USA > Ohio > Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I > Part 17
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The development of the coal trade of the State has been very remarkable. Some of the pioneer miners still survive. Mr. Henry Newberry, father of Dr. John S. Newberry, the eminent geologist, was one of the pioneer miners of Eastern Ohio, and made the first shipments to Cleveland in the year 1828, for the purpose of supplying the lake steamboats. A few years ago the writer, in pub- lishing this fact in his annual report as State Inspector of Mines, received the following letter from H. V. Bronson, of Peninsula, who took the first boat-load to Cleveland :
"PENINSULA, Summit County, Ohio, April 8, 1878.
"ANDREW ROY, EsQ. :
"Sir : Not long since I saw in the papers that in your annual report as State Inspector of Mines you stated that the first coal shipped to Cleveland was in the year 1828, and by the late Mr. Henry Newberry, of Cuyahoga Falls, father of Prof. Newberry, of Cleveland. I took that coal to Cleveland for Mr. Newberry, it being fifty years ago since it was done. I was then in the seventeenth year of my age, and have resided in this place ever since 1824. There were three of us boys on the boat. One of them was about a year my junior, and now resides in one of the townships of Cuyahoga county, and became a successful inventor and business man. The other was then in his twelfth year, and is now a lawyer, with a lucrative practice, in a beautiful growing city in an adjoining State. On the first of January last I made a New Year's call on Prof. Newberry at his home in Cleveland. A few years ago I presented Prof. Newberry with a lump of the coal taken from one of the boat-loads of that coal. As this whole transaction is somewhat remarkable, I have taken the liberty to write you about it, especially as we three boatmen are natives of Cuyahoga county.
"Very respectfully, "H. V. BRONSON."
The late President Garfield was a canal boatman from the mines of Governor David Tod, of Briar Hill, near Youngstown, to Cleveland, when he was a boy of fifteen years of age; and an accident which occurred to Garfield while on a canal-boat, by which he was nearly drowned, determined in some degree his future career. He fell into the canal and could not swim, and was saved, as he believed, by providential interference. He resolved to become a scholar, believing that God had destined him for some great purpose in life.
The mines of the Mahoning valley region were first opened by Governor David Tod, in the year 1845, at Briar Hill, and such was the superior quality of the coal that the coal of the Mahoning and Shenango valley was ever after known
IT?
MAA MINES AND MINING RESOURCES OF OHIO.
n market as Briar Hill coal. At Mineral Ridge, a few miles from Briar Hill, the coal-seam is split in two, the intercalated material consisting of a seam of black band iron ore, from four to fourteen inches in thickness. This ore is mined in connection with the coal, and is used in the blast-furnaces of the region with the hematite ores of the Lake Superior region, producing a very superior grade of iron, known in market as American Scotch pig.
The seams of coal and iron ore of the Hocking valley region were noted by the first white men who visited this country. A map of the Western country now in the possession of Judge P. H. Ewing, of Lancaster, Fairfield county, published in the year 1788, notes a number of sections of coal and iron-ore beds.
The development of the great coal region of the Hocking valley was due to the construction of the Hocking valley branch of the Ohio canal. Among the pioneer mine operators of this region was the elder Thomas Ewing, afterwards United States Senator from Ohio, and a member of President Lincoln's cabinet. His mines were located at Chauncy, at Nelsonville. The best market for coal at that time was the old Neil House, in Columbus. Thomas Ewing, and his asso- ciates in business, Samuel F. Vinton, Nicholas Biddle, and Elihu Chauncy, also mined salt in the Hocking valley, the first salt-well of the region being sunk in the year 1831 by Resolved Fuller, the water yielding ten per cent. of salt.
