Great American industries; volume one : coal, petroleum, iron, marble, slate, gold and silver, copper and zinc / by W. F. Rocheleau.

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About Google Book Search Google's mission is to organize the world's information and to make it universally accessible and useful. Google Book Search helps readers discover the world's books while helping authors and publishers reach new audiences. You can search through the full text of this book on the web at |http: //books .google .com/I F, -\S"=i, Ci-U,')to6 Ijarvar!) Collese Xibrarj ..t3..UQJDna.O.C^Mm...^vOnTk.Krv.sti2L XK...«\.*?W 3 2044 097 066 237 i 1 \l /! PROM J. h. HAMMETT CO. 116 120 Summer St. BOSTON MASS. „— a I .§■ The Scheef Comm?»*^2 of th^ CiV of S5<jst6n AD^m\:p}V.t:oH library GREAT American Industries VOLUMK I. CoAi,, Petroleum, Iron, Marble, Slate Gold and Silver, Copper and Zinc. BY W. F. ROCHELEAU. A. Flanagan Company, Publishers, CHICAGO. NEW YORK. \EdU^p"T~"^vq^ c-u."]^^^ HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY GIFT OF BOSTON SCHOOL COttMIHEE LIBRARY tAnd 23 1932 COPYRIGHT 1902, BY A. FI^ANAGAN CO. C /I T C/1T5 Copper and Zinc, Gold and Silver, — Granite, - 4 Iron, ^ Marble, - Natural Ga3, Petroleum, — Slate, 193 163 135 75 "3 6o 45 156 PRE.r ACE. The subjects treated in this Kttle volume are complete as far as it is thought the details will be of interest to pupils of grammar grades. In this, the work differs from its many competitors for public favor; it is a work of reference as well as a reader. The facts have been gathered from the most recent and reliable sources, and are correct to date. ** Peace hath her victories no less than War." Special attention has been given to the history of these great industries which have wielded such a potent influence in giving our country its position among the nations of the world. This feature of the work makes it a valuable supplement to any school history. Children are fond of writing, provided they have facts and thoughts to express. The author has found the subjects discussed in this volume of great interest to pupils for language exercises, and the suggestions ap- pended to each topic are to assist the teacher in this feature of the work. W. F. ROCHSWAU. COAL. DISCOVERY AND LOCATION OF COAL. ID you ever think what coal is and how it was formed, as you sat by your glow- ing grate or were whirl- ed over the country by an express train ? If not, it may be of interest to you to learn some- thing about this great source of wealth. Wood was the only fuel known to our grand- ■ parents, and in some sections it is still the only S Great American Industries. one in general use. The only coal known to them was charcoal, which was used in furnaces for melt- ing iron and by blacksmiths in their forges. It was used because it made a much hotter fire than wood. Charcoal is made by burning large piles of wood under cover, so only a small supply of air can get to the fire ; the wood bums very slowly, and only the smoke and gases pass oflF, leaving the pure coal. The old-fashioned coal-pit was made by covering a large pile of wood loosely thrown together with boughs and earth. The fire was then kindled in a small opening left at one end of the pit. After it was well started, the opening was closed, and the fire left to gradually burn through the pile. This would sometimes take two or three weeks if the pit was large. The covering was then taken oflF and a huge pile of charcoal was found ready for use. While wood was plenty and but little coal needed, this answered all purposes; but when nearly all the wood had been cut oflF and more coal was needed every day, people began to wonder where it was to come from. They never dreamed that in the ground, and possibly under their own houses, was so great a supply that it would take hundreds of years to use it all, even if it were used for every purpose for which heat is needed. Although mineral or stone coal has not been in . Great American Industries. 9 general use but a comparatively short time, we have good reasons for supposing that it was known and used to a limited extent many years ago. One Greek historian tells us that it was used as early as 300 B. c, and it is said that coal was systemat- ically mined in England in 1180. About two hundred years before Columbus discovered America, coal was quite largely used in London. But it burned with so much flame and gave oflf so much black smoke that the people thought it poisoned the air, and appealed to Parliament to stop its use. In response to this appeal, Parliament passed a law forbidding the burning of coal, and making the use of it punishable by death. About fifty years later, however, this law was repealed, and the people of Newcastle were given permission to mine coal. From that time the coal trade in England has continued to increase. The Indians probably knew of the existence of coal in this country before America was dis- covered by white men, but they could not bum it well enough to make it of any value to them. In 1679, Father Hennepin, a French explorer, marked the location of a coal mine on the banks of the Illinois River, near the present town of Ottawa. We do not know whether other explorers had dis- covered coal before Father Hennepin or not; he was the first to make any record of the discovery. 