Hymera Coal Mining Co., and Kellar Coal Co., all but one being in Sullivan county. The In- diana Southern Coal Co. took over the Indiana Hocking Coal Co., the Citizens Coal Co., the Cummings Coal Co., the Rainbow Coal Co., New Pittsburg Coal and Coke Co., Greene Hill Coal and Min- ing Co. in this county. Many other properties were brought under one management by the transactions of the large companies in ad- joining counties.
March 14, 1907-Nearly every mine in the IIth district run- ning on half time on account, it is claimed, of no demand for coal. Miners are facing one of the most serious propositions in the his- tory of the district.
April 23, 1907-All joint traffic rates on coal existing between the Southern Indiana and the Big Four railroads to sixty cities on the latter road have been suspended. It is understood that many if
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not most of the thirty mines on the Southern Indiana will be com- pelled to cease operations. Many mines are already closed for re- pairs, lack of work, great amount of coal on hand, and no market. Because of the withdrawal of the rates no coal from the IIth district is sent into the gas belt.
March 14, 1908-16,000 miners in the IIth district vote to strike. The fining system, docking, delivery of powder, and top wages are the subjects of contention. Miners claim that they are fined for failure to live up to contract, when there is no correspon- ding penalty for the operators. It is considered an inopportune time for strike, since there is no demand for coal.
June 30, 1908-T. E. Willard, the government expert in the employ of the geological survey, has visited and examined all the mines in the county except a few small ones. He thinks the mines in Indiana far superior to those of other states in methods used. West Virginia is the only state outside of Pennsylvania where he has seen mines in the same class with those in Sullivan county so far as methods go.
Oil and Gas.
During the present decade Sullivan county has attained to some im- portance in the production of oil and gas. Its oil wells have proved comparatively small as measured with the oil districts of adjacent coun- ties, both in this state and in Illinois, but the discovery of gas about two years ago has earned for the county the title of the "Sullivan county gas field."
Shortly after the close of the Civil war some interest was taken in the deposits of oil which were disclosed in the Wabash valley. At Terre Haute a deep well, being sunk by Chauncey Rose, struck oil in small quantities, but the discovery was not appreciated. This was in 1865, only a few years after Drake and his associates had begun the development of the oil regions about Titusville, Pennsylvania. The use of the new fuel and its appearance in the markets of the world were regarded with much interest, and the discussion of the oil deposits, the methods of ob-
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taining it from wells, and its value as a natural resource attracted atten- tion everywhere. So it is not strange that the possibility of oil deposits in Sullivan county was often considered, and evidences of oil would at- tract popular attention. The first published item of this kind so far as known was contained in the Democrat of February 9, 1865, in which it is stated that a well of drinking water on the lot of Mr. Otto is affected by the taste of petroleum, and that indications of oil appear on the sur- face of the water after it has stood for awhile. An intention was ex- pressed to bore for oil in that locality.
The following year (1866) proved to be one of much excitement over the oil development in this county. In January it was reported that the Oil and Mining Company of Celina, Ohio, had leased 1, 100 acres of land about ten miles northwest of Sullivan with the purpose of boring for oil. M. Beardsley of Merom was one of the incorporators of the company.
A little later two companies were formed to test for oil. In one of the bores made, gas was discovered in such quantities that the work could not be continued and the well was plugged. Natural gas was not yet in favor as fuel.
In May the Sullivan County Oil and Mining Company secured the lease of a well which had been bored by the railroad company some six or eight years before, near the Sullivan depot. After being sunk about 600 feet, the well was abandoned. At this depth, stated the Democrat, a peculiar substance had been found which at the time was unknown, but which was now believed to be petroleum.
The interest in oil soon died out, and the work of prospecting. was not productive of any practical results. More than three decades passed before attention was again paid to the oil and gas deposits of this section of the state.
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The renewal of the efforts to develop the oil and gas deposits of of the county began with the opening of the present century, about coincident with the opening of the western Indiana and eastern Illinois fields. But actual operations in this county are still more recent. At the close of 1904 what was known as the Sullivan Gas and Oil Company (J. P. Johnson, of Princeton, president ; F. J. Biggs, Princeton, secretary, and Sam A. White, of Sullivan, treasurer) leased a large amount of land in the western part of the county, and test wells were sunk in some places. Oil was discovered on the McGrew farm east of Farmersburg, and gas was struck at a depth of 250 feet by Harder and Hafer, south- east of that town.
The most important development of gas, which brought into general use the term "Sullivan county gas field," centered in the striking of gas on the Jamison farm about two miles west of Sullivan, where the pres- ence of derricks, the working of the pumps and the pipes at the roadside are evidence of a prosperous gas field. On the night of April 16, 1907, the drill penetrated to the gas, and all night long the well continued to blow out oil and stone. A few days later tests showed 300 pounds rock pressure, said to be within 50 pounds of the strongest well in the state. The Jamison farm has since continued the largest scene of operations in this county, both for gas and oil. During the year half a dozen wells were put down, and in November wells 4, 5 and 6 were reported to yield about forty barrels of oil a day.
