History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 101

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
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would require 250,000 cars of the ordinary railway size, and make a train' almost two thousand miles long, enough to make six trains reaching from Pitts- burgh to Philadelphia. . And this upon the present basis, allowing nothing for the ovens which will be built before the first of January next. Contracts are now let for over eight hundred ovens to be built be- fore the first of June, and it is a safe estimate that before the close of the current year there will be ten thousand ovens in the Connellsville coke regions proper, taking no account of the nine hundred scat- tered about the outskirts. The completion of the Youngwood Branch of the Southwest Railroad, which is now building, will develop a large part of the coal area which is still unworked.

Coke-making is a young industry, and notably a work of young men. Beardless boys have responsi- ble positions as book-keepers and managers in the company stores, that feed, clothe, and furnish, some of them 1000 persons. Young men who, according to Holy Writ, should still be tarrying at Jericho, in this country superintend the operations of works whose employés are numbered by the hundred, and whose market includes all the manufacturing belt of the United States. The owners of many of these ex- tensive coke-yards are still in the early prime of life, and have earned fortunes almost before they have wow wives. They are approachable people, and have not the hard-shell conservatism and secretiveness of older men in an industry of older growth. But the infor- mation they will furnish will only give him a super- ficial acquaintance of the country of to-day.

MOUNT PLEASANT REGION.

MOREWOOD MINES.

One can well spend a day in a tour of the More- wood Coke-Works alone, from the farthest under- ground room, where scores of little lamps twinkling on the foreheads of the swarthy miners look like an undersized torchlight procession that has been buried to await the resurrecting trumpet of the next cam- paign, from the dark passages where. the smothered clink of the picks tells how the little atoms of hu- manity are scratching under the skin of the big round earth, up the shaft to where the fresh-dug coal is dumped into the "larry," the one-hundred-bushel car that a little locomotive hauls back and forth along the railroad upon the top of the row of ovens, from which the coal is dumped directly into the ovens, one hundred bushels to each oven, to be raked out silvery gray glistening coke twenty-four hours later and packed, still steaming, into the cars for shipment. Or a part of the time may be employed in a visit to the great company's store that supplies food, clothing, and furniture for one thousand people, the inhabitants of a town that has five hundred full-grown men, of whom scarcely half are American citizens, a conden- sation of Europe, with a strong extract from Asia and a faint flavor of Africa.

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Dunbar Furnace Co., Vargeson ..

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W. A. K.for .....................

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HISTORY OF WESTMORELAND COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

These works make and ship daily about one thou- i of the Chinese, whose cousins they are. Others have sand tons of coke, averaging about sixty cars of about ' floated out upon the prairies of the West, for they sixteen and a quarter tons each. Turning over less have a keen eye to their profit, and if they see a chance of making money are quick to go after it. than half a dozen pages of their shipping book shows the initials of forty-seven different railroads, giving an index to the scope of their trade. The bare state- ment that one thousand tons of coke are manufac- tured at one place daily gives but an unsatisfactory notion of the output, but when that amount of in- animate energy is ciphered into human muscle the look of it is different and better understood. To make ; dles of the big wheelbarrows as they trot from the one ton of coke requires one and six-tenths tons of coal. The one thousand tons manufactured here daily mean, therefore, sixteen hundred tons of coal mined in the same time. Rogers estimates that one pound of coal applied to the production of mechanical power through the agency of steam will exert a power equal to that obtained from ten hours' continuous labor of a strong man on a tread-mill. A later writer, and one who has evidently given the subject much thought, holds that a ton and a half of coal, used to make steam, will produce a power equal to one man's work for a whole year. Taking this, the smaller estimate, then the sixteen hundred tons of coal dug daily at Morewood are equal to a year's labor of almost eleven hundred men.

A thousand strong men dug out of their bed, where they went to sleep when the twilight was strangled in the swamp vapors of the carboniferous age, and have slumbered peacefully ever since with never a snore, although the coverlets became dirty and veins of rock took the place of layers of cotton in their quilts, to stir this idle host into industry with their sharp picks, to serve notice on all these idlers that they have had their "nooning," and that the nineteenth century is an age of labor, not loafing, looks like a pretty good day's work for the Morewood miners. The story of the dragon's teeth springing up armed men isn't worth mentioning in comparison. Eleven hundred men working one year will do as much as one man laboring eleven hundred years. If Adam had kept on spading, allowing no time for strikes, he would only have been getting along towards the evening of the fourth day's work, measured by the Morewood standard, when the dawn of the new dispensation broke on his bald head. Methusaleh could not have done one such day's work in his long lifetime, even if he had been born with a pick in his hands and dropped at the edge of the grave. This awakening process is daily going on, and the world moves, be- cause modern mechanics are binding the strong shoulders of the long-sleeping giants to the yoke.