The Ohio and Mississippi rivers are the greatest and cheapest coal carriers in the world, and the vast coal-trade development of these famous streams dates back fifty years. The cost of shipping coal from Pittsburg to Louisville is only one and three-quarter cents per bushel, or forty-three and three-quarter cents per ton, the distance being upward of 600 miles. From Louisville to New Orleans, a dis- tance of 1,400 miles, the freight on coal is two cents per bushel, or fifty cents per ton, and this includes the return of the empty barges. The lowest freights charged by railroads is one cent per mile.
In the year 1818 a merchant of Cincinnati made an estimate for the benefit of Samuel Wyllis Pomeroy, who owned the coal-lands on which the mines of Pomeroy are now opened, of the amount of coal then used on the Ohio river between Pomeroy and the falls of the Ohio.
" I am able," wrote the merchant to Mr. Pomeroy, "to communicate the follow- ing information :
Cincinnati steam-mill consumes annually,
12,000 bushels.
iron-foundry
20,000
Manufacturing Co.
5,000
Sugar Manufacturing Co. "
2,000
.. Steam Saw-mill Co.
5,000
In Maysville, used or sold,
30,000
66
Louisville, "
30,000
Dean steam-mill, 100 miles below Cincinnati,
12,000
Total,
116,000
One of the noted pioneer miners of the Ohio river is Jacob Heatherington of Bellaire. Mr. Heatherington is a practical miner of English birth who came to Bellaire more than half a century ago. He purchased a mule which was named Jack, and leased three acres of coal-land fronting the Ohio river. Jack did ser- vice as a mining mule for thirty years, during which time Mr. Heatherington prospered in business. When the faithful mule was no longer able to work his master turned him out to pasture and with great solicitude watched over his de clining years. When poor Jack fell and was too old and infirm to rise.he was gently raised to his feet by loving hands, and when death came at last the faith- ful animal was buried with great ceremonies. Mr. Heatherington lives in a fine mansion on the Ohio river, and upon the keystone of the arch over the hall door has been carved the head of the faithful mule.
While Governor David Tod was the pioneer miner of the Mahoning valley, the great coal king of that region is Chauncey Andrews. The lucrative nature of the coal business of the Mahoning valley owing to the superior quality of the coal and its proximity to Lake Erie attracted the attention of Mr. Andrews. As the
114
THE MINES AND MINING RESOURCES OF OHIO.
coal is at all points in this region below water level and is found in basins or pots of limited area it has to be located by boring. Mr. Andrews was unsuccessful for several years, spending many thousand dollars and bringing himself to the verge of financial ruin. But he continued prospecting until success rewarded his per- severing efforts, and he is now one of the greatest coal miners in the State, being owner besides of blast furnaces, rolling-mills and railroads which he has built by his determined perseverance and business successes. The extraordinary prosperity of Youngstown is due to Chauncey Andrews more than to all other causes com- bined.
The space allotted to this article is too brief to include a sketch of the develop- ment of the coal trade, and of the men who were the pioneer miners of the State. Such a sketch, however, could not fail to be of great interest to the people of Ohio, for coal is the power upon which the future wealth and prosperity of the people will largely depend.
The manner of mining is the same in every mining district. Where the coa? is level free it is followed into the hill sides, and the workings are opened up by driving galleries eight feet wide on the face slips of the coal, which run in a northerly direction. At intervals of 150 to 200 yards branch galleries are opened of the same width as the main ones, and the rooms or chambers from which the coal is chiefly mined are opened out from the side or branch entries. The rooms are driven forward eight to ten yards wide for eighty to one hundred yards, pillars or columns of coal being left between the rooms for the support of the superincumbent strata.
