The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-11-29
NEARLY THREE HUNDRED MEN BURIED HUNDREDS
 OF FEET BELOW SURFACE
Women and Children Cry Piteously at the Mouth of the Mine, While Rescue Work Goes On
 Slowly, Hampered
 By Debris.

Maranna, Pa, November 2S.-(Special) Within three minutes after a state in- spector and the mine superintendent had returned from an inspection of It's depths, the model Marianna mine of the Pitts brrg-Buffalo Coal company was blown up by tremendous explosion today.
 Late tonight it is estimated that be- tween 175 and 300 men are entombed be- meath the thousands of tons of coal that eaved in upon them at a depth of GAO feet and authorities do not believe that a single one of them has escaped
 Six bodies have been recovered. They are those of Clarence Williams Joseph Powell, Henry Owens, Henry Thompson and two unidentified Americans. Thomp- son was a mine foreman. The rest are believed to be all Americans. Many in- jured men have been taken from the en- trance. Many of them will die from the frlghtful blast of coal debris and suffo- eating smoke belched up from the bowels of the earth, though none of them were more than 10 feet below the shaft.
 At 9:SO o'clock tonight a rescue party broke through an entry 3O0 yards from the foot of the shaft and found a great pile of dead bodies. This quenches the last hope that life may have survived in the bored shaft. No estimate of the dead ouud Is made. The taking out of bodies hegan before daybrealS.
 These bodies are supposed to be only those of the men nearest the surface. Hundreds of feet of coal separate the rest lying in the heart of the mine from the rescuers.
 Rescuers Find Bodies.
 At midnight the rescuers, penetrating through portion of the shaft. came upon 142 bodies. Most had been killed in- stantly by the debris flung upon them by the explosion. Many of the remains were badly mangled. Eighteen bodies were immediately carried to the top of the shaft. Six others killed at the top of the shaft had been previously recov- cred How many more remain in the wrecked mine will not be known until morning.
 When she learned that her husband was among the dead, Mrs. Joseph Jones broke through the guard of 50 state constabulary and made an attempt to dash herself to the bottom of the mine. She was caught and restrained just as she was about to make the fatal jump. Mrs. George Acker became violently insane when she 
 and was placed under restraint.
 A Model Mine.
 The Marianne mine, which has been in operation less than three months, was considered the model mine of the world. Every device known to modern invention that had been installed to prevent such tragedy as occurred today, now lies q mass of wreckage and is hampering the work of relief.
 The explosion came just before the noon hour in the Rachael shaft. It was so terrific that the blast, belching up the whole length of the deep shaft, tore loose the giant elevator cage at the surface of the mine and hurled it 300 feet away. Two men were in the cage at the time. Both were instantly killed, the head of one of them being literally blown off
 Rescuers to the number of 200 are burrowlng frantically at the mouth of the mine in a futile effort to dig down through the great masses of coal that block at least the upper reaches of the shaft, while other rescuers headed by President John H. Jones of the Pitts burg Buffalo Coal company, have rushed to the scene in special trains from Pittsburg and Monongahela with the latest appliances which are being erected at the head of the shaft to bore to the entombed men.
 Women Weep PiteousIy.
 Five thousand women and children and miners throng the mouth of the mine, the former weeping piteously and pleading for the rescue of their fath- CTS or brothers, within, while the latter curse impotently because there can be no way devised to reach the entombed men at once, even though as it is now believed some of them survived the ex- plosion and still remain alive.
 The officials of the mine are in a pitt full condition. They had spent hun dreds of thousands of dollars to make the Marianna fire proof and experts as sured them that such disaster as oc cured today was impossible.
 In the excitement and panic it is inn possible thus far to learn the exact number of victims or their names But ! the books of the company indicate that 3 the majority of the men are Americans < and that most of the others are Eng fish miners imported by the company two months ago to work the richest shafts.
 All mine disasters come unexpectedly of course, but that one would occur in the model Mariana mine was absolute ly undreamed of.
 The day shift of men entered the Rachael shaft and were lowered to their work nearly 700 feet beneath the sur face at T o'clock this morning The mine, automatically flooded with pure fresh air from the surface and lighted with incandescent electric lamps needed no safety lamps for it's working and the giant network of steel beams propping every possible point of col lapse gave the men a feeling of the most perfect security
 Just where in the Marianna mine the disaster occurred cannot be ascertained 
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