On the Hungarian peasant's mental map of Amer- ica "Morewood" is doubtless larger than all the Southern States together, better known than Penn- sylvania. Here the first large colony of them was brought a couple of years ago, and hither hundreds have drifted since. Many of the early colonists have gone back to the old country, following the fashion

Among the miners underground Hungarian men are plenty enough. Above surface their wives and daughters share their labor with the men. Broad- backed and brawny, the women 'handle the long, heavy iron scraper at the hot mouth of the oven, and their burly, dumpy figures are seen between the han- oven to the car with five or six bushels of coke, weighing from two hundred to two hundred and forty pounds. Their principal employment, however, is forking coke in the cars. They all wear boots; that is, for a few months in the winter. In the summer they go barefoot, and even thus early are found the strong imprint of plenty of pink toes in the yellow mud. Their skirts are scant, and leave room for about two feet of sunburn below. A distinctive feature of their costume is their head-drees, which usually con- sists of a shawl, not wrapped turban fashion, but pinned under the chin. Men and women are alike short, almost squat in stature, but broad and strongly built. The thick-set, grimy coke-drawers do not re- mind one forcibly of the famous Magyar cavalrymen, but the grandfather of some of these laborers charged with Kosciusko at Raclawicek, and heard withhis own ears the alleged shriek of Freedom when he fell. If he did, however, it is long odds that his grand- mother attended to the stabling of his steed. The women are accustomed to hard work in their own country, and the men seem to be willing to let them do it.

Col. Schoonmaker, the manager at Morewood, does all in his power to keep them out of the coke-yard, but nothing but a cordon of police could do it. Driven out of the yard repeatedly, they return whenever the yard-boss turns his back towards them.

The company keeps no account with them, and their time is computed with that of their husbands, fathers, or brothers. Constant labor has developed their muscles, and a sculptor might find some of the finest model arms among the coke-forkers.

Among the novel and curious industries developed in the coke region is that of " coke crushing," now in its infancy, and carried on by a company which has the exclusive monopoly. Their crusher is situated about a mile from the borough limits of Mount Pleasant.

CUKE CRUSHING.

As you approach the crusher you are struck by the very odd shape of the building, with its tower one hun- dred feet high, and the many extensions and changes in the roof. Yet the peculiar structure is necessary for the machinery used in crushing the coke. The supply of coke is hauled on truck-wagons from the Standard Mine Coke-Works, located but a few yards distant. It is weighed and run on the cage. Then it is hoisted to

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the top of the tower, while an empty one is lowered. The wagon is dumped by machinery, and the coke falls on metal bars below. All that is already fine enongh falls between the bars, while the rest rolls over the bars into the first pair of rollers, where it is partially crushed, and then another set of bars sep- arates the fine coke from the coarse, which passes between a second set of rollers. The crushed coke enters two large iron revolving screens. There the dust and dirt are first taken out, next the nut or smaller size of coke, next small stove size, next stove size, and lastly all that passes out at the end of the screen is called egg size. Thus four sizes of crushed coke are obtained. There are in all three screens, two for the crushed coke and one for the coke that is fine enough without passing through the crusher, and is separated by the iron bars spoken of before. This separation, if the coke already is fine enough, is to save waste from the coke being ground more or less into dust.

After the coke passes through these screens it falls into huge basins below, from which shutes carry the coke into the cars ready for shipping. Every part of the machinery does its work well. The whole struc- ture is on an entirely new plan. This is the only coke- crusher of the kind in the world. About fifteen cars of coke can be crushed daily, the product of about a hundred ovens.

The crusher is owned and controlled by the Penn- sylvania Crushed Coke Company. The officers and directors are all Pittsburgh men.

There is quite a demand for crushed coke cleaned and divided into sizes as it is made at these works. This crushed coke, it is claimed, is as good if not better for domestic purposes, and even for manufac- turing purposes, than the anthracite coal.