10 Great American Industries. Some of the soldiers who were in General Brad' dock's expedition against Fort DuQuesne, in 1755, claim to have cut through seams of coal in con- structing portions of the road over which the army marched in what is now Pennsylvania, and to have burned some of the coal on their camp fires. As the country was settled, after the Revo- lutionary War, the existence of coal became gen- erally known, as it was soon discovered in nearly all localities where it is found at present. The three principal kinds of coal are anthracite, bituminous, and cannel. The anthracite is very hard, and on that account is sometimes called stone coal. Bituminous and cannel are softer, and bum more readily and with a brighter flame. The diflFerent degrees of hardness, and the dif- ferent composition of these varieties oiF coal is sup- posed to be caused by the action of heat and varying degrees of pressure. Anthracite is in all probability the coal first formed. It is deeper in the earth than the other varieties, and has been subjected to greater heat and pressure, hence it is nearer pure carbon and more compact. Anthracite passes into bitu- minous by gradual stages, so it is somewhat difficult to draw the dividing line between them. The bituminous coal of Pennsylvania and Ohio is harder and more compact than that of Illinois or the mines west of that state. In the states still further west, Great American Industries. 11 we find a coal called lignite that seems to have been formed mnch later than the other varieties, and which resembles charcoal in its appearance. Anthracite is found in Rhode Island, Eastern and Central Pennsylvania, and Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Bituminous and cannel are found in western Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, southern Michigan, and a number of states west of the Mississippi River, but it is not extensively mined in these states at present. The area of the coal regions of the United States is one hundred and ninty-eight thousand five hundred square miles, or more than forty-one times the size of Ohio. The area of the coal fields of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick is eighteen thousand square miles. By this we see that there is more coal in the country than we can use in hundreds of years to come. The areas in which coal is found are known as coal measures. The coal mines that were first worked in America are near Richmond, in Chesterfield and Powhatan counties, Virginia. These mines were probably worked as early as 1750. In 1775, coal was in quite general use in this vicinity, and was valuable to the Americans for the manufacture of cannon balls in the war for independence. For a long time the use of coal was limited to furnaces and blacksmiths' forges. This was because people did 12 Great American Industries. not believe it could be burnt in open grates or jvtoves. Bituminous and cannel coal came into general use much sooner than anthracite, because they were eas- ily ignited, and required no special grate or furnace. We have said that anthracite is very hard. It is also somewhat difficult to ignite, and it was a long time before people learned its value. Every attempt to bum it failed. Not even the blacksmiths could ignite it in their forges, and every one thought it was worthless. At last a blacksmith by the name of Gore succeeded in igniting it in his forge, and discovered that it made a very hot fire and burned without flame. He told his discovery to others, and in a short time this coal was in general use among the smiths in the Susquehanna valley. However, its combustion depended upon the blast of air driven through it by the bellows, and it was not supposed that it could be made to bum without some arrangement whereby a strong current of air was forced through the fire. The first cargo shipped into Philadelphia could not be sold, and it was with difficulty that any one could be prevailed upon to take the coal as a gift, and make a trial of it. The trials ended in failure, and all attempts to place this new fuel upon the market were given up for the time. The secret of successfully using anthracite coal was discovered by accident. This is the way it Great American IndustHes. 13 happened. Every one thought that the coal must be continually poked and punched in order to make it burn. An iron company purchased a cart load and attempted to use it in its furnace. They worked and poked it all day, and wasted the entire load without getting a fire. They bought another load, and resolved to work all night before they gave it up. This they did, but without any better success. In the morning they went to breakfast and left the coal in the furnace with some wood burning under it. When a workman returned he was greatly surprised to find the furnace door red-hot. He threw open the door, and discovered the coal burning with great heat. From this it was seen that the only thing necessary to ignite anthracite coal was to place it on a good bed of kindlings and then let it alone. When this was once understood, there was no more trouble, and the coal began to be used in grates and stoves as well as furnaces. Bituminous coal would have been placed on the market much sooner than it was had there been means of transporting it. About 1810 this coal was shipped down the Susquehanna in boats and sold in Philadelphia and Baltimore, but dams were placed across the river soon after the traffic was com- menced, and it had to be given up. It is only since the construction of railroads and canals that coal can be taken to all cities and towns. 14 Great American Industries, WHAT COAL IS. FTERread- ing about the dis- covery and location of the coal fields, and the intro-* duction of coal into g e-n e r a 1 use, you may wish to know what coal is, and why we find it buried so deep in the earth. Let us ask the rocks, for they first told the story. Not only is the story of coal found in the rocks, but also the story of all the changes the earth has passed through from its creation to the present time. You and I may not be able to read these stories, but men who have studied the rocks all their lives can do it as easily as we read from the pages of a book. These men are called geologists, and the science which tells of the formation of the earth is geology. This is the story which the rocks tell us about coal : Great American Industries. 