One of the foremost districts in the world of industry is the valley of the Monongahela. Its iron and steel mills are noted the world throughout. The chief cause of this importance is its richness in coal deposits. This valley is in the center of the great bituminous district of Pennsylvania. This productiveness is the source of great wealth and improvement in the valley. There are nine dams which divide the river into nine “pools.” Although all of these are rich in the production of coal, the richest is the fourth pool. In this pool there are more mines and the coal is handier to the surface than in other mines. The banks in the river in the fourth pool are lined with small mining towns and numerous tipples. One of the largest of these towns is California. California is a town of about 2,500 inhabitants, situated along the left bank of the river about fifty miles from Pittsburgh and ten miles from Lock No. 4. It is the center of the mining district and the chief occupation is mining. There are five mines in the vicinity of California, four of which belong to the Monongahela Consolidated Coal and Coke Company and one to Jones and Laughlin.
1. The “Vigilant” is in the upper part of the town. 2. “Stony Hill” is almost directly opposite the Vigilant. 3. “Chamouni” is also on the right bank, about one-fourth mile above Stony Hill. 4. The “Crescent” is on the left bank a little above Chamouni. 5. The mine belonging to Jones and Laughlin is about ¼ mile above the river on Pike Run.
About 1870, a mine was opened a few hundred feet below the present site of Stony Hill and directly opposite the town. It was called “Cedar Hill.” It has been out of use for about five years and now scarcely any traces are left. The next mine to open was Stony Hill in 1878; it is still running.
Photograph: Stony Hill
Photograph: Vigilant

The Crescent opened in 1891 and Chamouni in the next year. At the four mines belonging to the River Combine there are about 800 men employed. They put out about 115,000 bu. per day, which is worth about $6,900. Altogether about 68 mules are used. In the Crescent and Vigilant, machines, worked by 2 men, are used; they can dig about as much as 20 men. Chamouni and Stony Hill are worked by men. The mine of Jones and Laughlin is probably about 20 years old. The old tipple ran across the hollow on Pike Run and tunneled under the hill above Coal Centre. A new tipple is being built down Pike Run to the river. Of these mines Chamouni is the most productive. Chamouni employs 400 men of whom 25 are drivers and 21 work outside. About 150 of these men live in shanties at Chamouni. Chamouni has two mouths and two main entries, one for going in, and the other for coming out.
Photograph: Miners’ House at Chamouni
These branch out into “blind” entries and side entries, etc. Between the side entries and the main entry are the rooms where the miners work.
Illustration: Diagram of Simple Mine
In Chamouni at the present time, it is about 5,000 feet or nearly one mile from the mouth to the rooms now being worked.
The miner on first going into the mine examines to see whether it is safe to work. He then undermines the coal which he wishes to take out. After this is done, a hole is bored and filled with powder. The miner lights the fuse and seeks a place of safety. After the blast, the coal is loaded into cars or “wagons.” A good miner will dig about 200 bushels per day. This 200 bushels is a mixture of clean coal and slack which is called “mine run.” The cars or wagons hold about 50 bushels and in one day, a miner will fill about four of them. At Chamouni about 450 wagons are in use. After the coal is cleared up, posts have to be put in to prop up the roof. One miner will use about 2 posts in one day. When a mine is abandoned these posts are pulled out and the coal pillars, etc. are
taken. After the coal is loaded in the cars it is hauled with mules to the main entry where it is hooked on the line. The hauling used as Chamouni is the “endless wire system.” It is an endless wire cable which reaches from the engine down through the empty slope along the main entry, back the other main entry, and out the other mouth to the engine again. It is worked by a powerful engine. When the loaded cars are brought to the main entry they are clamped to the cable which is always in motion. These loaded cars are unclamped at the tipple and emptied; they are then shifted to the empty slope and again clamped to the moving cable and hauled into the pit.
Photograph: One of the Mouths at Chamouni
The system used at the Vigilant is the “dilley” system. When the mine only has one mouth the cable has to bring the loaded cars out and reverse to take the empties back. The endless line system saves time and trouble. With the “dilley” the cars are brought out in “trips” and only one trip can be on the track at one time and the cars cannot come out until a trip is ready. When the coal is hauled out of the pit it is weighed on the tipple and then dumped into boats on the river.
Photograph: Untitled
The Crescent and Vigilant can also dump into railroad cars; but as on the right bank, there is as yet no completed railroad, the river only can be used to carry coal.
Photograph: Coal Tipple at the Vigilant
The coal from the tipples is dumped into 3 kinds of freight boats. A flat holds from 3,500 bu. to 7,000 bu.; A large holds from 12,000 bu. to 14,000 bu.; and a coal boat holds from 18,000 bu. to 24,000 bu. The work of loading the boats can be done pretty fast. Sometimes 4 are emptied per minute on an average. These boats when loaded are towed down the river to Pittsburgh and the cities on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. A boat will take as an ordinary load about 7 or 8 flats or 50,000 bu.

The production of coal at Chamouni is about 50,000 bu. per day, “mine run” and 6¢ per bu. amounts to $3,000 per day, while the expense of getting it out is about 3 ¼ ¢ per bu. The miner gets $2.65 per hundred bushels for digging and the hauling costs the difference.
Photograph: Untitled
Pedagogy
The study of mining itself is very interesting to children. Few are they who have not been in old coal-mines or even active ones and have not “stories” to tell about them. In a town like California the children being so close to the mines soon learn something about them which can be developed into better knowledge. The children can see nearly everything for themselves and can get material from their parents. Mining could be taught first in the third grade. The study of mining also makes a basis for geology, arithmetic, commerce and English. The geological structure may be taught by showing a hillside where the strata crop out. The commerce can be taught greatly through the shipping of coal by rail and river. The pupils can be taught the commercial cities, chief industries, etc. from mining. The compositions and oral narrations will give fine opportunities for the development of English work.
~Finis~
Photograph: Untitled, presumably of residents in a mining town