STANDARD MINES

adjoin the borough of Mount Pleasant, and were opened in 1879. They are owned by A. A. Hutch- inson & Brother, of Pittsburgh. The superintendent is Charles Cunningham, who here and at other points has been connected with this firm since 1873. This company has five hundred and sixty-nine coke-ovens, and employs five hundred and fifty men. It carries on a large store, of which D. M. Pigman is foreman. It owns fifteen, hundred acres of coal lands, of which two hundred is surface. It operates fifteen miles of railroad under ground and seven outside. Its daily production of coke is ten hundred and sixty-five tons, or seventy-one cars, at fifteen tons per car, and has connections with the Baltimore and Ohio and South- western Pennsylvania Railroads. The company has one hundred and fifty houses for its hands. There was erected in 1881, at its works, by the Pennsylvania Coal and Coke Company, a coke-crusher, which is the principal one in this region. Its superintendent is J. C. Dysart. It makes five sizes of coke.

Boyle & Rafferty's coke-ovens are located at Bridge-

port, and number several hundred, giving employment to hundreds of hands.

Mullin & Strickler have extensive coke-ovens and mines near the above.

The Cochran Heirs mines and ovens are situated at Bridgeport and near the others before mentioned.

Rafferty's mines and ovens are at Painter's Station, and are very extensively carried on.

Joseph R. Stauffer's ovens are located near West Overton.

Morewood Mines are owned by Schoonmaker & H. Clay Frick, and are very extensive.

Alice Mines is the property of the Schoonmakers. Hecla Coal Company has just been started.

The United Coal and Coke Company was organized in 1882, and is now in operation.

The Rising Sun and Bessemer Coke-Ovens are owned by C. P. Markle & Sons, of West Newton. F. M. McClain is superintendent of the Bessemer.

EAST HUNTINGDON TOWNSHIP REGION.

Since the building of the Southwestern Pennsyl- vania Railroad to Scottdale in 1872, the township of East Huntingdon has been revolutionized in its busi- ness, and where before were only the peaceful haunts of the tillers of the soil have become the marts of large manufacturing establishments, with coal-mines and coke-ovens scattered all over its limits, giving employment to thousands of hands. Where were only fields of grain now stand busy factories, and where the farmers' herds once grazed in quiet, hun- dreds of miners are digging out coal or making coke.

SCOTTDALE IRON-WORKS.

Everson, Macrum & Co.'s rolling-mill was estab- lished in 1872, before the railroad was completed to Scottdale. The firm was then Everson, Graff & Co., who purchased of William A. Kifer the old "Foun- tain Mill" and distillery, on which site they erected their new rolling-mill. The firm is now Everson, Macrum & Co., composed of W. H. Everson, John Q. Everson, David S. Macrum, Christopher L. Graff, Walter T. Brown, and Edwin Miles. The first firm also bought of Col. Israel Painter a tract of land in Fayette County, on the other side of Jacobs Creek, the Frick farm below it, and some ten acres of Peter S. and Jacob S. Loucks, on this side of the creek. On the latter they made an addition to the town and erected thirty dwellings for their hands. The mill was started in operation May, 1873. It then made annually three thousand tons of sheet iron, which it now still manufactures, besides eight thousand tons of muck-bar. The foundry was added in 1875, and makes all kinds of castings for this mill and the one in Pittsburgh, the latter established in 1842 by Ever- son, Preston & Co. William H. Everson has been the general manager since 1873,-the commencement. The rolling-mill and foundry employ two hundred hands. The company's office stands where W. A. Kifer's residence was. The selection of its site for

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the rolling-mill made the town of Scottdale: other- wise the town would have been at Everson, the centre of the coke-oven industries. The rolling-mill company started also an extensive store, which with the mill made the nucleus around which has arisen the flourishing borough.

Everson, Macrum & Co.'s "Charlotte Furnace" was built in 1878, and blown October 14th of that year. The firm of the furnace was then Everson, Knap & Co. The first year its product was thirty- five tons daily, but is now between fifty-five and sixty tons. It employs seventy-five men. The furnace is considered one of the best in the country, and is under the efficient superintendency of Edwin Miles. The company has the " Greenlick Narrow Gauge Railroad" from its mines to the Mount Pleasant Branch of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, from which it gets daily sixty tons of ore. In connection with the na- tive ores mined on the company's property, ores from Lake Superior and Blair County, Pa., are also used.