15 Away back in the past, so many years ago that no one can nnmber them, ages before any animals or men lived npon the land, everything was very mnch diflferent from what we find it now. The earth's surface contained much more water and much less land than at present. There were no high mountains nor deep valleys such as we see, and the climate seems to have been the same all over the earth. It was very hot ; much hotter than any climate known to-day. The air was filled with moisture, and contained in large quantities gas that was poisonous to men and animals. This gas was so poisonous that it could not be breathed even for a short time without causing death. This gas is called carbonic acid, or more properly car- bonic di-oxide, because it is composed of two parts of oxygen to one of carbon. While carbonic acid is poisonous to animals, it is the very best of food for plants. During this time, which is called the coal period, plants flourished in great abundance all over the land. So abundant was this vegetation that nothing can be found in the most dense forests of the tropical regions that can compare with it. Suppose we should go out into the woods for a picnic some day and find all the ferns, and rushes, and club-mosses, and horsetails grown to tall trees with trunks several feet in diameter, and much 16 Great American Industries. larger than any we ever saw. Suppose, again, that these trees and rushes were so closely crowded to- gether that we could not get through them, and that the great club-mosses and other vines covered their trunks and hung down from the branches everywhere so dense that we could not even see through them. This will help us to imagine some- chiug of how the forests of the coal period looked. We see that the plants of our imaginary forest were much different from those found in the Great American Industries. 17 forests of the present time. There were no flowers, and very few, if any, plants with small stems and delicate leaves. After these forests had flourished for a long time, some g^at force caused the land on which they stood to sink below the level of the sea. The trees fell and slowly decayed, and were covered with sand and mud. As the ages went by, this sand and mud turned into stone, and the heat and pressure changed the plants to coal. You see, therefore, coal is formed in very ranch the same way that charcoal is made, by burning wood with a small supply of air. Wherever coal occurs, several layers or seams are found lying one above the ether, separated by layers of rock. From this we learn that the process by which one layer was formed must have been repeated as many times as there are seams. 18 Great American Industries. But how can the rocks tell these stories ? Let us see. You all know how easy it is to make a perfect picture of a leaf by pressing it down on the soft surface of a piece of clay. Now, if we let the clay harden the impression will remain until the tablet is broken. So the sand and mud, falling on the vegetation that formed the coal, took im- pressions of leaves and stems and trunks of trees, and then hardened into stone. And there these impressions have remained through all these ages until the geologists discovered them and used them to tell this story. Some geologists have attempted to tell how many years it took to form coal, but no one knows just how long the time was. One says that the amount of vegetable matter contained in a seam of coal six inches thick is greater than the most abundant vegetation of the present day could form in twelve hundred years. Fifty tons of stone coal spread evenly over an aqre of ground will not make a layer a half inch in thickness. At this rate it would require at present seven hundred and twenty years to form a seam of coal three feet thick. This is the thinnest seam that can be worked with profit. In the coal measures of Nova Scotia there are seventy-six seams of coal, one of which is twenty- two feet thick and another thirty-seven. The Mammouth vein at Wilkesbarre, Penn., is twenty- Great American Industries. 19 nine feet thick. If we consider that it must have taken at least as much time to form the layers of rock between the seams as it did to form the coal, the entire coal period will extend over nearly three hundred thousand years, a time so long that none of us can begin to think how long it is. 20 Great American Industries. A COAL MINE. -^^OAL was first discovered in, those seams wHicli came to the surface in the moun- tainous re- gions. This was also the first coal used. From what we learned about the for- mation of coal we might think that all the seams would be found in a horizontal position, but this is not the case. The great changes that took place while the earth was being prepared for the home of man, upheaved the mountains in places where coal had been formed. By this means the coal seams were thrown up, and lie in the same posi- tion as the layers of rock among which they were formed. Great American Industries. 21 Men first began to dig coal from those seams that were on the surface, and this did very well so long as only a little was used. Now the use is so gen- eral that all these seams have been exhausted, and mines are sunk deep into the earth. The depth of a mine depends upon its location and the length of time it has been worked. In the bituminous coal measures of the Mississippi Valley, the seams are in nearly the same position as when they were formed, and are found from two hundred to six hundred feet below the surface. In the anthracite regions of Pennsylvania, some of the mines extend as far as fifteen hundred feet below the surface. When a mine is opened in an out-cropping seam it follows the seam into the earth, and resembles a 22 Great American Industries. stone quarry or a cave. Sometimes it is worked into the side of a mountain like a tunnel. The tun- nel is also often made in the side of a hill or moun- tain when the coal can be reached easier that way than by digging down from the top. Nearly all mines now worked, however, are so deep that these