The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1867-01-23
WEST VIRGINIA AND HER RE.
SOURCES.


SODAASLsSs
Necessary for n Geological Survey.
Editors IntelIigencer:
Western Virginia crowns the Alle-
ghanies. She wears the diadem of the
Atlantic States, and should sway the
scepter of our mineral kingdom. Her
mountains hold the wealth of the APP
palachains,-her rivers the the keys OF
the West. The forests of Maine might
be lost on the Great Kanawha-"River
of the woods''-nnd the mines of Penn
sylvauia grow dim among the minerals
of the mountain State. Her fields OF
coal are more extensive than those OF
the celebrated keystone" and her re-
sources in "black diamonds" even
more vast than those of Illinois. More
than half the camel coal Of the IDOrLd,
reposes in her mountains; and her
fountains of petroleum appear to be in
eNhaustible. It is even Solidified in
her caverns, and exists in dykes
through which it has burst, under the
pressure of its vast subterranean accu-
mutation.
The central location of West Virginia,
surrounded by old and populous
States, is singular and suggestive. The
richest mineral State in the Union, and
yet undeveloped, though thousands
have been pushing their way beyond
the Rocky mountains, in search of the
bosom. Within her limits are the most
productive soils, and her climate is the
most salubrious and delightful of all
the New World, and yet the adven-
turous sons of New England, and the
industrious, money loving Germans,
pass on to the vast plains of Wisconsin
and Iowa, where the winds that rush
down from the Northwest, are as pierc-
ing as steel. They do not know of the
paradise which they pass unheeding by,
where the mountains and streams, and
soils and climate they could love, re-
pose in the wild beauty of sylvan love
liness, rich in all the wealth and happi-
ness they go so far, and suffer so much,
in search of. There, corn need not be
burned for fire. Insatiate markets are
ever open for profitable trade in her
cereals. Her very rocks are fuel! West
Virginia is New England transformed!
The rocks are toned to virgin soils,
''where corn and wine and milk and
honey flow." The sun shines warmer,
the winds have lost their icy breath,
and nature smiles from March 10 De-
cenIber.
The lumberman and raitman of the
distant forests, on the waters of the
Allegheny, toll fora pittance; with vast
labor they send their floats by the
month of The Great Kanawha, within
sight, almost, of unbroken wilds, where
magnificent forest trees of the most
valuable varieties, stand like vast
giants, defying the axe and the saw.
Does the "woodman know how long he
"spares the tree?" Tell the pioneers
Allegheny and the Susquehanna,
and the lumberman of Maine,
OF the magnificent forests that
dnrken the mountains of your State,
and Cincinnati will no longer have to
depend on the floods from Pennsyl-
r.. l.. H..
boats of the Mississippi wait for the ice
floods to supply the Crescent city from
the far Northwest. Where else will
loftier forests of pine be found than on
the ''river OF the woods?" Where finer
black walnut, locust and cherry? where
nobler pOplars, oaks and hickory?
where whittier, lighter linn, maple and
buckeye? in fact all the timber trees of
the Atlantic exist here in magnificent
profusion. You have only TO let the
world know of their existence.
Why are the men of the iron city
sending their coal and their iron from
the mountains of Pennsylvania to the
cities below your borders? Why are
the merchants and manufacturers OF
Baltimore, Philadelphia aud New York
sending their rails, their steel and their
implements of iron, through your ter
ritory, while your supplies of iron
and coal are ineXhaustable?
Do the miners of England and Wales
know of your unequalled beds of coal?
Your seams Ofsplint and camel? Your
deposits of iron ores and fire clay2 If
they knew, would they slave in the
mine and the mill for a bare pittance
while a kingdOm-an independence
awaits them here?
Though mountainous, West Virginia
is rich in soils, while the
bare and barren granite hills
ut
ther grass nor grain. Your mountains
and highlands are rich in herbage.
Grapes flourish on the steepest slopes,
while cattle grow fat on the hill tops.
The whole State is a pasture field.
Even tine wilderness of the Tug and
the wild swamps of Coal and Gauley,
afford grass in the dead of winter,
where sheep will live and thrive amid
untasted hay stacks.
But luxuriant as those wild and un-
cultivated mountains are in pastures
and soils, the wealth above bears no
comparison to the wealth below. The
vegetable kingdom sinks into insignifi-
cance when compared TO the mineral
kingdom. The coal and iron beneath
the hills of West Virginia, would buy
all Europe, RdevelOped as the minerals
of England are West Virginia has
more tfdn ttviec the amount of coal and
iron which England possessed a centu-
ry ago, nearly three times as much as
she owns now, and nearly twice as
much available coal as all Europe now
possesses!
The location of this vast mineral
wealth is central, as regards the Allan
tic States, and beyond the influence oi
competition in regard to the control oil
the markets of the Lower Mississippi,
and the great basin which stretches a
thousand miles from the Alleghanies
20 the Rocky Mountains, and from the
Lakes TO the Gulf. Iron can be made
IN the Valley of the great Kanawha
cheaper than any other part of the
world under the same degree of devel-
opment, and the same rates of wages
for labor. Owing to the availability Of
both coal and iron, their extent, purity
and proximity, iron and steel may be
manufactured here in competition with
the world, for home consumption,
when that great valley is fairly open 70
navigation and the locomotive.
Thei vast extent of it's beds of coal,
and their variety and richness, place