Hill & Kenney's foundry and machine-shop was erected in August, 1880, and has been in operation fifteen months. The partners are J. D. Hill and T. C. Kenney. The latter is a practical machinist, for- merly employed by "Charlotte Furnace Company." They employ twenty men, and are doing a business of $40,000 per year. The firm purchased the land on which to erect their buildings of Everson, Macrum & Co., part of the old Loucks place. They are ma- chinists and brass and iron founders, and make spec- ialties of coke manufacturers' supplies, viz. : larries, pit and machine-bolts, coke-barrows, pit-wheels and axles, pit-wagons, frogs, turnouts, railroad frogs, etc., and keep a full line of brass and iron fittings, brass castings, and machinery supplies. Their shop is well equipped and with first-class workmen.

SCOTTDALE COKE REGION.

The coal-mines of Everson, Macrum & Co. are on the opposite side of Jacobs Creek, and com- prises one hundred and twelve acres of land. Fifty miners are here employed, and fifty thousand tons of coal are annually produced for their rolling-mill and blast furnace. Several railroad tracks run from the mines over the creek to the mill and furnace. This firm has coke-ovens, of which fifty were started in 1878. They make nearly seven thousand bushels per day of coke.

Stauffer's coke-ovens are situated northwest of Scottdale, towards Mount Pleasant, and immediately opposite are those of Blake & Co. Some four miles north of Scottdale are those of C. P. Markle & Sons, called the " Bessemer" and " Rising Sun," of which George A. Markle and Mr. McClain are superintend- ents.

The Home coke-ovens are operated by Stauffer & Co. -Frick & Co. operate the "Valley Works" and "Tip Top Coke-Mines."

Tarr's Station. Here are the coke-works of Peter Tarr, embracing eighty-one ovens, and the South- West Coal and Coke Company of Frick & Co., suc- cessors to Stoner, Hitchman & Co. The latter have eleven hundred acres of coal lands, and employ two hundred men, and have fifty dwellings for their men. It has another opening at Stonersville. Here, too, are sixty-four coke-ovens of Samuel Dillinger & Sons, erected in 1879.

Hawkeye Station. At this point Samuel Dillinger & Sons have fifty-one coke-ovens, built in 1871-72.

West Overton. Just north of this village are the one hundred and thirty coke-ovens of A. R. S. Over- holt & Co., of which sixty-two were started in 1873 and the others in 1878.

These give employment to over a hundred men, and produce one hundred and eighty tons of coke daily.

AT STONERSVILLE.

In 1872, Hurst, Stoner & Co. (Braden Hurst, B. B. Stoner, Mr. Shaw, and W. B. Neal) established their coke-works, and laid out thirty lots on which they built dwellings for their men. They now have seventy ovens. The firm-name is yet the same, but the part- ners are Braden Hurst and Messrs. Rafferty and Mc- Clure. In 1878, S. Warden opened their coke-works, and erected twenty company dwellings. This com- pany (three-fourths of whose stock is owned by the Southwest Coal Company) has seventy-two coke- orens in full operation.

LATROBE REGION.

The general business outlook in this neat little town, located on the Pennsylvania Central Railroad, forty miles east of Pittsburgh, never was so bright as at present. All the various industrial establishments and coke-works surrounding her are in full blast, with cheering prospects. The steadily-increasing demand for coke is causing capitalists to secure all the coal ter- ritory from which this valuable article can be manu- factured. This is not only true of the Connellsville region, but for many miles surrounding it. Latrobe is coming in for a large share of this rapidly-increasing industry. Several large new coke-works and mines have been opened up during the year 1881, and are now in full blast, adding to their facilities as rapidly as circumstances will admit, while all the old works have made large additions and improvements. In addition to this a new branch has been surveyed and will be built from Latrobe, running through a large coal-field, striking the Southwestern road some miles back. Wealthy companies of business men have se- cured this coal, and as soon as the road is built it will be lined with coke-works.

THE MONASTERY COKE-WORKS.

