The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1883-06-28
The New Virginia.

The New Virginia.
GEOLOGICAL RESEARCHES AND THE De
vELOPNIENT OF MINERAL WEALTH.
BALTIC. San.
AS deposit after deposit of coal and iron
of the Virginias is unfolded in the progress
OF present industrial development, sur
prise is expressed that this great mineral
wealth should have remained so long I'M
known and unused. But it was not I'M
known. The late Prof. VIM. B. Rogers
made exhaustive investigations and COM
plete memoranda of the mineral wealth OF
Virginia when he was State geologist, be-
tween the years 1885 and 1S4l. 1t has been
asserted that his reports were suppressed
because the sentiment of Old Virginia was
averSe to the Introduction OF free skilled
labor in the days of slavery. The truth is,
however, that before Rogers could write
out all his field notes the appropriation for
geological investigation ceased in Virginia,
as in several other States at the same time.
Rogers was the pioneer geologist of the
United States. DR.. Patrick Kerr Rogers,
his father, was physician in Baltimore
from 1872 to 1878, when he became a pro-
fessor in William and Mary College, Va.
VIM. b. Rogers was a teacher III New
Windsor, Md, in 1925, when he proposed a
plan for an institute of technology i'll Balti-
more, in connection with the Maryland In
stitute of Mechanics Arts, then occupying
public attention in the city. The same plan
was adopted subsequently for the Massa-
chusetts Institute OF Technology at Boston,
the first technical school founded in this
country, and now tiourishing establish
ment, having five OF six hundred students
aunrv yaar (tO1 Tod HOtchlicc who iC
about issuing volume of Rogers reports
and field notes never before published, has
in his possession the original draft for the
Maryland School of Technology, which he
regards as one of the neglected opportuni-
ties of Baltimore.
Prof. Rogers died only year ago while
lecturing before class in the Boston in
stitution which he originated. His mem
oranda of geological researches, made
nearly fifty years ago, are still the most re-
liable data which New Virginia employs
to guide and direct her present enter
prises. Among the manuscripts which he
left are notes on the Flat Top coal fields in
TazeWell county. These valuable mineral
west Improvement Company, an associa-
ton of Philadelphia and other Northern
capitalists identified with the railroad syn
dictate controlling the Norfolk and Western
and Shenandoah Valley Railroads.
The Southwest Improvement Company
has within the past eighteen months con-
structed a branch railroad from New
River, on the Norfolk and Western Road,
70 miles to Pocahontas, at the foot of Flat
Top mountain, to bring into use the vast
and valuable beds OF coal there developed.
The branch railroad was opened May q,
and last week the first body of eXcursionists
OF the American Institute of Mining En-
road is through wild and undeveloped
country, along the New and East rivers
simultaneously with the beginning of
railroad construction, the Opening of the
mine began Is months ago. Flat Top is
eleven hundred feet high, and within this
space, ranged at intervals one above an
other, are 10 beds of coal, aggregating So
feet inches in thickness. Three of these
beds are 5 feet thick : one is 6 feet inches,
and one is II feet. The last two are 4
feet apart. The 12-foot bed is the one
upon which operations have been com
menced. The railroad enters it at the
level of the stream The bed has been
penetrated fifteen hundred feet, and the
drifts have been carried more than mile.
Several chambers have been opened for
operations. All the dead work has been
done, and the company is prepared for an
output OF l 1000 tons a day, OF 1000 tons, il
demanded, at cost for mining of 80 cents
a ton. The bed is entirely homogeneous,
and equal in quality to Connelsville coal
for steam and coke. The mountain is five
miles through, and the dip of the bed from
the horizontal line is about thirty feet to
the mile westwardly. The distance from
the mine to Norfolk is 37S miles, and to
Roanoke 100 miles.
Pocahontas, the mining village OF about
a hundred houses, lies in a gorge beneath
the shade Of some splendid forest trees
left by the Woodlands axe in making the
clearing. The houses are all well built and
comfortable homes. The miners include
Swedes, Norwegians, Hungarians, Ger
mans, Frenchmen and blacks. The equip
ment of the mines includes 200 coke ovens,
which have begun to work for the Roanoke
furnaces.
Tazewell county has magnificent timber
and inexhauStible coal beds. 1t is also a
great producing county agriculturally.
with the famous blue grass for cattle. 1t
it susceptible of infinite development, and
the wish is expressed for an extension of
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroads Valley
Branch from Lexington through Craig,
Giles, Bland and TazeWell counties. down
the Clinch valley.
One of the most interesting develop
ments contiguous to the Norfolk and
Western Railroad, though not III Virginia,
is that of magnetic iron ore of the Gran
berry mines, Mitchell county, western
North Carolina, about a mile and a-half
over the East Tennessee border. From
johnson City, Tennessee, the mines are
Western North Carolina Railroad, of
feet gauge and SO miles length. This road
is remarkable for it's construction. The
engineer and present superintendent is
Mr.. Thos. E. Matson, of Baltimore. MI.
Matson made the preliminary surveys,
which were so difficult that the company
was near giving up the enterprise. The
road has been built about a year, and the
mine, which is owned and worked in the
same interest, was opened simultaneously.
Part Of the route is through wild gorge
in Carter county, Tenn, where some of
the curves are Is degrees and the track is
along a narrow shelf, under cliffs 700 feet
high and above the rapid torrent of noun
tain stream.
Six OF seven miles distant from the line
of the railroad is Roam mountain, 600
feet above the tide, with its summit nearly
always hidden by the clouds. Onthispea
is q hotel, where many visitors spend the
hot months. Roam mountain is famous
for it's cherry and walnut timber. The |
cherry is the finest in the world, some of |
it being SO inches diameter. A timber |
merchant said the trees grew on the third
story of the mountain, and it was very
difficult work to get them to market The !
railroad has as much as it can do hauling
logs. The magnetic iron ore lies in Gran
berry like solid rock, most remarkable |
for quality and quantity A drill run 800 |
feet at right angles with the seam did not |
reach the end, and the whole interior of |
the mountain seems to be iron ore.