methods have been set aside for the shaft. THE SHAFT OF A COAL MINE. Perhaps you have watched the digging of a well, or a deep cellar for a large building. Well, the shaft to a mine is dug or sunk in much the same way. It is larger than a well, but probably smaller than a cellar. A shaft of average size is twelve feet wide and thirty feet long. As the shaft sinks through the soil and soft earth, the sides are walled with strong timbers or stone to keep them from cav- ing in. When it sinks through solid rock these walls are not needed. The shaft is sunk until it reaches the bottom of the seam which the miners wish to excavate. If the seam is tilted, the shaft is located if possible so as to sink it to the lowest point. We shall see why they do this further on. The shaft is divided into four compartments bj partitions running its entire length. These parti- tions are made by placing oak timbers six inches Great American Industries. 23 jlffiritflHf lie SHMl^^ • . • • . • • . y • '*. .• • <^!*rT • • SPTY SWDSTrtWry > * » -V A^ '^0- ^ -4«« -^HBFiSFtiNpt. v. -«?r My:^ • • • ' • ' • coj ie; sforrl j : r ^jj. - VHft«4:^ COAI, SHAFT. C represents a strata of coaL The light parts show the coal removed ; the dark* the coal left in for support. 24 Great American Industries. square across the shaft and firmly fastening their ends into the walls. These timbers, called buttons, are placed four feet apart and covered with boards. This makes a strong, tight partition. Two of these compartments are used for the hoisting carriage, one for the purpose of getting air into the mine, and the other for pumping out the water. The partition between the hoisting and air compartments needs to be air tight, otherwise the mine could not be properly ventilated. On two sides of each hoisting shaft are slender vertical timbers fastened to the middle of the partitions. These are to guide the carriage, or cage, as it is called by the miners. This gives the compartment the appearance of an elevator well, which you can see in almost any high building in a city. A strong frame, called the head-frame, is erected over the mouth of the shaft. The height of this frame depends upon the location of the shaft and the number of times the coal must be handled be- fore it is shipped. It is always as high as a two- story house, and often much higher. Large wheels, called sheaves, are placed on the top of the head- frame, and over these pass the wire ropes that are attached to the carriages. These ropes are connected with a drum which is operated by a powerful engine placed near the shaft. The carriages are so attached to the drum that as one is raised the other is lowered. Great American Industries. 25 The carriage bears quite a close resemblance to ordinary freight elevator. To the strong platform, which forms the bottom, are fastened two strong, upright timbers, which are fitted to the guides by grooves. These uprights are joined at the top by a beam to which is attached the rope. This rope is made of wire and is very strong. A covering, called the hood, is also fastened to this beam. This is to prevent anything that should happen to fall into the shaft from injuring those .who may be on the carriage. A track is placed on the plat- form in such a direction as to make it continuous with that in the mine when the carriage is at the bottom of the shaft, and with that on the trestle when it is on the head-frame. Now we have learned how the shaft is con- structed and operated, we will next study the mine. 26 Great American Industries. THE PLAN OF A COAL MINE. ^1^ ET us put on a miner's suit, take each a miner's lamp, and, attended by a guide, 'place ourselves on the carriage and descend into the regions below. As the carriage begins its descent, and the walls of the shaft seem to fly upward, we may feel fear- ful of the outcome of our journey, and wish we had not started. The writer has known this to happen when parties were making excursions into a mine. But we do not have much time to think about it before the carriage suddenly stops, and here we are! Our guide hurries us oflF the carriage that it may immediately return with its load of coal. How dark it isl We have been out on the darkest night, but have never before known such darkness as this. We can scarcely see anything, even with the light of our lamps. The guide asks us to be Great American Industries. tl seated on a bench near the foot of tlie shaft for a few minutes, until we can become somewhat acquainted with our surroundings. We hear strange sounds all about us, but cannot tell where they are. The rumbling of machinery; the rattle 28 Great American Industries. of cars; the shouts of the drivers; the crack of the miners' drills; and the dull heavy roar of a distant blast, all make us think that we are in another world. The first thing that attracts our attention is the row of lights twinkling and dancing down the long, dark passage way. This passage is the main entrance to the mine, and is called the gangway. It contains the track over which the cars pass on their way to and from the shaft. Running along beside the gangway and parallel to it, is another passage called the air passage. This is for the purpose of carrying pure air to all parts of the mine. Crossing the gangway at right angles, and at short distances from each other we shall find passages leading to the chambers where the miners are at work. If the mine has been worked for a long time, we shall find other gangways crossing these, so that all together the passages excavated in a coal mine resemble the streets and alleys of a city. The only diflFerence is that these passages are not regularly laid out, for they must follow the seam of coal, and that may be very irregular. Now we have become accustomed to the dark- ness, we will begin our exploring trip. As we pass the lights that first attracted our attention, we notice that each one is fixed to a miner's cap. This enables the miner to carry his light and have Great American Industries. 