A short distance west of town we find the large mines and coke-ovens of Carnegie Bros.,1 under the

1 This company has lately been reorganised, but Carnegie & Bros. still have a controlling interest.

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general supervision of Mr. Robert Ramsey, formerly of Shafton. During the past year this company have made many improvements and additions to their works, among them the building of one hundred new coke-ovens, a new crusher and washer, besides extend- ing the capacity of their mines. They have now two hundred and forty ovens. The mine is reached by a slope three hundred feet in length, in which about ninety miners are employed, getting pretty fair work, as the ovens will be kept steadily in blast supplying coke for the Lucy Furnace and the steel-works. The coal averages about six feet. The miners receive thirty-five cents per wagon for run of mine. About two hundred men are given steady employment in the mines and about the coke-ovens and crushers.

THE LATROBE COAL AND COKE WORKS.

This is a new work, or rather an old work opened previous to the panic, on the opposite side of the rail- road from the Monastery Works, now being operated by this company. under the general supervision of Mr. D. W. Jones. They have built new chutes, put up new machinery, and built sixteen coke-ovens, in which they coke all theslack and ship the coal, aver- aging at present about ten cars daily. The under- ground workings, in charge of Mr. Alexander Sned- den, are reached by a slope one hundred and fifty feet in length. The coal runs from seven to eight feet. About fifty men are now employed, and more will be added as the trade increases. The miners receive thirty-five cents per wagon for run of mine.

M. SOXMAN, JR., & CO.'S WORKS.

About half a mile east of the town are located the coke-works and mines of this company, under the general supervision of Mr. Francis Kiernan. The mine at present has a drift entrance, and the coal is brought forward and hauled up quite a steep grade on to their chutes. The coal will average about seven feet. The miners receive forty cents per ton for run of mine. Last year they built and put in operation thirty coke-ovens, to which thirty more new ovens have recently been added, having now in blast sixty ovens. A large amount of coal is also shipped daily from the mine. A shaft is being sunk to the coal alongside of the ovens, from which the coal will be hoisted in the future. It will be seventy feet to the coal. Hoisting machinery, etc., will be erected as soon as the shaft is completed. They have a fine piece of coal, and will increase their shipping facili- ties. They employ at present forty miners, and thirty- five day men about the mine and ovens, giving them steady work.

THE LOYALHANNA COAL AND COKE-WORKS.

The extensive works of this company are located on the opposite side of the road, a short distance east of the Soxman works. Mr. Morris Ramsey, formerly of the Franklin mines, at Houtzdale, has charge of the works as general superintendent. They have also

made many improvements during the year. One hun- dred additional ovens have been built, giving them a total of two hundred and forty ovens, one hundred and forty of which have been in blast. The new ovens are now being lit up. The mine is entered by a shaft one hundred and. forty-six feet deep. The coal averages seven feet, the miners receiving thirty- eight cents per ton for run of mine coal. Besides manufacturing coke they have their chutes built for coaling engines on the Pennsylvania road, and supply considerable coal for that purpose. About ninety miners, besides seventy-five other hands, are employed by the company. They own quite a number of houses, and are now erecting enough to accommodate thirty more families.

RIDGEVIEW COAL AND COKE-WORKS.

This company, which is presided over by Mr. James P. Scott, son of the late Col. Thomas A. Scott, has opened a new works at St. Clair Station. Mr. D. C. George, of Latrobe, is the general superintendent. They have made a drift opening into a fine piece of coal, averaging from six and a half to eight feet in thickness. They are shipping and manufacturing coke, having now thirty ovens in blast, and are grad- ing for a plant of eighty more. They are shipping about ten cars of coal daily to Philadelphia for steam purposes, and will increase the output as fast as open- ings are made. They employ about fifty-five men at present. The miners receive thirty-eight cents per ton for oven coal and forty cents per ton for shipping coal.

THE ST. CLAIR COAL AND COKE-WORKS.

This is also a new opening, recently made by a Pittsburgh company, Preston, Davis & Co., with Mr. Matthew Preston in charge as superintendent. They have fifty coke ovens up, thirty of which are in blast, and Mr. J. C. Watt is working on a contract of twenty more. Their mine is entered by a slope, the coal averaging from six and a half to seven and a half feet. They will also ship coal. About twenty miners are at work, and others will be added as fast as room can be made. The coke will be shipped to the different works of the company.

THE MILLWOOD COAL AND COKE COMPANY.

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History of the County of Westmoreland, Pennsylvania, with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 101

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author: George Dallas Albert, editor
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: