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Anthracite
Coal Production
Passing of the Man with the Pick
and Shovel—Demand More Exacting;
Pure Coal Scarcer–Uncertainty of
Early Conditions—Thin Seams Now
the Rule–Large Allowance for Waste
Labor—Cleaning and Separation–
Taking out the “Bone '’– Problem
of Waste Disposal—Keeping Mines
Free of Water–Labor’s Large
Share of Increased Mining Cost.
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AN A N T H R A CITE COLLIERY
Hard Coal “must now go through
processes almost as costly and
complicated as the milling of
flour from wheat.”

Anthracite Coal Production
Changes in the industry that have made it ‘’ not alone a mining
proposition, but a manufacturing and commercial
undertaking as well ''
No other machinery than a pick and shovel was required in
the mining of the first ton of Anthracite coal ever produced. For
a long time no more elaborate Operations were carried on than
would be involved in Surface mining or running shallow tunnels.
But of late years physical conditions in the hard coal fields and
the demands of hard coal consumers have entirely revolutionized
the industry. As President Thomas of the Lehigh Valley Rail-
road said in addressing the last annual Stockholders' meeting of
the company, “It must be borne in mind that the business of pro-
ducing Anthracite coal is not alone a mining proposition, but a
manufacturing and commercial undertaking as well.”
In place of the first Anthracite miner with pick and shovel,
Successful hard coal mining now means shafts from 200 to 2,000
feet deep, collieries that cost as much as $750,000, pumps that can
handle 3,500 gallons of water every minute, timbering that costs
$5,000,000 a year. The business must be carried on upon a large
Scale and with almost unlimited capital or not at all.
Demand more exacting;
Pure Coal Scarcer
Besides the difficulties that naturally multiply as the coal de-
posits go deeper and the seams become thin, there is the necessity
to produce fuel that will satisfy demands that are more exacting
every year, although pure Anthracite in its natural state is at the
same time becoming Scarcer and Scarcer. Fifteen years ago a
large percentage of Anthracite went on the market as lump
coal. Now hardly three per cent. is consumed in that form. Do-
mestic demand steadily increases and this means that coal must
go through processes almost as costly and complicated as the
milling of flour from wheat.
In the days when seams of coal ran from six to twelve feet
and in some localities twenty-four feet thick, a good miner could
go into his chamber in the morning, drill and blast a few hours
and then his work was done. He had mined enough coal to load
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his allotted number of cars, say six, containing about eighty cubic
feet each. The miner was paid about 90 cents a car, and after
deducting what his laborer received and what it cost him for
powder and Other supplies, he had left about $3—a fair average
daily earning.
Uncertainty Marked
Early Conditions
But because the market for Anthracite was so small that
continuous production was impossible, the costs of Operation
were heavy, and neither the miner nor the Operator made much
money. Whenever the labor cost per ton exceeded a dollar there
was nothing left for interest on capital. As a matter of fact, if
lumber and machinery had not been comparatively cheap, and
if the old royalties had not been much lower than those of the
present day, few of the coal companies could have kept out of
bankruptcy. As it was, many individual companies had to sell
out to large corporations having command of the capital required.
And this was true, in spite of the fact that the seams of coal in
operation fifteen years ago were so free from impurities that the
automatic Slate picker was rarely necessary in the preparation of
coal of the required standard for market.