29 boti hands free for work. As we move along the passages we notice that great pillars of coal are left 30 Great American Industries. every few feet to support the roof of the mine. In addition to these, hard wood posts are also used in many places. The pressure from above is so great that the miners have to take the utmost care to prevent the roof from caving in. Sometimes all the supports are crushed, and great masses of rock fall into the mine. If this happens during work- ing hours, the poor miners are liable to be crushed by the falling rock, or cut off from escape, so that they perish from suffocation before aid can reach them. All along the passages, and in many of the chambers we see tracks that connect with the one in the main gangway. By this arrangement the cars may be placed in all parts of the mine, and the coal loaded where it is taken from the seam. If the mine is level these tracks may be construct- ed wherever they are needed, but if it slopes the tracks are placed only in those gangways that are on nearly the same level as the foot of the shaft. The coal is then slid down to the gangway by a shute, or is taken out by a small car called a buggy. We can now understand why the shaft is sunk to the lowest point in the seam. It is much easier and cheaper to slide the coal down to the gangway and then hoist it from a greater depth than it is to work it up a slope in the mine. The water also runs to an excavation made for it Great American Industries. 31 near the foot of the shaft, and called the sump. In this way a mine can often be drained by a single pumping station. THE WORK IN THE MINE. Our guide has been explaining all these things as Tve walk along the passages, and now we find ourselves in one of the chambers where the miners are at work. Here are four men — ^two of them are miners and two are laborers. The miners are partners and make a contract with the coal company to receive a certain price for every ton of coal mined by them. These miners furnish their own tools and hire their laborers. Their powder, oil, fuse, etc., is furnished by the company and charged to their account. The two miners divide their wages equally with each other and are called butties. "Butty" seems rather a strange name for a business partner, doesn't it? The miner's duties are to loosen the coal and set the props so as to protect the roof of the chamber. The laborers must load the coal into the car and clean away the refuse so the chamber will be ready for work the next morning. The coal is loosened with a pick or by blasting. When making an entrance into a chamber, the space is often so narrow that the drill cannot be 32 Great American Industries. used. Then the pick is resorted to until enough coal has been removed to admit of drilling. The drills are of two kinds — ^the common hand drill and the machine drill. This may be so arranged that it can be driven by hand or by steam or com- pressed air. This last method is very common in bituminous mines, but in the mines where anthra- cite is found it does not work well, as it breaks the coal into small pieces and causes waste. The miner prepares his blast by first drilling a hole about five feet deep, cleaning it out, and placing a cartridge of black powder in the farther end. He then arranges to connect the fuse, or squib, as he calls it, and fills the hole with moist earth, driving it in hard with the end of his drill. This is called tamping. When the tamping is completed he is ready to fire the charge. As we have watched these preparations, we begin to think it is about time for us to visit some other part of the mine, but our guide asks us to remain and see the eflFect of the blast. He conducts us behind some pillars at a safe distance and we await results. The miner shouts "Fire I'* several times, to warn any one who may be coming to his chamber, lights the fuse and runs behind a pillar. Pres- ently we feel a puflf of air, hear a dull roar, have our eyes and mouth filled with fine dust, and real- ize that the blast has been discharged. As soon Greai American Industries. 33 as the dust has settled, we return to the face of the chamber and notice that a good quantity of coal has been loosened. The miner begins drilling another hole, and keeps on blasting until he has loosened as much coal as will be needed for the day. His work is then through, and he can leave the mine, but the laborers must stay until they have everything ready for the next day's work. If his work goes well, the miner is usually ready to leave by noon, and sometimes sooner. You see that he does not have along day's work, but we must not judge it to be a very easy one by that. He often has to work in such positions as to make a 34 Great American Industries. few hours labor veiy tiresome, as you can see by looking at some of the cuts showing miners at work. When the laborers have loaded the car it is pushed out ofthe chamber, and a driver draws it to the shaft. These drivers are boys. Each boy has charge of a mule, and both mule and driver become so familiar with the passages that they never take the wrong one, and seldom meet with accidents. As the car nears the shaft the boy unhitches the mule and he dodges into a side passage and lets the car pass. In some mines the mules are kept in underground stables, and never go out. In others they are taken out every night. The mule places himself on the carriage with his driver and is hoisted to the surface with as little concern as the miners. In the mines of England ponies are used instead of mules, and in some of the large mines in this country small locomotives and electric engines are used to draw the cars along the gangways. Besides the miners and drivers, we find several other classes of workmen in the mine. There are the door boys who open and close the doors as the miners and cars pass through. These doors are made in partitions placed across some of the pas- sages to change the direction of the air currents, and must be tended very carefully, as the safety of thtt miners depends upon the free circulation of air Great American Industries. 