Springfield globe-republic. (Springfield, Ohio) 1884-1887, 1886-05-30
The PHOSPHATE BEDS OF BEAUFORT


| Inc Great Industry at the South Carolina
Coast-The brotherhood nredge.
The phosphate beds make the great in
/ duTry of Beaufort a. Of most Of the coast
| southwest of Stone ferry; and as all the
! negrocs average 81 day in cash earnings
! or can do 81 If they want tO work their
| general condition j. good. \ satisfactory
| explanation Of these phosphate deposits
! has not been worked out. and il lS some
| thing of problem. aS the geology Of
| south Carolina jumps all the intermediate
| ages between archran and tertiary. In
! the piedmont section uf 'he state the aZuic
I rocks stand ont sharp and abrupt from
| the hills and line the channels uf the many
! bright and swiftly flowing streams Of that
| region \ httlc further down the SlOpe
| the drltt covers these rocks and they arc
! StIIl thrre,and the excavations at Columbia
! bring out a horde of blue and ftCktsl
granite \ little lower, there is in pupu-
lar language. no bed rock" At Orange
burg they bored /, lOU feet for artesiaI
water, and found drift all the way down
| clay, sand, and mari
Still coming down the slope. one reaches
point where the sand has travelled 50 far
| from It's original matrIN in the Blue ridge
that II Is completely tIiturated, and the
hills have no consistency. Along this line.
at an average dlstanc" of perhaps sixty
miles from the coast, i a line of sand hills
which seem to have been shaped by the
wind and below them is the broad. fat
generally unhcalthful. "low country"
where the purple and chocolate culOred
streams flow sluggiShly over shiny bot
toms. between muddy banks Shruuded by
the funeral moss, And Yet on the sea
ward side of this tract, in the bottom of
the creeks and lnlets. but occasionally ex-
tending a long distance inland. is the phus-
phate rock
II was known TO be of some value As
early As lNE. but nothing was done to
develop il until tie reconstruction leCisla-
Iure of lN,,> chartered a company to work
IT. Since then the companies have paid
royalty Ia the state for all they took out Of
uaNlgahlc waters OF from state land and
last year the state received Sl1j. 90 from
that source. ts much was taken from
private Lands, the yield must have eX-
ceeded 2tO,ON tons. The supply is practi-
cally ineNhaU Stible, as the strata wherever
pierced are over twenty feet thick. and in
many places il l. known that successive
strata Is suprrImpusrd with dirt between
When first mined the rock is dark gray or
nearly black; after being washed and
ground il is a lighter gray. The com
mrrCial article sell at ii 10 81 per ton. and
Il Is expected that the total yield of the
state this year Will be worth over 81 800 |
upO
\ great impulse has been given the work |
lately by the Brotherhood dredga the in |
veutiOn of Samuel Brntherhood-w |
axes up the rock 10y thirty-siN iron scoop |
buckets, running on aXleS. somewhat in |
he style of the endless platform Of horse |
power. In the original rock are sharks |
teeth and fish bones Of many kinds, which.
suppose, with the phosphate of lime. |
make il valuable as fertilizer In front
If where | write are two steam dredges at
work; across the point are extensive
works on the land, and elsewhere in the
place are large establishments. A few
negroes still follow the old system Of wad-
ng in the shallow creeks and carrying out
such detached pieces of the rock rs they
an handlc.-"Parke" in Chicago Times