USA > Pennsylvania > Lackawanna County > The Wyoming Valley, upper waters of the Susquehanna, and the Lackawanna coal-region : including views of the natural scenery of northern Pennsylvania : from the Indian occupancy to the year 1875 > Part 16
USA > Pennsylvania > Susquehanna County > Susquehanna > The Wyoming Valley, upper waters of the Susquehanna, and the Lackawanna coal-region : including views of the natural scenery of northern Pennsylvania : from the Indian occupancy to the year 1875 > Part 16
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There appears to be many claimants to the honor of being the earliest in action in the coal beds, and some warmth of feeling has been mani- fested in relation to the subjeet. It is conclusive at any rate, to state that in the United States, the
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THE WYOMING VALLEY.
knowledge and use of anthracite coal do not ex- tend back beyoud nincty-five years. The In- dians at Wyoming, it is possible, had some know- ledge of the nature of the coal deposits.
It is recorded that two chiefs from the Valley, in company with three others from the country of the Six Nations, visited England in 1710, and it is presumed they witnessed the burning of coal, then in general use in the cities of England, for domestic purposes. The appearance of an- thracite had long been familar to their eyes, and it is nothing strange if the spectacle before them of coals burning, made a deep impression on their minds. They would naturally infer that this fuel was nearly allied to the black stones of their own country. The seven feet vein of coal had been cut through and exposed by the Nanticoke creek, and the nine feet view at Plymouth had been laid open to view by Ransom's creek. The Susquehanna had exposed the coal at Pittston, and the Lackawanna at several points along its banks. If the Indians at that day were ignorant of the practical use of coal, they were at least ac- quainted with its appearance, and not improba- bly with its inflammable nature. That the In- dians had mines of some kind at Wyoming, the following account fully establishes :-
In 1776, a company of Nanticokes and Mohi- cans, six in number, who had formerly lived at Wyoming, visited Philadelphia, and in their talk with the governor, said : "As we came down from Chenango, we stopped at Wyoming, where we had a mine in two places, and we discovered that some white people had been at work in the mine, and had filled canoes with the ore, and we saw their tools with which they dug it out of the ground, where they made a hole at least forty feet long and five or six feet deep. It happened that formerly some white people did take, now and then,only a small bit and carry it away, but these people have been working at the mine and filled their canoes. We inform you that there is one John Anderson, a trader, now living at Wyo- ming, and we suspect he, or somebody by him, has robbed our mine. This man has a store of goods, and it may happen that when the Indians see their mine robbed they will come and take away his goods," &c.
Near the confluence of the Lackawanna with the Susquehanna, there is a vein of a useless sil- very nature, but it is uot presumed that the In- dians referred to this. It is supposed that even if the whites had at different times carried away small quantities to test them, that having found it useless, they would not have returned to take away cance loads, unless it could have been coal.
Stewart Pearce, in his "Annals of Luzerne," gives the following in relation to the early his- tory of coal:
"In 1768,Charles Stewart surveyed the manor of Sunbury, on the west side of the Susquehanna opposite Wilkes-Barre, and on the original draft is noted 'stone coal,' as appearing in what is now cal'ed Rosshill. In 1769, the year following, Obadiah Gore and his brother came from Con- necticut, with a body of settlers, and the same year used anthracite coal in his blacksmith-shop. We do not believe, as do some, that the Gores were the first whites who used anthracite on the Susquehanna for blacksmithing. Stone coal would not have been noted on the original draft of the manor of Sunbury, if it had not been known to be a useful article. Hence, when the first settlers came into our valley, the evidence inclines us to believe the knowledge of the use of anthracite coal was communicated to them by the Indians, or by some of their own race."
In 1776, two Durham boats were sent from be- low to Wyoming for coal, which was purchased from Mr. R. Geer, and mined from the opening afterward the property of Colonel George. M. Hollenback, above Mill Creek. From Harris's Ferry, now Harrisburg, the coal, "about twenty tons," was liauled on wagons to Carlisle, where it was used in the United States' Armory, recently erected there. This was done annually during the Revolutionary War.
Major George Grant, of Sullivan's army, writ- ing from Wyoming, in 1779, says: "The land here is excellent and contains vast mines of coal, lead, and copper." Science and subsequent in- vestigation prove that he was mistaken as to the lead and copper.
