Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1890-05-09
FRIDAY MORNING. MAY 9. 1890.
THE DEVELOPMENT AROUND
UNION HAS FORCED
ITSELF

IISELF.
The present home effort. especially in
the iron region Of Virginia, backed by cap
ital from elsewhere, is no boom in the COM
mon accordance of that word. 1t is simply
the great hidden wealth of this section of
Virginia demanding that the world shall
develop and use it.
The knowledge of this wealth is not
new. We have before us an anonymous
pamphlet, written by "E. 7. gent and
published in London just two hundred and
fifty years ago, in which the writer seeks
to interest Englishmen in the Astounding
ssiron cares and woods in this part of
Virginia. sFor," says he, "neither does
Virginia yeeld to any other Province what
soever in excellency and plenty Of this
Dare; And I cannot promise to myself any
other than extraordinary successe and
game. if this noble and useful Staple be
but vigorously followed" At that time
the manufacture of iron had already been
commenced, but the ''treachery of the In
dians'' in destroying the mill, and ''the
backwardness of the Virginia merchants to
re-erect it'' had brought the industry to a
halt
Nearly two hundred years later, this par
ticular wealth forced itself on the public
mind. And all through the Valley might
have been seen for years afterwards the ruins
of furnaces which had been erected and af-
forwards abandoned because the founders
discovered that without railway OF water
transportation the ore had as well be under
as above ground. Even under this condi-
ton and with Pennsylvania running her
iron over railroads, the Virginia iron mas
ters continued long time with their wag
Oh transportation before they did what was
inevitable break down. Sosuperior was
the ore found in this section, that iron mas
ters on the Shenandoah river made iron all
the year round, waited for the Spring floods
and fioated it down on barges, which were
broken up at the end of the trip as they
could not reascend the river. With all
this loss Of interest and material these mas
ters made money for years.. Here in Au-
gusta are furnaces whose output in that
day was waggoned for many miles, and
which held out until the rapid railroad
building in Pennsylvania put them at such
a disadvantage in competition that they
had to surrender.
But that day is past. To-day the rail
roads gridiron the country hereabouts, and
Pennsylvania must surrender the vantage
she captured in other days under such IA
yoriDg circumstances. The leading iron
men concur in this view, because the pro-
ducts of iron furnaces, all things
considered, can be made more cheaply here
than at any point in the country outside Of
this region. The Hon. Hester Clymer,
M. c., of Reading, Pa, the representative
of one of the leading iron producing dis
tricts in the Union, in letter to the great
house of McCalmont Bros. & Co. of Lon
don, Eng, says, in speaking of this region:
''The great seat of the manufacture of pig
iron must be transferred from the Lehigh
and Schuylkill districts in our State to that
portion Of the State of Virginia, since pig
iron can there be made at rate so low that
it will be impossible for us to compete with
them. \ Cheap iron is the necessity of
the age, and we cannot produce it in this
State. In Virginia where the ore deposits
are regular, of enormous extent and great
richness, and where limestone and coal are
i'll proximity, and where the product can be
shipped cheaply either to the seaboard OF
the Great West, must he the place where in
a few years pig iron must be made most
largely and successfully"
1t is confessed that in the iron ore field
this section of Virginia has no rival now in
Pennsylvania. In the coking field it has
rivals neither in Pennsylvania, nor Ala
bama, nor Tennessee, nor anywhere in this
country. The coking fields of Southwest
Virginia, West Virginia and Connelsvile
are brought to our doors by rail. Coke can
be laid down at Pittsburg at So "a; Birming-
ham, Florence and Sheffield, Ala, at $3.50,
and at Staunton at $40. The day is not
far off when this coking supply will settle
the question of England S supremacy as an
iron manufacturing country, for we read
in the Iron World of March It'll that ''The
present cost of coke needed to make one
ton of pig iron in England is $9.31."
The field is ripe. the fruit has forced it.
self through the ground into the attention
of the world. With time changes have
come. Railroad transportation has super
seeded the wagon teams of other days that
dragged the iron master into bankruptcy
The people of Staunton have changed with
the times. They are inviting the World to
take part in the development Of the wealth
around them. Presenting this invitation is
the Staunton Development Company, a
home enterprise backed by capital and &C.
tive business men. They do not invite the
world to hew down forest to find and build
habitations. They stand in front of a
pretty city Of ten thousand people, with
electric lights in full blaze, with colleges
churches, gas, police, charitable institu.
tions, street cars, banks, factories, stores.
well paved streets-with all this in the very
midst Of the ore, timber, and minerals
which can be made into wealth. Her rail
roads take the output of her factories to the
ocean in a night and across the Mississippi
river in day. AS you pass under the
arch OF one Of her railways going East and
West, you stand Oh a train going North
and South.
What more does this locality offer 2
Healthier deaths are only fourteen in a
thousand. Comfort in working-the aver
age winter temperature is 40 and the aver
age summer 75c. Time for work-the
weather is favorable for outdoor work
nearly the entire gear. Food-of the one
hundred counties in the State, Augusta
county stands first in the value of the
products of her farms, orchards and vine
wards and second in tho yalua of oD;,,a1