Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1896-12-30
Proposed Railway Extension.

4
An article printed in our issue of
Dec. I'd, on the subject of the extern
sion of railway from Harrisonburg
west through Highland and Pocahon-
tas counties, having attracted some
comment and rather more
attention than we had supposed. we
take the liberty of further calling to
the attention of capitalists generally
and to the Southern Railway especial.
ly, the advantages and advisability of
entering the West Virginia coal fields
by an extension of their Harrisonburg
branch to the head of Gauly or Elk
river. Few people comparatively.
know the vast country road over
that route would drain, and fewer still
know the resources of the section. A
residence of about fourteen years in
Pocahontas county, has given
US probably as familiar an ac-
quaintance with what it contains as
most ordinary unscientific persons
could acquire in such a period. We
never obtained an analysis of it's min
erals nor attempted a development of
any of them, but we did examine pref
ty carefully into its timber. The
county of Highland has without doubt
vast quantity of iron, but it is not
supplied with timber as the counties
west of it. 1t would, however, furnish
large quantities of oak. some pulp
wood, and great quantities of tap
bark. 1t would also supply many
hundred carloads of cattle every year,
and fine quarries of building stone
would doubtless be opened. There is
no calculating what would be shipped
until the opportunity presented itself.
When Pocahontas county would be
reached the unculled timber of that
region would at once supply freight,
without awaiting mineral or other de-
velopment. Several lumber companies
in that county have offered railroad
corporations as an inducement to build
into their holdings in that county, to
give the railroad all the tan bark on
their land, and in addition guarantee
them forty car loads of lumber per day
for twenty years. This was the propo-
sition of single lumber companies, and
those companies, nor any other COM
pany has any monopoly of the timber
there. Nothing but some white pine
and walnut have ever been taken from
that county. and this out flow would
be stopped at once by a'road entering
the county, and the freight yearly
derived from s5,O0O,00O feet of sawed
lumber, which now floats away and is
caught by the G, & O. at Ronceverte,
be saved to the new company.
It has been claimed by per-
sons close to the Southern, we
have heard, that that road did
not seek any new coal fields, that it
had all the coal it could use or handle.
This must be mistake. The South
ern has no coal north of Alabama, and
has no coking coal anywhere so far as
we can learn.
Should it build the 100 miles of rail
road we advocate it would be in the
midst of the West Virginia coking coal,
and would enter field with coal on
both sides of it's line for 200 miles. It
must be a source of profit to the G. &
o. and B. & O, to haul coal eastward
Why then would it not be as profitable
to the Southern? With a well built
line, the road mentioned could haul
coal in competition with these roads
and unquestionably an immense iron
business would spring up on the line
as the iron ores of Pocahontas and the
Gauley coal fields are not thirty miles
from each other over this route. In
fact they are really in sight. with
limestone at hand, of the finest quality
for fluxing. There has been found in
Pocahontas county in large quantities
a fine quality of hard coal. This vein
has been opened in four or five places
in the Levels a section of that coun-
ty, and it is thought to be valu bile
and certainly is abundant. The mag
nificent deposit of red and gray mar
BILE found in this same Levels section
of that county. is another feature in
figuring on freights. There would
also come from this county yearly
many hundred car loads of stock. All
this must be taken into account. BY
this route the shortest line from Wash
and no such grades.as the B. & 0. en-
counters at Allegheny or Cheat noun
tain would be met. The gaps at the
head of Elk or .Gauley are low, never
blocked with snow for any length of
time, and the gap in the Allegheny at |
Frost is one of the very lowest in that
When we behold the strug |
zle the B. & o. makes in carrying it's /
rains over the Alleghanies by its pres
mt line and think of the difference in
The mountains on the proposed line,
which we have crossed at all seasons
If the year, we are astonished that so
wonderful a route. into so magnificent
region has not long since been aceu
bed by railroad! when capital has
,een blowing down the Rockies and
'eiras and laying rusty rails over
prairie and desert in the west, whilst
lere in it's very face under the shadow
# our great cities is more wealth, than
an be found in the same unoccupied
xpanse of territory, anywhere else Ia
he United States. If the Southern
# some other corporation does not soon
'uild the line we mention, feeders and
will of course reach out from
he G. & 0. and B. & O. and in sort
f sickly half hearted way undertake ;