In 1791, Philip Ginther, while hunting, acei- dently discovered coal at what is now called Mauch Chunk, and communicated the fact to
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THE PIONEERS OF THE COAL TRADE.
Colonel Jacob Weiss, who purchased the land, and soon after carried specimens of the coal to Philadelphia in his saddle-bag's.
"Re exhibited them to several persons, who called them worthless black stones, and laughed at the colonel's folly. But Colonel Weiss was not discouraged. In 1792, he and others formed themselves into a company called the 'Lehigh Coal Mine Company,' the first of the kind in the United States. In 1803 the company succeeded in getting two ark-loads, about 30 tons to Phila- delphia, but no purchaser could be found.
As a matter of experiment, the city authori- ties at length consented to take it. An attempt was made to burn it under the boilers of the steam engine at the water-works, but it only served to put the fire out. The remainder was then broken up and scattered over the sidewalks in place of gravel."
Up to this time the blacksmiths in the vicini- ty of the mines, wherever discovered, were using coal in their shops. But no one had as yet dis- covered the art of consuming anthracite for do- mestic purposes. To Jesse Fell, of Wilkes-Barre belongs the honor of having first utilized it for domestic purposes. Having been familar with "stone coal," as it was then called, for many years, he concluded that a good draft of air was alone necessary to make it burn freely. He according- ly constructed a grate of green hickory-saplings and, placing it in a large fire-place in his bar-room, filled it with broken coal. A quantity of dry wood was placed under the grate and set on fire, and the flames spreading through the
coal it soon ignited, and before the wooden grate was consumed the success of the new experiment was fully demonstrated. A wrought iron grate was now constructed, and set with brick and mortar in his fire-place and was soon glowing with the burning stone coal. Judge Fell (for he had been one of the associate judges for many years) made the following memorandum at the time on one of the fly leaves of a book entitled, "The Free Mason's Monitor :"
"February 11th, of Masonry 5808. Made the experiment of burning the common stone coal of the valley, in a grate, in a common fire-place in my house, and find it will answer the purpose of fuel, making a clearer and better fire, at less ex- pense, than burning wood in the common way.
JESSE FELL
February 11th, 1808.
The news of this experiment spread rapidly, and to convince themselves of the truth of the report the citizens from every quarter flocked to "Fell's Tavern" to witness for themselves the feasibility of appropriating the hitherto worthless stones to fuel purposes. The public house, in which this memorable experiment was made stood at the corner of Washington and Northampton streets, in the city of Wilkes-Barre.
It was shortly after this event that the Smiths, John and Abijah, noticed before by Hon. H. B. Wright as the pioneers of the coal trade, loaded two arks with coal and proceeded down the river to Columbia, where, finding no market they left the black stones behind them.
CHAPTER XXII.
COLLIERY-INCIDENTS IN AND AROUND COAL-MINES.
"Well, now I have all this and more, . I ask not to increase my store ; But here a greivance seems to lie, All this is mine but till I die ; . I can't but think 'twould sound more clever, To me and to my heirs forever."-Swift's "Competence."
The term colliery as applied to coal-mining establishments, includes the mines, buildings and machinery employed, while the use of the word collier, as applied to the individual operator, is as common in the coal regions as the word-miner.
To the outside world, the province of a colliery is peculiar, and one which takes in a vast field for thought and investigation.
In the earlier eras of coal mining the complica- tions were few about the working machinery of a coal mine, the greater portion of the labor being performed by human hands, and too often, the hardest portion of it was alloted to women.
In modern coal-mining, and especially in the anthracite regions, these establishments are of immense proportions, employing hundreds of hands, and a vast capital. It is only at a late day that the primitive process of digging coal and other minerals by simply removing the sur- faee earth, and quarrying the coal on the out- crops of the beds, has been abandoned to make way for a more scientific method of reaching the hidden treasures of the earth. From the natural construction of the earth, the original process may, in some localities, be still retained ; for in- stanee the old Summit mines of the Lehigh, where the great mammoth bed was uncovered to the extent of thirty acres, and produced 2,000,000 tons of coal up to 1847, when it was abandoned. A tree which had grown over this spot and ex- tended its roots into the coal beds below, having been uprooted by the wind, revealed the coal to a hunter, who reported the discovery, and from
this grew the famous Lehigh coal mines. This bed for some portion of its extension was seventy feet thick.
