The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-07-13
BY WILL T. STEPHAN.

DA W AAA As
 Ashland, July 12.-(Special Corres- pondence.)- .)-The road to the graphite mines leads through scenery, wild and awesomely beautiful.
 s It>strikes a precipice and a mountain. On the left there rises closer at hand and almost overhead, a mountainous peak decked in green vestment of oak, of pine and of hickory. To the right the mountain side drops sharply to the run of a little torrent whose waters rush noisily. but not unmusically for its outlet between the foothills. In the distance the peaks of the Talladega Mountains show their dark blue contour in graceful curves against the lighter blue of the summer skies.
 In the middle ground of the picture. at once wild and beautiful, the foot hills break into bits of table lands or gentle hill sides where the mountain farmer grows his unambitious crops of corn and of cotton.
 A panorama of wild and mountain ous beauty unfolds with every turn of the road as the trip is made from Chan dler Springs to the graphite mines. It runs by the log cabin of the moun- taineer set in a nest of vines and yer dant trees close against the mountain side or again 1t sweeps through little valley fertile and promising with its corn mad cotton as 1t should be, for is not the valley rich in the alluvial soil that has washed down the mountain sides throughout unnumbered years?
 It Is a road of twists and curves. It is a level, but curved gash through the valleys and a spiral streak around the mountains.
 Here the road parallels winding. twisting stake and rider fence clinging tenaciously to the mountain side. and here it follows the winding of the val ley that marks the domain of a noun tain branch struggling on its destined way to the broad Coosa, moving sedate- ly to the sea.
 The Mountain Climate.
 The drive is as picturesque panora- ma of mountain beauty as Scott ever described. It is in Alabama. too. almost in middle, and yet Alabamians go to Colorado, to East Tennessee, to the Highlands of New York for mountain air and mountain beauty. The best they find Is not superior to the wild and untouched picturesqueness of these foot hills of the Talladegas.
 And being the foothills. minerals may be looked for. When the mountain ranges ena where the foot hills lie be- tween the plains and the mountains. the minerals crop out and come to the surface. And there are minerals here. not the coal and iron of the Birming- f,sm district, nor the rich brown hema- Cite ores of the Anniston section, but graphite pyrites, some gold, some cop per and some tin ores. But these lat ter are not found in quantities which make the working of them paying in- vestment.
 The most of value that these hills which mark the gradation of the Talla- dega mountains Is the rich vein Of graphite ore. It appears. this vein of graphite ore. in the southeastern DOT tion of Talladega and in the northern portion of Clay County. It follows the hills and is carried by them to Noun tain Creek. in Chiffon County. where the development of the graphite indus try Is one of the important industrial endeavors of the day.
 Nor is the upper end of the graphite vein without development. For in time our drive from Chandler Springs brings us to the big plant of the Allen Graph ite Company, set in an immense cup in the mountains. The nearest railroad Is five miles away. On every side the hills rise sheer and precipitous. They tower high above the big wooden build ings, but there are three breaks in the encircling hills through which the mountain streams turn and twist, and through which the road winds ana curves. Here the Allen Graphite Com pany. with a capital stock of $90.000. is spending thousands and thousands of dollars in building mills. storage dams. tramways and in putting In hugh ma chinery. An old mill was operated here on this site for five years. It was an experiment, this old mill. whose pur- pose was to find out if graphite could be mined here and put on the market at profit.
 Served It's Purpose.
 The old mill served its purpose. It was found that the Alabama graphite could be gotten out of the hills, treat ed and sold in the New York market at a decided profit. Some s2.000 worth of graphite was mined, hauled to Tal- ladega on wagons, shipped to New York and sold at a figure that repaid the men who had the nerve to go into this ir- dustry miles from a railroad.
 To go back to the discovery of the outcroppings of the graphite ores Is to go back to the great war period. Some seven miles in the mountains from this graphite mine Is what is locally known as "The Copper Mines" At the present time there are at the Old Copper Mines two industries engaged in getting out pyrites ore which is made into sulphu- ric acid, used in the manufacture of acid phosphate
 In the war days, however. the Con- federate authorities were convinced that these copper mines would yield them valuable chemicals for use in the manufacture of gun-powder. so sorely needed by the struggling Government