Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1894-05-30
Il 18TH CHARCOAL BURNERS
PECULIAR CoMMUNITIE3 SCAT.
TERED OVER NEW JERSEY.
Cutting Wood and Bucning it En-
p'oys Hundreds of Men Who Live
in Primitive simplicity.


in Primitive Simplicity.
7 TITLE colonies of men, peculiar
| r. communities, are scattered up
aud down New Jersey like
| bumps on a log. They live
remote from the centres of civiiiz Ition !;
they have little or no interest in the af-
/ fairs of the outside world, while their
wants are very few and of the simplest
kind. These are the charcoal burners Of
tie Jersey pines.
All told, there are not more than fifty
,f them in the State. Their earnings are
scantY, averaging the year round about a
dollar a day, fact in itself which pre-
c.udes the enjoyment of much that others
enjoy, even the poorer classes in great
| ;iries.
Day in and day out, in winters cold
and summers heat, the ring Of the char.
C. al burAer's axe may be heard in the
pine forests of the State beyond the Del
aware. On days when the mercury in
the thermometer hugs the zero mark
these fellows begin their labor in the
woods at daybreak. Their first act is to
light fire with suci dry branches as
they can scrape together, over which
they hold their keeu-edgei axes to draw
the frost out of their glitteriny blades.
| ''Ei we didn't, why, the fust lick 'li
| break 'em right in twO," said one of the
fraternity who took enough of his time
to tell something about their way OF
life.
AtsiOn is the nearest settlement to the
| charcoal pits, and Atsion is medise val
| dream. II is the wreck of once con-
siderable village. If Its unpainted and
decaying houses were of stone instead Of
old-iashioued clayboards, it would be a
fac-simile reproduction of Yorkshire
( ham'e ct gone to seed.
"This part of the country has beer
pretty well chawed up by caOrcJal burn
ers," said the driver, as the decrepit
buggy rolled noiselessly along. "ThGy
clear out patches here and there, and
then move of to another piece to begin
work. The man who owns this track
wont let them cut it up the way the other
owner did. He keeps them pretty muck
n one place"
In the expressive Jersey vcrnlcuIar
the soil in spots did present "cnewed
! up" appearance. There were side clear
ings covered with thick growth of
shrubbery and long grass, through which
J peeped the black stumps of trees which
had been felled years before. After an
hours ride there came, OF to the right,
the sound of axes at regular intervals,
and the forms of men were seen moving
TO and fro. In clearing near by were a
lot of smoking tu.nuli-heap' of earth
ten or dozen feet in height, around
whose SUBMITS light vapor were curling
| in fantastic wreatjs aid shapes.
b. a strange pervcrsion of English
| these heaps of eartl were called "plts."
In them were burned the charcoal of
commerce aud manufacture.
There was light SNOW on the ground,
but the workers did not seem TO mind it..
Most CT them were in their SHIRT sleeves
heavy wooden slirts-aEd the eXertiOn
of swinging their axes kept them in a
perspiration, despite the cutting wind
which whistIed to itself as it played hide
and seek with tue Ciumps of decIvei
caves. Out in the clearing a detected
looking horse was hauling loa OF cord
wood on a sled, while near one of the
pits sturdy man was wheeling bar
rowful of logs th !: would have made a
city nod carrier grJin. There were old
scn ani YONG; some were boy. at
work in the wood land. Trees of all
sizes, from the sapllur four inches in di-
iane.cr 10 the giant ise feet IN circum-
ference, were crashing here ani there,
and the steady stroke of axes was never
silent.
The burning of charcoal is done in the
same primitive condition here that it has
been carried on for centuries IN Eastern
lands. The wood is heapCd up, covered
with earth and fired. But peculiar
nomenclature expresses the various
processes of the work. Thus after the
wood is cut and ''ranked" 1t is wheeled
or sledded to the spot where the pit IS to
be ''set"-that Is, where the wood is set
Iup on end-'stwo banks" or eighty feet
in height, with space in the centre for
the fire, or, as it is called, the "chim-
lney." The average to each pit is about
seven cords of wood.
Alter the pit has been set then comes
:he "blackin," and "foating." For a
space of three feet around the pile of
wood the earth, or turf, or "blackin', "
is dug up and thrown on the pile Of
wood. Upon this is thrown more sand,
and the whole is covered compactly with
sod and soil. The fire is then kindled
from the top, and the wood is left to be
charred. 1t has to be tended night and
iav, however, and this process is called
dressing" it.
There were ten or twelve pits in the
lield where the Atsion workers were cut
lting fuel. Some of them had about
buraed out, had suukeu to hah their
original size, while others were just be-
ginning to smoke like mimic volcanoes.
The average product of a pit is about
200 bushels of CHARCOAL. In tending O
tpit the watchman has to climb to the top
of the mound by rude ladder made out
of log of wood, with n;cies or steps
cut in it and set up on end against the
smoking pile.
Sometimes the pits BEGIN to "mull :
that is, it burns too fast aud the fire eats
to the foot of the pit and threatens to
lconsume the entire mass. Tending char
coal pits is a dangerous business,
Ialthough it looks as simple as throwing
Goals on a CRATE. A couple of years ago
a son of the superintendent of the pit:
described went up on pit TO attend the
fires, wnen the whole mass cIved in
under his feet and he was roasted tC
death. 1t was during the night and Mt
help was near.
The best paid men about charcoal pit
are those who haul the wood Gn1 s'set'
them. They are compelled to woii
very hard to earn IS week. The mer
"ho 90 th.s YORK ut Atsion are brothers
aud have labore1 at charcoal burning in
Illinois and other Western States. Upon
the manner of "setting" charcoal pit
depends, very largely, the success in
burning. Sometimes the pits are built
Of three tiers of wood, and then with the
float" or earthly covering they measure
about thirteen feet in height. The aver