35 to all parts of the mine. We also find track layers, carpenters, and sometimes engineers. The principal officers of the mine are the mine boss, the fire boss, and the driver boss. The mine boss is at the head and is responsible for the work- ing of the mine ; all others are subject to his orders. The fire boss must look after the gas that collects in the chambers and see that it is expelled, and caution the miners to guard against it. He also attends to the ventilation. The driver boss looks after the driver boys and mules. DANGERS OI^ THB COAI, MINE. The strange feeling. that came over us as we entered the mine has by this time partially passed oflF, but we do not feel perfectly safe. We ask the guide if mining is very dangerous work, and in re- sponse he tells of the dangers that the miner must meet every day. We have already spoken of the danger that may occur by the falling of the roof, but there are others of a far different nature. The gases known as fire-damp and choke-damp are the source of the greatest danger to the miner, for he can neither hear nor see them, and may come upon them when he least expects to. Fire-damp, as it is called, is very explosive, and when brought in contact with a light explodes with 36 Great American Industries. such violence as to cause death to those who are near, and sometimes do great injury to the mine. This gas escapes from the newly -worked sur- faces, and is liable to accumulate during the night. To prevent accidents, the fire boss goes into the mine and examines all suspected places _ in the morning before the miners commence work. So many lives were form- erly lost by explosions of this gas in the mines of Eng- land that a great scientist, Sir Humphrey Davy, in- vented a lamp to protect them. This is called a safety- lamp. It looks very much like an ordinary lantern, and the principal difference is that a fine wire screen takes the place of the glass globe in a lantern. If the gas takes fire within this screen PAW BAPETv LAMP. thc flamc wiU not pass out between the wires for some minutes, and the miner is warned and can make his escape. If we are to explore any new or unused parts of the mine, the fire boss precedes us to test for the presence of this gas before we are allowed to enter with our lights. Great American Industries. 37 We may be taken to a chamber where a small quantity is found and lighted for us. After having once seen this done, we never forget the danger the miners are constantly facing. The guide asks us to stand at the entrance to the chamber, and leave our lamps back far enough to ensure safety. He then takes a lighted candle and places it on a long stick, and reaches up to the top of the chamber, and a great mass of blue flame rolls along the roof with a noise like distant thunder. We conclude that, if a small quantity of this gas can cause such an explosion, that from a large quantity must be terrific indeed. The choke-damp is formed by the burning of fire-damp, and settles in the bottom of the mine. It will not bum, and is so poisonous that a person breathing it will live but a few minutes. Miners are sometimes suffocated by this gas before they realize its presence. It may be discovered by lower- ing a lighted candle into the place v/here it is sup- posed to be. If present the candle is extinguished. Besides the dangers already mentioned there is another from blasting, and from falling rock and coal in the chambers where the miners are at work. So we see that* the miner must use great care in every thing he does. Smoking is not allowed, and the careless use of lamps is constantly guarded against by the bosses. 38 Great American Industries, We have been so interested in the work around us, and in the explanations given by our guide . that we have failed to notice the roof of the mine. But before we return let us examine the ceiling of some of these chambers, for the ceilings of the finest king's palace were never half so beautifully frescoed as are some of these underground cham- bers. If the coal dropped from the layer of rock without breaking its surface, we find there the most delicate tracings of the leaves and stems of those plants from which the coal was formed. These are often so interwoven as to make the most beautiful patterns imag^iuable. Remember it is by these and other fossil remains that the geologists have been able to read in the rocks the story of coal formation. Great Americm Industries. 39 PREPARING THE COAL FOR MARKET. The workmen in tlie mine load the coal just as it is loosened from the vein. When the mine car reaches the head of the breaker it is run to the dump shute and dumped. This shute is made of long, paralled bars of iron, placed four inches apart, and inclined so the coal will readily slide over them. The small coal, dirt and pieces of rock fall between the bars into a bin called the hopper. The large pieces pass on to the breaker. This is a machine for crushing the coal, and consists of sets of strong iron rollers with teeth projecting from their sur- face. The rollers are so arranged that the teeth of one fit into a hollow in the one opposite. There are usually two sets of rollers in a machine. The upper set has large teeth placed far apart, and breaks the coal into large pieces. It then falls to the set below, and is crushed into sizes suitable for use. After the coal has passed through the breaker it is screened, so that each size is separated out and placed by itself. Narrow seats are placed across the shutes leading from the breaker, and boys sit on these to catch and throw out the pieces of slate and other rock that may have been brought up with the coal. These boys become very skillful at their work, and will throw out