Thin Seams
Now the Rule
To-day a very different condition of affairs prevails in the
industry whose product heats the homes and cooks the food of
millions of people. Instead of seams running from six to twenty-
four feet, most of those now being worked run from thirty
inches to four and one-half feet, and the majority of these seams
are full of impurities. It is common nowadays to find seams of
three or four feet in thickness that “blow,” as the miners express
it, in two or three benches. g
There will be a layer of coal perhaps ten inches thick, then
fifteen inches of black “bone,” then another thinner layer of coal,
then a tier of slate, a thinner tier of coal, more “bone,” and final-
ly, perhaps, six inches more of coal. The “bone” adheres to the
coal and it is very difficult to separate them at the top, so that
when the miner fires a blast he is likely to bring down the top
benches and leave the bottom ones unmolested. To dislodge
them more blasts are required, and then it is necessary to separ-
ate the bone refuse from the coal with a pick. -
It is hard for the practical miner to believe that coal is the
result of vegetable decomposition, for wherever there is a layer
of coal over bone, there is never a clean parting between the lay-
ers, such as happens between coal and slate. If coal is decom-
posed vegetable matter, the miner cannot understand why a
layer of it sticks so closely to one material and parts so readily
from another. -
Large Allowance
For Waste Labor
On account of the difficulty the miner has in separating coal
from refuse, he is allowed to load a certain amount of waste in
the mine car, generally not over 800 pounds. The fact again that
each miner has to blast down two to three feet of rock from the
roof, so as to make way for the mine cars, results in the mixing
of a lot of slate with the coal in sizes so small that they must
go to the breaker to be cleaned. Here an automatic picker, in the
form of Open slots at regular intervals, allows the coal to pass
over, but gathers in the heavier slate. When coal to be cleaned
is wet, “jigging” is resorted to in order to wash the fuel clean
from mud and dirt.
The miner may obtain from five to ten cars for each keg of
powder, which costs him $1.50 a keg, unless he is compelled to
use dynamite, which costs $2.75 for a box of twenty-five pounds,
and while fifteen years ago he was able to mine six cars in a shift
he is now, Owing to the thinness of the Seams, able to produce no
more than three and a half cars in a shift, for which he will be
paid about $3.75. After he had paid his laborer $2 and supplies
out of this sum he would have only about a dollar left, and so
to make his compensation adequate the coal Operator has to pay
“rib yardage” as well as for blasting down top rock. All this
increases the yardage cost to the coal company about thirty-five
cents a ton, as against the cost of Only four or five cents fifteen
years ago. The labor cost per ton of coal is now not far from
$1.8O.
Cleaning and
Separation
After the miner has done his part the coal is loaded into
mine cars. It is a mixture of all sizes, from lumps of IOO pounds
to the finest culm. From the mine depths it is hauled to the foot
of the shaft, hoisted to the surface, transported to the breaker,
and there again hoisted from IOO to I50 feet and discharged from
the car. Grates of iron separate the large and small pieces. The
refuse is removed, crushers reduce the large chunks, screens or
shakers make a still further separation into various sizes. These
are now run over a series of automatic pickers which are sup-
posed to remove the “bone” and slate refuse.
But black “bone” is very difficult to remove from coal, owing
to their weights being so nearly the same, and fifty per cent. of
the coal and refuse has to be run over pickers two or three times
before it is pure enough to come up to the standard required by
the market. After it has gone through all these washings, jig-
gings and separations, the coal is now ready to go into the cars
that scatter it the country over.
Taking Out
The “Bone"
This is hardly half the story of the intricate processes
through which Anthracite must pass before it becomes the fuel of
commerce. The fifty per cent. Of the coal that is generally wet
and slimy must go into a series of jigs, one for each size of coal
from “egg” down to “buckwheat,” and all costing large sums to
construct. In these jigs is the greatest difficulty of dividing
slate and “bone” from the coal.
The water in the jigs, rising and falling by the action of a
plunger, drives the coal to the surface, while the rock is deposited
at the bottom. This makes the Operation comparatively easy
when only rock and coal are to be separated, but the greatest.
quantity of the refuse found in coal is “bone,” the relative density
of which is so nearly the same as coal that in water it floats to the
surface with the carbon. The jig, therefore, is useful only in the
elimination of rock or slate ; another means must be resorted to
to relieve the coal of its “bone” impurities. For this purpose a
spiral slate picker is employed ; this means, of course, that many
different kinds of pickers have to be operated in the same breaker.
Owing to the poor quality of the majority of coal seams now
in operation, the quantity of small sizes, below “chestnut” coal,
naturally increased, and the operators have to make a correspond-
ing increase in the number of pickers and jigs to meet the situa-
tion. Again, owing to the number of jigs in operation and the
quantity of water necessary on the fine coal screens to wash im-
purities away and to take care of the culm passing through the
smallest mesh in the screens, the problem of disposing of the re-
sulting culm slush became more difficult and more expensive.