Under ground work and the establishment of collieries next followed, thus dispensing with the tedious and often unprofitable quarry method. The first attempt at excavations where the mines existed above water level, did not extend beyond the formations of small galleries in the solid coal. with arched tops, and without timber supports. The most noted of these in the Wyoming Valley were on the outerops of the Mammoth,so familier- ly known hereabouts as the "Old Baltimore Coal Openings." These exeavations are so large as to admit of horses and wagons to drive in and turn in the rooms or galleries thus formed. Many such openings are visible in the city of Scranton, which have been abandoned years ago. These openings are usually seen along the beds of the brooks, and the hill-side ravines, thus showing that man attacked coal where it first showed it- self, for in prospecting for coal, when the soil of a distriet is already known to be underlaid by the coal formation the geologists usually follow these paths, watching as well for particles of the eoal itself as the black carbonaceous slate, which is one of the commonest associates of productive coal-seams. This examination, which requires close attention and a quick and critical eye,is best pursued when the streams are shrunken in sum- mer, or when the ravines are entirely dry, as the débris from the outerops of all the strata swept into the channel by the freshets of the winter and
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COLLIERY-INCIDENTS IN AND AROUND COAL-MINES.
and spring,may be then readily turned over by the pick and handled. Having onee detected the débris of a coal-scam ,it is usually a simple mat- ter to trace it to the parent bed ; for unless this rises very high in the adjacent hills, a studious tracing of the loose fragments up the channels or ravines will presently, by a sudden cessation of any signs of coal, show him that he has passed their source. He will then make use of a pick, turning the soil and inspecting it very closely for indications of the "smut" of the seam-that is to say, for any stain imparted to the earth by very finely divided coaly matter.+
Another mode of searching for coal is to com- menee at the stage just indicated; it dispenses, that is to say, with any preliminary inspection of the wash accumulated in the water-courses, and aims at detecting the smut of the coal-seam immedi- ately by systematic digging in the supposed viein- ity of the coal-bed. This method implies a knowledge of the topographical indications of coal, and nice judgment in availing one's self of the conditions of the ground to test the presence of the looked-for bed with the least expenditure of time and labor. Thie topographical features which indicate the presence of beds of coal in a group of coal-measures are obvious enough to an eye once familiarized to them. They are merc- ly indentations or benchies in the sides of the hills, more or less conspicious in obedienec to certain geological conditions easily understood.
Having discovered by external signs the prob- able presence of a seam of coal which it is desira- ble to open or prove, the next process is to reach it by digging, and establish its thickness,and the direction of its clip with the least amount of ex- cavation practicable. Not a few serious mistakes, and some flagrant frauds, in developing virgin coal-fields, have arisen from a too superficial knowledge of the geological formation, and the methods of detection of veins and their courscs.
Another method of searching for coal is by boring. This is usually resorted to either where coal is suspected to underlie the soil at easily ac- cessible depths, or where it is desirable to aseer- tain the precise depth of a bed or beds already known to be present. Where a known coal lics deep, and where it is important to ascertain its
depth, and perhaps its thickness, prior to sinking a permanent pit or mino-shaft to it, boring is performed in an elaborate manner very much up- on the plan of perforating an artesian well. Great improvements are being constantly contributed to the machinery of the coal regions, which ren- ders this labor less laborious than formerly.
In opening or proving coal-scams preliminary to mining, it is necessary then to determine the thickness and quality of the coal as well as the direction and condition of its clip within the strata. These satisfactorily attested by experi- ment, the next step is the ercction of a colliery. If the coal field is characterised by an approxi- mately horizontal stratification, then the plan of mining is to enter the coal-seain by a main gang- way or nearly horizontal gallery, so placed and laid out as to drain as large a tract of the con- templated mine as possible. If the coal-seam is situated above the beds of the adjacent valleys, it is penetrated of course, from a point or points in the sides of the hills, and a thick wall or pillar of the coal is left between the gangway and the actual outcrop to sustain the pressure of the su- perineumbent strata. After the main entry has been carried in a convenient length, other side- galleries or gangways are excavated, branching from it cither at right angles, or in directions best adapted to command an easy drainage and internal transportation of the hewn coal. From these lateral alleys, short rooms or stalls arc ex- cavatcd, leaving massive columns of the coal standing to support the roof. Where the strata are much undulated, and where, for the most part, they are inelined at considerable angles, the plan of entering and mining the coal is some- what different, being modified to suit the circum- stances.
The simplest of the conditions under which coal is excavated is where it lies accessible to open quarrying,as has been before intimated ; or as it is sometimes spoken of in mining phrase- open cut. This method is resorted to only when the coal-bed is of such thickness, or has been so effectually protected from deterio. ation by a cov- ering of easily-removable rock, as to possess a marketable valuc. Of course it is seldom worth while to strip and quarry a thinnish seam of coal
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THE WYOMING VALLEY.
since the coal itself will be found rotten by the elements throughout too great a portion of its thickness, and even where sufficiently sound will not yield enough to a given area to repay the cost of uncovering it.
Another extemporaneous process of mining is resorted to where the coal seam is approximate- ly horizontal, and outerops on both sides of a comparatively narrow hill. The field of coal is then entered from some ravine near the most de- pressed part of the outerop, and the coal is min- ed out in the direction of the rise of the strata,by leaving huge columns of the solid coal to sustain the weight of the hill above. Where the seam is thick, the subterranean quarrying proceeds by benehing, or cutting the coal in steps. The most notable of this class may be seen in the old Bal- timore Coal Company's openings, before alluded to, about one mile S. E. of Wilkes-Barre.
Mining by drift, is a common method, hither- to practiced in the anthracite basins of this State, the process of which has been to seleet a locality where a coal seam rises to a remunerative height above some convenient water-level, or the bed of a contiguous valley or ravine intersecting it. The seam is in this case accessible edgewise or end- wise from the ravine, and after the surface matter is removed, it is entered by a drift or gangway, which is carried in horizontally with just a suffi- ciently gentle rate of ascent to drain out the water to the external valley.
After this mine " level," as it is called, has been extended sufficiently far, lateral alleys or shutes are cut at a convenient angle, usually at right angles to it, ascending toward the outerop, and rooms or small chambers are hewn out of the coal at regular intervals along thesc alleys, pil- lars of the firm coal being left between these chambers, and also between them and the shutes, except where this communicates with the rooms. Thus each shute is protected by a wall of solid coal, only here and there perforated. Certain of these shutes are cxtended up to the outerop as early as practicable, for the purpose of ventil- ating the workings, the air in which tends to be- come very foul where the dip is steep, and the "breast," or slant length of the co: I-bed is tall. The coal is shovelled by the miners from the
lateral chambers into the sloping shutes, and is drawn out of these from an inclined bin by gates or trap-doors, which deliver it into the coal cars placed opposite them ou a railroad which oceu- pics the floor of the main horizontal gangway.
Another mode of carrying ou the excavation of the coal in the interior of the mine, is, to take it out in broad rooms, still called shutes, extend- ing from the level or gangway up the breast of the coal to within a suitable distance of the next higher level, or of the outerop, leaving longitudin- al pillars or walls of the solid coal strong enough to support the pressure of the superincumbent mass. These pillars are generally from four to eight yards wide, and the long rooms or shutes between them are commonly from ten to four- teen yards broad. Just at the gangway the pil- lars are generally left as broad as possible, the better to insure resistance to pressure,and for the purpose of more easily closing the outlet of the shute, and providing it with a gate for the de- livery of the coal into the ears below. In some cases, especially where the dip is steep, a nar- row shute, called a " man-way," is first eut, as- cending the breast, and cross-ways are excavated from this to give the miners an opportunity to cut or blast away the coal from the breast above them. These lateral excavations, enlarging and meeting, form the shutes into which all the coal is collected. When the process is completed, the only coal left standing to support the roof is on a series of pillars or columns perforated by the man-way.
Still another and very common mode of reach- ing the coal, particular in the steeper-dipping beds of the anthracite basins, is by tunnels, cut across the strata, the slates, sandstones, &e., which separate the seams of coal. These tunnels are often resorted to, to get adimission to portions of coal-seams endwise from intersecting ravines. The best level at which the tunnel should be made often requires a nice caleulation between the cost involved in lengthening it, by planting it too low, and the sacrifice of losing available coal, by making it shorter and setting it too high Where the coal-seanis ocear at comparatively short intervals in the strata, and where their dip is stecp, a tunnel of the length of a few hundred
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COLLIERY-INCIDENTS IN AND AROUND COAL MINES.
feet will be sufficient to indicate the resources which lie hidden ahead.
In addition to these methods of development, a singular feature of the colliery establishments is the immense and costly structures known as Breakers. These are generally masses of heavy frame-work of great elevation and strength, and are used for the fourfold purpose of breaking, selecting, separating, and storing the prepared coal. Looking from any eminence on cither of the mountain ranges which border the valleys . these immense structures can be footed up by scores. The first thing which encounters the eye of the traveler as he whirls into the coal region is the huge black coal breaker. Here the coal is dumped into a wide schute provided with bars or flat screens and platforms. The coal is separated by passing over the screens and selected by the immense little armies of slate- pickers, or " cracker-boys," who, by continued practice can detect the worthless the moment it shows itself in the moving mass.
The purest or best lump of large coal is thrown into a bin, provided for the purpose, while the second size, or steamboat coal, passes into the second bin ; and the remainder, excepting the dirt and slate or impurities is put through the breaking rolls, which consist of from two to four heavy iron rollers provided with steel or chilled cast-iron teeth. In passing through these, the coal is broken into small pieces, and descends into a system of large circular screens
which are constantly revolving, and which separ- ate the coal into sizes known as pea, chestnut, stove, cgg, and broken coal; and sometimes a larger size used for large ranges or heaters in hotels, puddling furnaces, &c. The sizes above this are steamboat and lump, which last is the largest, and generally used for blast furnaces, though the steamboat is often mixed with the lump for this purpose. Formerly this prepara- tion was exceedingly wasteful, owing to the im- perfect breaking machinery, and a careless habit of crowding the whole mass, both large and small coal, through the breaking rolls without regularity or order. Mr. Daddow estimates that " 20 to 25 per cent. of the coal was thus lost. To these defects must also be added that both pea coal and chestnut were wasted in 'dirt banks' during the early days of the anthracite trade." "Culm dumps" have become so exten- sive as to mar the beauty of the landscape of the Wyoming and Lackawanna valleys, and in many cases they have encroached upon the borders of many a pleasant home.
Mining as a life-long occupation might excite some surprise that so many people will be found to brave its dangers, but the enemy being invisi- ble and familiarity with mining are different things, and these dangers are the most readily overlooked. The work being enormous, is simple and requires but little skill in coal cutting, and in well-managed collieries the men seldom com- plain.
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CHAPTER XXIII.
LACKAWANNA IRON AND COAL COMPANY.
"Great Nature spoke ; observant man obey'd : Cities were built, societies were made ;
Here rose one little state ; another near - Grew by like means, and joined through love or fear." .
-POPE'S ESSAY ON MAN.
Every city carries with its local annals certain historical incidents which are forever insepara- ble in the common onward train of events, and no public centre in this Commonwealth furnishes a more convincing illustration than the present city of Scranton ; the rise, development, and pro- gress of which is nearly wholly attributable to the combined energies of a single association of individuals, in the early days of its history, which has grown into the magnitude of a mammoth corporation denominated and extensively known as the Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company.
Not that the entire population arc in any way knit in relative ties of any description, but that the inhabitants of the city never could have made an aggregate so famous had it not been for the common influence which this association of in- dividuals has infused into the history of this re- markable city, now the third in the Keystone State.
The first historie incident on record which brings this corporation to its inception in con- nection with the Lackawanna Valley dates 1840. The region of Capouse, noticed in the earlier pages of this work, upon which is now located a part of the city, claims the prior attention of a name. The termination of difficulties and the subsequent settlement of the adventurous whites brought the region named into a business rela- tion with the scattered hamlets over the broad forests, but primitive life, and that devoted to agriculture was not calculated to make extraor- dinary progress.
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