COAL - Clpdigital.org

000 bushels were consumed in families; 2,000,000
bushels in stoves, schools, and in small manufacturing;
a total of 7,365,306 bushels, which, at
4 cents a bushel, was worth $306,512. In the
ninety salt works of Western Pennsylvania 5,000,-
000 more bushels were used per year.
FIRST COAL TRANSPORTATION.
A word about the transportation of coal on the
Ohio, though a discussion of this subject does
not properly fall within the limits of this article.
The first load of coal sent down the Ohio from
Pittsburgh was in the ship Louisiana, which was
built in Pittsburgh in 1803 and sent out "ballasted
with stone coal which was sold at Philadelphia
for 37\'2 cents a bushel." Some time prior to
1810 coal was sent down the river from Grave
Creek, below Wheeling, and in 1817 the transportation
of coal from Pittsburgh in flat boats was
begun. In 1845 steamboats were first used in
towing coal, the boats and barges being at first
fastened to the sides and in the rear of the towboats.
It was not long, however, before the
present system of placing the towboats behind the
"fleet" was adopted. In 1841 Locks 1 and 2 of
the Monongahela River Navigation Co.'s improvements
were completed and opened for navigation
on October 18. During the eight weeks succeeding
this date 41,500 tons of coal passed through
Lock No. 1. This industry has grown until upwards
of 4,000 crafts of various kinds, from the
steamboat to the flat, are employed, and the amount
of coal passing the locks has at times reached
nearly 100,000,000 bushels a year, much of which,
in addition to some mined below the first dam, is
sent down the Ohio.
It is also true that the history of the development
of the use of coal and coke in iron making,
especially in blast furnaces, is more properly given
in connection with the history of the iron industry.
It is essential to the completeness of this article,
however, to state in addition to data already given
that as early as 1807 there were three nail factories
in Pittsburgh. The one rolling mill of 1812 had
increased to eight in 1829. At Plumsoek, on Redstone
creek, in 1816 or 1817. the first mill to puddle
iron in the United States was built In 1819 Bear
Creek Furnace was built to use coke, but it was
not until 1837 that F. H. Oliphant at the Fair
Chance Furnace, near Uniontown, made the first
100 tons of coke iron made in the country. In
1885 the production of bituminous iron in Pennsylvania,
most of which is made west of the mountains
from coke, was 1,198 100 net tons, requiring.
say, 1,677,340 tons of coke, which on an nssumed
yield of coal in coke of 60 per cent, would reouire
2,795,566 tons of coal. In addition to this, large
amounts of coke are sent east of the mountains
to be used in furnaces mixed with anthracite.
THE COAL TRADE BULLETIN. 35
THE COKE INDUSTRY.
The history of coking in Western Pennsylvania.
however, is properly a part of this article. In
1813 Mr. John Beal published an advertisement in
the Pittsburgh "Mercury" offering his services to
blast furnace proprietors to instruct them in the
method of converting stone coal into "Coak."
Whether his offer was accepted, by any one does
not appear, but this is the earliest authenticated
reference to coking Western Pennsylvania coal 1
have been able to find. There is a statement to
the effect that a Mr. Mossman, who mined coal
from Herrons Hill, Pittsburgh, in 1795, also made
coke, and that this business was carried on by
his successor, Stephen Wiley, for a number of
years. The "History of Fayette County" also
states that the Allegheny Furnace. Blair county,
used coke in 1811. I have not been able to authenticate
either of these statements. It is certain
that coke was made near Parkers Landing as
early as 1819, and on Redstone creek for refining
iron as early as 1817.
Although coke was made in many parts of the
bituminous coal regions of Pennsylvania, chiefly
for experiments in the blast furnace, it was not
until the development of the Connellsville region
that this industry assumed any importance. In
fhe earlier manufactures of coke in this region
it was made in pits "on the ground." In 1S41
the first ovens were erected at Connellsville. It
was in this year (18411 that two carpenters, Provance
McCormick and James Campbell, overheard
an Englishman, so the story runs, commenting
on the rich deposits of coal at Connellsville and
their fitness for making coke, as well as the value
of coke for foundry purposes, and they determined
to enter upon its manufacture. Mr. Mccormick
who is still living, nearly 90 years old,
gave me an account from memory of this enterprise,
which I quote:
DEVELOPING THE CONNELLSVILLE REGION.
"James Campbell and myself heard, in some way
that I do not now recollect, that the manufacturing
of coke might be made a good business. Mr.
John Taylor, a stone mason, who owned the farm
on which the Fayette Coke Works now stand,
and who was mining coal in a small way, was
spoken to regarding our enterprise, and propos°d
a partnership—he to build the ovens and make
the coke, and Mr. Campbell and myself to build
a boat and take the coke to Cincinnati, where we
heard there was a good demand. This was in
1841. Mr. Taylor built two ovens. I think they
were about ten feet in diameter. My recollection
is that the charge was eighty bushels. The ovens
were built in the same style as those now used,
but had no iron ring at the top to prevent the
brick from falling in when filling the oven with