Where the coal is won by shaft mining the same system of working out the coal obtains as where the seam is level free, but larger columns of coal are left to keep in place the overlying rocks in deep shafts than in shallow ones or in drifts or level free openings. Some seams of coal are more tender than others and larger pillars are required in consequence. Such seams of soft coal are less able to resist the overlying pressure than those of a firm and compact character. As a general rule mining operators aim to take out about 66 per cent. of coal in working forward, and after the workings have been advanced to the boundary of the plant the pillar coal is attacked in the far end of the excavation, and as much of the pillar coal mined as can be recovered. When an area of several acres has been all worked away the roof falls to the floor, and while the rocks are breaking the whole of the overlying strata appears to be giving way, but the miners con- tinue at their posts until the crash finally occurs, when they retreat undismayed under the protection of the unmined pillars. The pillars bordering the last fall are next attacked and worked out until another crash comes on, and this method is repeated until the workmen reach the bottom of the shaft or the mouth of the drift. If the seam of coal is five or six feet thick and the overlying strata not more than 150 to 200 feet, great chasms are frequently made on the surface of the earth directly over the places where the coal has been mined out. Houses and parts of villages are sometimes involved in the subsidence.
A system of working coal prevails in some of the mining regions of Ilhnois and Kansas, of working all the coal out as the miners advance with the excavations. This plan is known as the long wall system, and is only practiced in seams of four feet or less in thickness. Where bands of shale or fire clay are met in the coal and have to be sorted out and thrown aside in the mine, they are an advan- tage in long wall working, as they assist in the construction of the pack walls, which require to be built where the miners are at work. While long wali min- ing has many warm advocates among practical miners in Ohio this system has never obtained a permanent foothold in the State. Several of our coal seams are well adapted to long wall working.
In excavating the coal a groove or undercut is made in the bottom of the bed three to six feet in depth, along the width of the room. A hole is then bored in the coal with a drill having a bit about two inches wide. A charge of powder is inserted in the hole proportioned to the necessity of the case, when the powder is tightly tamped and the blast set off. The miner generally loads all the coal in the car as he breaks it down in his room, and after it is raised to the surface it is formed into lump, nut and slack as it passes over the screens into the railroad cars at the pit mouth, the lump coal falling into one car, the nut coal into another
115
THE MINES AND MINING RESOURCES OF OHIO.
and the slack into still another, and thus assorted the various grades are shipped to market.
The capacity or output of the mines of the State varies greatly. Thick coals are capable of a greater daily output than thin seams, and as a general rule drift mines possess greater advantages for loading coal rapidly than shaft openings. In many of the mines of the great vein region of the Hocking valley the capacity is equal to 1,200 to 1,500 tons per day. In shaft mines 600 to 700 tons daily is regarded as a good output.
The first ton of coal in a shaft mine 100 feet in depth and having a daily capacity of 600 tons frequently costs the mining adventurer upwards of $20,000, and cases are on record where owing to the extraordinary amount of water in sinking, $100,000 have been expended before coal was reached. Drift mines, as they require no machinery for pumping water and raising coal, cost less than half the amount required in shaft mining.
Water is, however, an expensive item in drift mines opened on the dip of the coal, and underground hauling under such conditions is unusually costly, par- ticularly if horses or mules are used. Many mining .companies use machinery instead of horse-power, and this is always true economy.
Two plans obtain where machinery is used, namely, by small mine locomotives and by wire ropes operated by a stationary engine located outside or at the bottom of the mine. Locomotives are objectionable owing to the smoke they make, though under the management of a skilled mining engineer who is master of the art of mine ventilation, the smoke from a mine locomotive can be made quite harmless.
Three gases are met in coal mines which make ventilation a paramount con- sideration. These gases are known among miners as fire damp, black damp and white damp. Fire damp is the light carburetted hydrogen of chemistry, and when mixed with certain proportions of atmospheric air explodes with great force and violence, producing the most dreadful consequences. Black damp is carbonic acid, and white damp is carbonic oxide gas. They are formed by blasting, by the breathing of men and animals, and they escape from the coal and its associate strata. Fire damp is seldom met in alarming quantities in drift or shallow shaft mines, and as our mines in Ohio are all less than three hundred feet below the surface, few explosions of a very destructive nature have yet occurred in the State. Black damp is the chief annoyance in Ohio mines.