a score of pieces of rock 40 Great American Industries. when you or I could not see one. But in the last few years a number of machines have been invented which do this work better and cheaper than the boys can, so we may soon expect to find the picker boys, as they are called, put at other work. There are several sizes of anthracite coal found upon the market. Taken in order of their size, be- ginning with the largest, they are lump, steam- boat, broken, ^%%^ large stove, small stove, chestnut, pea, buckwheat, and dirt. The ^%%^ stove, and chestnut are the sizes we see most frequently, as they are burned in our stoves and grates. Coal finer than the buckwheat is not usually considered suitable for fuel. In some of the countries of Europe, however, and on some of the railways in the Eastern States, dirt coal is used by being made into bricks. This is done by mixing the coal with a preparation of pitch which sticks the particles together. Bituminous coal is so soft that it is not necessary to run it through a breaker ; in fact one of the great sources of waste in mining this coal is found in the amount of dirt formed. When a car of bitu- minous coal comes from the mine it is usually loaded directly on to the cars or boat to be shipped to market. Some mines have a washer to which the dirt and small sized coal is sent, and separated and washed. After washing, the coal is screened Great American Industries. .41 the same as in the breakers. This washed coal is clean, and makes an excellent fuel. There is such a demand for it that those mines having washers are scarcely able to keep up with their orders. MARKETING THE COAI.. Coal is taken to market by both cars and boats. Shipping by boat is much the cheaper, and the coal companies employ this method wherever they can. We see immense coal docks on the wharves of all our large cities. Here we find about the same devices for handling the coal as we found at the mines, .Workmen are constantly engaged unload- ing the coal from the boats and re-loading it on to cars. This is done because it is cheaper to freight the coal by boat as far as possible and then change it to the railway than it is to freight it from the mines to the interior of the country by rail. The coal for the great cities of the Atlantic sea board reaches them by the way of canals, rivers and the eea. That for the Western states by the way of the Great Lakes and the railways leading from Chicago, Milwaukee, and Duluth . The price of coal depends very much upon the expense of freight in bringing it to us. If the people of Chicago could buy their anthracite coal right at the mine it would not cost them much more than half what they now pay for 42 Great American Industries. it, and the price to the inhabitants of Duluth, St. Paul, and Minneapolis is about three times what it is at the mines. SOME USES OI? COAL. We are all familiar with the most common uses of coal; we know what a hot fire it makes, and how it warms our houses and makes the steam that drives the great engines of commerce. Have we ever thought how strong it is ? King Coal is a real giant; there seems to be no limit to his strength, and some one has called him "the giant spirit of all work." The strength of coal has been estimated by an English engineer, and he says that the steam pro- duced by one pound of anthracite coal, if used in an engine, will do as much work as can be done by a strong, healthy workman in one day. A bushel of this coal weighs about eighty-five pounds. From this we can see that the coal burned in our stove on a cold day in winter will do as much work as fifty men. If we were obliged to suddenly stop the use of coal, the manufactures and commerce of most of the world would be ruined. Coal turns the wheels of our factories, whirls us across the country in the rushing train, and drives the great steam- ers over the sea. Great American Industries. 43 But there are other uses of this valuable product that we may never have thought of. A great deal of bituminous coal is made into coke by about the same process as wood is made into charcoal. The coke is used in furnaces for smelting ores and metals. The gas that lights the streets and homes of our cities is also made from this coal, by distill- ing it in large iron retorts. Besides the gas we get a liquid from which ammonia is made, and coal-tar from which come a number of useful articles. The most important of these are the beautiful aniline dyes used in coloring dress goods and rib- bons, and paraffine, a white wax, from which candles are made. When you study chemistry you will learn all about these substances and how they are made. Now that we have learned about the discovery of coal, its early use, and the great value it is to every one at the present time, we are prepared to read what one of our greatest poets, William CuUen Bryant, wrote about it a long time ago. Dark anthracite that reddenest on my hearth, Thou in those islands didst slumber long; But now thou art come forth to move the earth, And put to shame the men that mean thee wrong : Thou shalt be coals of fire to those that hate thee, And warm the shins of all that underrate thee. a Great American Indushies. For thou shalt forge vast railways, and shalt heat The hissing rivers into steam, and drive Huge masses from thy mines, on iron feet. Walking their steady way, as if alive, Northward until everlasting ice besets thee, And South as far as the grim Spaniard lets thee. Thou shalt make mighty engines swim the sea. Like its own monsters — boats that for a guinea Will take a man to Havre — and shalt be The moving soul of many a ^Inning-jenny, And ply thy shuttles, till a bard can wear As good a suit of broadcloth as the mayor. SncGBSTioKS : Compare a piece of charcoal with a \ iece of wood and tell how they resemble each other. Find as many kinds and sizes of coal as you can, and see if you can name them correctly. Examine a piece of anthracite coal with a niagnif; ing glass, and describe what you see. Write an imaginary description of a coal mine. Great American Industries. PETROLEUn. DISCOVERY AND LOCATION OF THE OIL FIELDS. ETROLEUM comes from two words; a Greek word, petra, meaning rock, and the Latin word, oleum, meaning oil. The name means rock- oil, and is ap- plied to a class of sub- stances that have nearly the same composition and products as bituminous coal, and are found in almost every country of the world. 