i STEAM COAL - Clpdigital.org

28 THE COAL TRADE BULLETIN.
sons with coals from other fields. The coals of
the New River district belong to the Pottsville,
or No. 12 series. Until 1873 the New River canon
was a wilderness, without a habitation for many
miles, except at certain crossings, and not even a
bridle trail existed along the margins of the
stream. Through this wild territory the Chesapeake
& Ohio Railway forced its way, and with its
advent there came the development of a great
mining industry.
The coals of the Pottsville series in Southern
West Virginia are unique. They have characteristics
that enable them to hold a place that is
separate and distinct from all other classes of
bituminous coals. In the process of combustion
they are almost entirely free from smoke and the
well known trade designation, New River Smokeless,
has been properly applied. This adds
greatly to their value for service in residence districts,
on passenger steamers, men-of-war, etc.
Where intermittent demands are made upon a
motive power the New River Smokeless is unexcelled.
It may remain banked for minutes or
hours, retaining its fire under a crust of coke,
and then be brought to active life by a single
motion of the slice bar.
Three seams are mined in the district, but they
are so nearly alike in structure, chemical analyses
and working results that it is almost impossible
to formulate a single distinction that is worthy of
note in a practical way. The highest coal in geological
order is the Sewell seam; the middle number
is the Beckley, and the lowest is the Fire
Creek.
The Sewell seam, by reason of its thickness, has
naturally received the most attention from operators
and in September, 1904, forty-five mines were
shipping from it, with a loading capacity of 24,-
215 tons per day, or 66 32-100 per cent, of the
total tonnage of the field.
There are eight mines in the Beckley seam
with an output of 2,595 tons a day. The 24 mines
in the Fire creek district have a daily loading
capacity of 8,525 tons.
For a little more than 30 years the Fire creek
coal has held a place as one of the fuel standards
of the world. It has been shipped to Maine and
to Canada; blacksmiths have made their welds
with it in Arizona; it has gone to the interior of
Mexico, and to the Dakotas and Montana in the
Northwest. Only a coal of tried excellence could
bear the cost of transportation to such distant
markets.
All the mines in the New River and Kanawha
districts referred to are located on the line of the
Chesapeake & Ohio railway. Quite a large number
in the Kanawha district, in addition to their railroad
connections, have loading tipples on the Great
Kanawha river.
PARTIAL SETTLEMENT OF THE
KANAWHA DISTRICT STRIKE.
The board of conciliation, composed of three
operators from the Kanawha Coal Association and
a like number of representatives from the miners'
organization, has arrived at a satisfactory agreement
in the Kanawha district. Both sides made
compromises. The operators agreed to be responsible
for the payment of a uniform amount
of dues for paying the checkweighman and the
miners conceded the right of the operators to employ
non-union miners without discrimination.
This means that unless unforeseen circumstances
arise there will be no further clashing about the
Charleston agreement for 16 months. The compromise
was favorably considered first by the
operators and then ratified by the board of conciliation.
The operators are pleased at the understanding
which allows them to employ men
without regard to their affiliation with a union
and the miners seem pleased at the assurance that
the operators will withhold from all employes the
dues to pay the checkweighman.
The Cabin creek mines of this district, however,
are still within the strike zone. The operators
in that section withdraw from the Kanawha Coal
Association and declare they will run their operations
without the union. It remains to be seen
what effect the action of their associates will have
on their willingness to recede from their original
position. The miners on Cabin creek petitioned
Governor White to appoint peace officers and investigate
the alleged violations of laws by the
special mine guards on the railroad and highway
approaches to the premises of the coal companies.
In an exhaustive reply he states there is no law
authorizing him to act in the matter and that the
sheriff of Kanawha county has deputies on the
scene to see the laws are obeyed. No violence or
physical trouble has occurred during the Cabin
creek strike.
A Change In Pay Systems Needed.
The robbery of a clerk of the Leahy Coal Co.
of a satchel containing $2,000 in cash just as he
was about to leave the company's office in Altoona,
Pa., on his way to pay the miners at Lilly, is
another illustration of the expensive carelessness
embodied in such pay systems. Surely the rapidly
increasing number of murders and robberies
of paymasters traveling with large sums of money
should be incentive enough to bring about a safe
system of paying employes located in sparsely
'settled districts. The problem will not be a
difficult one when those whose place it is to do
so awake to its importance. The Jews solved it
more than ten centuries ago.