There is an excitement in coal mining as there is in every branch of mining the useful and precious metals. Few men who go into the coal business ever turn their backs upon it afterwards. And, indeed, there are few failures in coal min- ing enterprises, while nearly every adventurer grows rich in time.
Until the year 1874 there was no attempt made to collect the statistics of the coal production of the State. In that year the General Assembly created the office of State Inspector of Mines, and the inspector published in his annual re- ports from the best data obtainable a statement of the aggregate annual output, beginning with the year 1872. For several years after the enactment of the law creating the Department of Mines operators were unwilling to furnish the mine inspector with a statement of the output, and as the law did not require this to be done, the statistics were generally estimates based on the returns made to the mine inspector by such companies as chose to report the product of their mines. In 1884, however, the law was so amended as to require all the mining firms in the State to report the product of coal, iron ore and limestone, and the annual output of these minerals is now more accurate and valuable than formerly.
ANNUAL COAL PRODUCTION OF OHIO FROM 1872 TO 1886.
Years.
Tons.
Years.
Tons.
1872 .
5,315,294
1880
7,000,000
1873 .
4,550,028
1881
8,225,000
1874 .
3,267,585
1882 .
9,450,000
1875 .
4,864,259
1883 .
8,229,429
1876 .
3,500,000
1884 .
7,650,062
1877 .
5,250,000
1885
7,816,179
1878 .
5,500,000
1886
8,435,211
1879
6,000,000
1887
10,301,708
ITG
THE MINES AND MINING RESOURCES OF OHIO.
COAL PRODUCTION BY COUNTIES FOR 1885 AND 1886.
Counties.
Total 1886.
Total 1885.
Lump.
Nut.
Perry
1,346,131
261,535
1,607,666
1,259,592
Athens .
766,411
132,635
899,046
823,139
Jackson .
717,516
139,224
856,740
791,60S
Hocking
637,224
104,347
741,571
656,441
Stark
519,992
73,430
593,422
391,412
Belmont
462,252
111,527
573,779
744,446
Guernsey
349,503
84,297
433,800
297,267
Columbiana
268,465
67,598
336,063
462,733
Mahoning
251,515
61,525
313,040
275,944
Jefferson
242,051
33,615
275,666
271,329
Tuscarawas
212,362
55,304
267,666
285,545
Medina .
223,747
28,664
252,411
152,721
Carroll
184,095
32,535
216,630
150,695
Meigs
165,627
26,636
192,263
234,765
Trumbull
162,331
26,200
188,531
264,517
Lawrence
139,173
27,760
166,933
145,916
Wayne .
99,174
9,883
109,057
81,507
Muskingum
85,011
11,590
96,601
86,846
Summit
70,221
12,004
82,225
145,134
Portage
61,273
9,066
70,339
77,071
Vinton
49,392
10,621
60,013
77,127
Coshocton
43,361
9,573
52,934
99,609
Gallia
14,862
2,562
17,424
16,383
Holmes .
10,491
2,179
12,670
11,459
Harrison
5,132
377
5,509
Washington
4,000
1,500
5,500
5,000
Morgan
4,370
4,370
5,536
Noble
3,342
3,342
2,440
Totals
7,099,024
1,336,187
8,435,211
7,816,179
The following table gives a summary, in a condensed form, of the tonnage, time worked, employés and casualties in each county in 1887 .*
TABLE OF TONNAGE, TIME WORKED, NUMBER OF MEN, ETC., IN EACH COUNTY IN 1887.
Counties.
Tonnage.
Number of
Average weeks
worked.
Number of
Miners.
Outside Em-
ployés.
Accidents.
Fatalities.
Athens .
1,083,543
44
35
2,080
318
2
6
Belmont
721,767
54
43
1,092
241
6
3
Columbiana
516,057
57
44
872
185
1
1
Coshocton .
124,791
20
47
219
33
1
Carroll .
293,328
27
44
533
87
5
Guernsey
553,613
15
31
795
104
5
1
Gallia
15,365
2
40
30
3
Holmes
10,526
12
40
31
6
Harrison
4,032
7
16
1
Hocking
853,063
17
31
1,389
253
2
3
Jackson
1,135,605
64
35
2,213
291
5
3
Jefferson
293,875
20
40
495
94
3
.
·
1
* Mine Inspector's report,
None repo'd
Scioto
Tonnage for 1886.
Mines.
THE MINES AND MINING RESOURCES OF OHIO.
TABLE OF TONNAGE, TIME WORKED, NUMBER OF MEN, ETC., IN EACH COUNTY IN 1887-Continued.
Counties.
Tonnage.
Number of
Mines.
Average weeks
worked.
Number of
Miners.
Outside Em-
ployés.
Accidents.
Fatalities.
Lawrence
143,559
22
42
306
52
I
2
Meigs .
185,205
15
28
495
118
1
Muskingum
171,928
73
38
385
91
2
.
Mahoning .
272,349
31
43
642
98
3
Medina .
225,487
9
41
550
61
3
Morgan (estimated)
4,100
10
2
Noble
6,300
1
8
4
Perry
1,870,841
70
34
3,008
633
7
5
Portage
65,163
3
34
138
35
Summit
95,815
11
38
156
28
3
Stark
784,164
57
35
1,561
253
17
6
Tuscarawas
506,466
47
37
852
149
3
2
Trumbull
167,989
26
33
533
96
4
Vinton .
89,727
19
44
200
51
1
Wayne .
105,150
5
36
261
71
I
1
Washington
1,880
1
7
2
Totals
10,301,708
729
913
18,877
3,360
75
36
.
The beds of iron-ore associated with the coal-seams of the Coal Measures are known by the general name of black-band ore, limestone ore, block ore, kidney ore, etc. Black-band is a dark gray, bituminous shale with reddish streaks run- ning through it. It is met in paying quantities in only two horizons in the State; namely, that of the lower coal of the series, as has been already stated, and over coal No. 7. In its best development in the mines of the Mahoning valley it yields a ton of ore to a ton of coal, but one ton of ore to three tons of coal will be the general average, and it is present in only a few mines of the valley.
In the Tuscarawas valley, near Canal Dover and Port Washington, the black- band capping coal No. 7 is met in basins of limited area. In the centre of these basins the ore is sometimes met ten to twelve feet in thickness, but it soon dwarfs to a few inches and disappears entirely. Black-band has been met on other hori- zons of the lower Coal Measures, but never of such quality as to justify mining.
The limestone ores, as calcareous and argillaceous carbonates and hydro-perox- ides or linonites, are very abundant and have been mined for fifty years in the Hanging Rock regions of Ohio and Kentucky. They were the base of the char- coal iron industries of this famous iron region-an industry which, owing to the growing scarcity of timber, is fast disappearing forever. The limestone ores derive their name from being associated with a thick and extensive deposit of gray limestone which is spread over a greater portion of the counties of Lawrence, Scioto, Jackson and Vinton, in Ohio, and the counties of Greenup, Boyd and Carter, in Kentucky. The iron made from this ore has always held a front rank in market, the cold-blast iron being particularly prized for the manufacture of ordnance, car wheels and other castings requiring tough iron.
In the manufacture of charcoal iron the linonite ore was preferred, and as this ore appeared as an outcrop it was mined by stripping the overlying cover. The counties constituting the Hanging Rock iron region on both sides of the Ohio river, along the horizon of the gray limestone ore, have been worked over in every hill and the ore stripped to a depth of eight to twelve feet, forming a line of many miles of terrace work. Since the decline of the charcoal iron industry the miners have penetrated boldly under cover and worked away the ore as coal is mined underground. The linonites when followed under cover change to car- bonates, and become less valuable in consequence. There are six to eight distinct ore horizons in the Hanging Rock region, but none of these deposits bear com-
1
THE MINES AND MINING RESOURCES OF OHIO.
parison with the gray limestone ore both as regards quality of mineral and thick- ness of vein.
The ores of value in the horizons of the Hanging Rock region are known as the big red block, the sand block and the little red block. These deposits lie lower in the geological scale than the limestone ore, and are obtained by stripping. The big red block sometimes rises to eighteen inches in thickness, but it is gen- erally met in beds of six inches or less. The sand block ore is also less than six inches thick, and is inferior to the big or little red blocks in quality, containing less iron and more silica. The little red block is not more than four inches thick on an average. These ores are mined in connection with the limestone ore wher- ever they are met in paying quality and quantity. They are too thin as a general rule to follow under cover. Occasionally other seams are met and mined, and a deposit known as the Boggs, which rises to three and four feet in thickness, but occurs as a local deposit, is recovered by drift mining.
In most of the coal regions of the State iron ore is mined to a greater or less extent, the deposits of the Hanging Rock region reappearing as equivalent strata on the same geological horizons in every part of the coal-field. The ores have local names, as the coals have local names. Nowhere is exclusive reliance placed in the native ores of the State in the manufacture of stone coal iron, the Lake Superior and Iron Mountain ores of the specular and hematite varieties forming an important mixture at every blast-furnace, while in several of the iron producing districts foreign ores are used exclusively. We have no hematite ore in the Coal Measures of Ohio, although our linonites, which are simply argillaceous carbo- nates oxydized by the action of the atmosphere, bear some resemblance to hema- tite ore. Black band and clay band ores are the main product of the Coal Meas- ures. The following is the output of ore for the year 1887, as copied from the last annual report of the inspector of mining.
AMOUNT OF IRON ORE MINED IN 1887.
Counties.
Tons of Black Band. Clay Band.
Lawrence
147.479
Vinton
37,920
Jackson
36,362
Tuscarawas
61,595
Perry
21,630
Trumbull
4,740
Columbiana
7,800
Scioto
14,784
Hocking
9,118
Gallia
8,326
Total tons
87,965
289,500
Tons of
27,711
Mahoning
MOSS ENE CONY
ENG lu A
JAMES GEDDES.
SAMUEL FORRER.
PIONEER ENGINEERS OF OHIO. BY COL. CHARLES WHITTLESEY.
[Of the many who contributed a paper to the first edition of this work, Col. Whittlesey was the only one living to contribute to the second edition and this is the paper. He has not, we profoundly regret to have to say, lived to see it in print. For a notice of its very eminent author the reader is referred to Cuyahoga county.]
WHEN Governor Ethan Allen Brown became an ardent advocate for navigable canals in Ohio, he did not meet with the opposition which DeWitt Clinton en- countered in New York. The leading men of this State, whether from Episcopal Virginia, Scotch-Irish New Jersey, Quaker Pennsylvania or Puritan New England, were endowed with broad views of public policy. Many had seen military ser- vice from the old French war, through that of the Revolution, the Indian wars and that of 1812.
They foresaw the destiny of Ohio in case her affairs were administered judi- ciously.
Men who were not appalled by the scalping knife, or its directing power, Great Britain, were equal to an encounter with the wilderness after peace was secured.
The hope and courage of our citizens, with a rich soil and a genial climate, constituted the resources of the State.
In response to Gov. Brown's earnest recommendation, the legislature appointed a committee to consider a plan for internal navigation in January, 1819. Early in 1820 a call was made for information from all sources on that subject. On the 21st of January, 1822, a joint resolution was passed, appointing a canal board, which consisted of Alfred Kelley, Benjamin Tappan, Thomas Worthington, Isaac Menor, Jeremiah Morrow and Ethan Allen Brown, with power to cause surveys to be made for the improvement of the Falls of the Ohio at Louisville; and to examine four routes for a canal or canals from Lake Erie to the Ohio. Six thou- sand dollars was appropriated for that purpose.
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