46 Great American Industries. Petroleum, under one form and another, has been known since the earliest times. It is often referred to in the Old Testament, and was without doubt the substance used by Noah to make the Ark water-tight. The oldest known oil wells are in Burmah, on a small tributary of the Irrawady. The oil from these wells has been used by the inhabitants of the country to light their houses for centuries. Japan produces about two and a half million gallons a year, and Baku, in Russia, has a very productive field, small quantities have also been taken from Peru during the last few years. But the greatest petroleum regions of the world are found in the United States. The discovery of petroleum in large quantities in the United States was first made by Col. E. L. Drake, of Titusville, Penn., in 1859. The existence of an oily ill-smelling fluid that oozed from the rocks was known to the earliest explorers and set- tlers of that portion of the states in which the oil fields are located. It was also known to the Indians, who, in a pow-wow given to entertain the French at Fort DuQuesne, set fire to it in the seams of the rocks and on the surface of a small creek, dancing in its light. The Indians also valued it for medicine, and in this way it was first used among the early settlers. It was considered a remedy for rheumatism, and was known as Seneca Oil, as its Great American Industries. 47 tise was first made known by the Seneca Indians. The Indians collected the oil by spreading their blankets on the surface of the creeks where it floated and then wringing the oil out of them. Some years before Col. Drake's discovery, a company began the manufacture of a liniment under the name of Seneca Oil, and it had an exten- sive sale. The company was in need of more Seneca Oil than they could collect by any means at hand. Col. Drake told them that he believed more oil would be found by digging into the earth, and the company furnished the money for his first well. At the depth of about sixty feet the well struck oil, and began to flow, but at this time no one supposed it could be used for the purposes of lighting and heating. Col. Drake's well yielded 2,000 barrels the first year, and the next year two other wells were bored and the yield n amounted to 500,000 barrels. In 1861 the yield was over 2,000,000 of barrels, and in 1863 it was over 3,000,000. From that time to the present the amount of petroleum taken from the earth each year has increased, until it now amounts to over 60,000,000 of barrels of forty- two gallons each a year. This discovery of petroleum and its rapid intro- duction into use caused almost as much excitement in the northern states as did the battles of the great 48 Great American Industries. Civil War whicli was then in progress. Our his- tories seldom mention this great discovery, yet petroleum has done as much for the country in one way as the war did in another. The discovery and development of this industry was in a little section of country about one hundred and fifty miles long and less than twenty miles wide, and located in the northwestern portion of Pennsylvania. Men rushed to this section from all parts of the country, as they have rushed to those places where gold has been discovered. The oil region was wild with speculation. Men went to bed poor and awoke to find themselves rich. Farms that were considered worthless rose in value until they sold for $500 and $1,000 an acre, and the owners of the land often made more money than the seekers for oil. Geologists early made a careful study of the rock which contained the oil, and were soon able to tell with certainty where it could be found. But the oil speculators would not heed their warnings, and many of them put their money into holes in the ground, and — ^there it is to day. While petroleum has been found in nearly every state in the Union, there are only a few localities that produce it in sufiicientl}^ large quantities to pay for working. These locali- ties are known as the oil fields, and, as far as dis- Great American Industries. 49 50 Great American Indtistrtes* covered, are located in western Pennsylvania and New York ; West Virginia, in and around what is known as tlie Turkey's Foot ; around Macksburg and Lima, Ohio; near Florence, Colorado; in South- em California, and near Beaumont, Texas. The oil is not evenly distributed over these fields, but occurs in places in the rock called pools. If a well is bored to one side of these pools it will Hot yield any oil, and is a dry well. FORMATION OF PETROLEUM. We do not know as much about the formation of petroleum as we do about that of coal. The fossil remains of the Coal Period have left no doubt in the mind of the geologist as to the origin of coal, - but no such remains can be found in connection with oil. Petroleum exists in definite localities of small area, and usually in the vicinity of the coal measures. Still it is generally believed that it has not been formed from the coal. Quite a num- ber of theories have been given to account for the formation of petroleum, and, while they all differ in many particulars, they pretty generally agree that it has been formed from plants and animals buried in the earth. There was a time before the coal period when the waters swarmed with fish and a class of Great American Industries. 51 animals called moUusks. These animals were much more numerous then than now, and STRATA OF OIL AND. GAS. they w