The following items from the Democrat indicate the progress of the oil and gas development :
Aug. 17, 1905-The Jones Oil and Gas Company, the largest independent operators in the state, have leased 2,100 acres near Dugger, and 5,000 acres near Carlisle ; boring to begin soon.
Dec. 28, 1905-Gas has been struck at a depth of 535 feet by the Fairbanks Gas and Coal Co .; Jan. 4, 1906-the gas has been piped to the engine boiler and boring continued, in search of oil.
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May 3, 1906-The well on the farm of J. W. Bowen near Fair- banks was shot at depth of 440 feet, and said to have a capacity of ten or fifteen barrels a day.
June 7, 1906-Articles of incorporation of the Carlisle Oil and Gas Co. filed ; $10,000 capital at one dollar per share. To drill on the farms of Finley Collins and William R. Colvin southeast of Carlisle.
July 16, 1906-Egypt Oil and Gas Co. files articles of incor- poration to work in Indiana and Illinois. Sullivan men backing the company.
Dec. 27, 1906-Company formed at Farmersburg. Its first test well at depth of 1,900 feet yields few indications of oil. ยท
Feb. 21, 1907-A little gas and some oil found at the well on the Julius Hoseman farm southeast of Merom. Well was drilled to I,100 feet, then plugged to 700 feet where a layer of oil sand had been found, and was then shot; April II-estimated that from IO to 25 barrels of oil are now flowing from this well, with a large quantity of salt water.
April, 1907-Work has begun on T. H. Mason farm, south of the Jamison farm, and a company of local men leased about I,100 acres near Sullivan and began drilling on the Frank Mason farm south of town.
Jan. 9, 1908-Hamilton Oil and Gas Co. has sold 1,000 barrels of oil to a Terre Haute firm from the Jamison wells.
April 25, 1907-Good flow at the Barnard well 100 feet south of the Jamison.
May 23, 1907-Oil sand struck at the Park Osborne well five miles northwest of Sullivan at depth of 527 feet .- Bailey McCon- nell, president of the Carlisle Oil and Gas Co., has signed over all the leases held by them on 4,000 acres southeast of Carlisle to the Union Oil Co. of Pennsylvania.
April 9, 1908-The Big Four Oil and Gas Co. of Bridgeport, Illinois, has leased hundreds of acres near Farnsworth and begun the building of the biggest rig in the county.
May 7, 1908-The Crawford Oil Co., after spending thousands of dollars and months of time, is about to abandon the territory east of Paxton.
June 18, 1908-A corps of surveyors now at work in Sullivan county for the Tide Water pipe line.
CHAPTER XVIII.
MONEY AND BANKING.
Sullivan county has no banking institutions within its boundaries during the pioneer history. Yet the residents of the county were not without banking facilities, though to get them it was necessary to go to Terre Haute on the north or Vincennes on the south.
The absence of a bank in any considerable center of trade would in this modern age be felt as a serious drawback. It is almost a daily occurrence for the merchant and business man of Sullivan county to buy the credit of his local bank for the purpose of transacting business with distant centers. Instead of using his individual credit to pay for goods in the wholesale markets of Chicago or St. Louis, he uses the official paper and name of the local bank, which is a recognized medium for such transactions. Any other method of doing business would result in delays and losses that would not be tolerated in this commercial age.
It was very different in the early years of Sullivan county. The business of the community was then primitive and simple; now it is complex.
What constituted the business activities of the county during the years following its first settlement ? It is possible to answer this question without omitting any important interest.
The supply and demand which comprehended the trade and industry
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of the time were limited to the articles that are needed by society in a frontier condition. The demand was for things to eat; clothing and shelter ; and the implements that were used in the field, in the house and in the mills. The local production of things included under these heads was almost sufficient to satisfy the demand. The farmer grew his wheat and corn, from which his bread was made; raised the hogs from which came his supply of pork or obtained a considerable portion of his meat from the wild game in the woods. The forest supplied material for building and furniture. The flax, and in early days, the cotton, raised in the fields, was converted by housewifely diligence and skill into garments for all members of the family.
When the simple economy of the pioneers is considered, it is sur- prising that the amount of trade was as large as it was. Like many Robinson Crusoes, the settlers lived by consuming only what nature and their own efforts produced.
Nevertheless, there was some degree of classification of industry. The individual pounded or ground his corn with his own crude imple- ments only until the first mill was built. The flour mill was the most important institution in the new country, and with its establishment came the miller, who depended on the patronage of his neighbors to supply him with the means of subsistence.
Though so much was grown and wrought on the farm, there was still necessity for a central place where the rarer articles of common use might be kept for sale. The stock in trade of the early merchant was limited in variety, yet the trade in staples was sufficient to make many a fortune for men who engaged in such trade during the early years.
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