Problem of
Refuse Disposal
At first the culm was deposited wherever there was space for
it near the breakers. This method of disposal soon amounted to
a great nuisance and it was finally decided to return the refuse
material to the mines, depositing it wherever possible in old
worked-out chambers. This protects the pillars left behind and
helps to avoid cave-ins. To return the refuse to the mines, how-
ever, was by no means a simple process. Holes had to be bored
from the surface to the seam. These holes vary in size from four
to twelve inches, and have to be double cased and cemented
between two lines of pipes, varying in depth from 200 to 800 feet.
At the underground end, pipe lines have to be connected. Some
of these lines are 5,000 feet long from the foot of the bore-hole
and deposit the refuse at a height of IOO feet above the bottom
elevation.
The life of the refuse pipes depends upon the quantity of
water and culm passing through them per minute and the amount
of acid the water contains, but in no case do they last long, al-
though their installation involves a large outlay. The additional
cost to the coal companies in this department of culm disposal
is at least 300 per cent. in excess of what it was fifteen years ago,
and when the increased quantity of water required is taken into
consideration, no great exercise of the imagination is necessary
to realize the huge additional cost thus incurred.
Small Sea of VVater
Pumped from Mines Daily
In addition to all these expenses, there is the cost of keeping
the mines free from water. Over half a billion gallons of water
must be pumped out of the Anthracite mines of Pennsylvania
every day. The exact daily average for 1905 was 633,OOO,OOO
gallons. Mines may be shut down and coal production suspend-
ed, but the water flows on forever, and the battle with it must
ever be kept up. In some mines forty tons of water must be
pumped out for every ton of coal produced, and when the water
is brought to the surface it is often necessary to construct expen-
sive aqueducts to carry it off. At a Hazleton shaft a wooden
canal three and one-half miles long had to be built to carry the
water away.
Large power requirements at the mines to operate the pumps,
breakers and other machinery eat up over 6,OOO,OOO tons of coal a
year. As much as twenty-five per cent. of the entire coal pro-
duction of some mines is so utilized. Steam with which to
operate shaft and slope engines is forced through more than IOO
miles of piping. Altogether it is estimated that 470,000 horse-
power has to be produced at the mines.
Increased wages and the increased force necessary to do the
same amount of work have also added greatly to the expense of
the production of Anthracite. Since 1900 the miners have re-
ceived an increase of wages equal to twenty per cent., and with
the sliding scale they are now getting about twenty-five per cent.
more than they received seven years ago. Sixty per cent. is a
conservative estimate of the increased cost of producing coal to-
day as compared to fifteen years ago.
Labor Gets 91 Per Cent.
Of Increased Mining Cost
In 1906 when the effect of the Anthracite Strike Commission
award had been fully demonstrated, President David Willcox, of
the Delaware & Hudson Co., showed that on the basis of a pro-
duction of 61,4IO,2OI tons, “the increase in cost of production
Over 190I was 36.77 cents per ton, or $22,580,530.90. Of this 33.66
cents per ton, or $20,670,673.66, were paid to labor. The increase
in amount realized was 37.57 cents per ton, or $23,071,812.52. Of
this increase the cost of production absorbed $22,580,530.90 and
$491,281.62 remained. The increase in price was, therefore, 37.57
cents per ton, which was distributed as follows: Labor, 33.66
cents; materials, supplies and royalties, 3.II cents; capital, O.8
cents.” -
Old leases have expired and coal lands can now be obtained
only by paying very much higher premiums than formerly pre-
vailed. - -
Of course, if the mine owner has to pay more for his raw
material, more for wages, more for power, more for timbering,
the price of coal must inevitably increase, although economies in
Operation have prevented so far an increase in price to consumers
equal to the increase in the cost of production,
3 9015 O7496 0314
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
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THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
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