The number of persons employed in a single mine in the anthracite regions varies from a dozen in the newest and smallest mines to seven hundred or eight hundred in the largest and busiest. The average would probably be between two hundred and three hundred. In the bituminous districts the average is not so large.
First among those who go down into the mine is the mine boss, or, as he is sometimes called, the “inside boss.” It is his duty “to direct and generally supervise the whole working of the mine.” All the workmen are under his control, and everything is done in obedience to his orders. He reports to, and receives instructions from, the general superintendent of the mines.
Next in authority is the fire boss. It is his duty to examine, every morning before the men come to their work, every place in the mine where explosive gas is evolved or likely to be evolved, and to give the necessary instructions to the workmen regarding the same. He also has general oversight of the ventilating system, and sees that all stoppings, doors, brattices, and airways are kept in proper condition. The driver boss has charge of the driver boys and door boys, and sees that the mules are properly cared for and are not abused. Each driver boy has charge of a mule, and the mule draws the empty cars in along the gangway and up to the faces of the chambers, and draws the loaded cars out to the foot of the shaft. The door boy must stay at his post all day and open and close the door for the cars to pass in and out. The use and necessity of these doors will be explained in a subsequent chapter. Then there are the footmen, carpenters, blacksmiths, masons, and tracklayers, whose occupations in the mines are apparent from the names which indicate their several callings.
Finally we have the miners and the miners’ laborers, and it now becomes a matter of especial interest to inquire into the character of their work and their manner of performing it. To drive a gangway or airway is much the same as driving a chamber, except that the gangway is only about one third the width of a chamber, and must be driven on a slightly ascending grade. Gangway driving is special work, for which the miner receives special wages, it being impossible in this work to send out as much coal with the same amount of labor as can be sent out in chamber work. And since the great bulk of coal is taken from the chambers, it will be better to observe in one of them the processes of mining.
There are usually four workmen, two miners and two laborers, employed in each chamber. The miners are employed by, or are under contract with, the coal company, and the laborers are employed by the miners, subject to the approval of the mining superintendent. The two miners divide their profits or wages equally with each other, and are called “butties.” A miner’s butty is the man who works the chamber with him on halves. A laborer’s butty is the man who is associated with him in the employ of the same miners. Between the miner and the laborer there is a well-defined and strictly observed line of social demarcation. The miner belongs to the aristocracy of underground workers; the laborer is of a lower order, whose great ambition it is to be elevated, at an early day, to that height on which his employer stands.
Now as to the work done by these four men. Before the chamber has progressed a pillar’s length above the airway, propping will usually be necessary to sustain the roof, so large an area of which has been left without support. Hardwood props about nine inches in diameter are used for the purpose. They are purchased by the mining companies in large quantities, and are usually cut and hauled to the railroad in the winter time to be shipped at any season to the mines. By the law of 1885 the person or company operating a mine is obliged to furnish to the miner, at the face of his chamber, as many props of the required length as he may need. Having received the props the miner himself sets them on each side of the middle line of the chamber at such points as he thinks require them, or at such points as the mine boss designates. He drives the prop to its place by means of a large flat wedge inserted between the top of it and the roof, thus making the stick tight and firm and also giving it a larger bearing against the roof. Some chambers require very few props; others must be well lined with them. Their necessity depends upon the character of the roof. If it is soft, slaty, and loose it must be supported at frequent intervals. It very rarely occurs that a chamber, worked to its limit, has needed no propping from its foot to its face. Usually a good part of the miner’s time is occupied in setting props as his work at the face advances.
Every seam has its top and bottom bench of coal, divided about midway by a thin slate partition, and one bench is always taken out to a horizontal depth of four or five feet before the other one is mined. If the upper bench contains the best and cleanest coal, with the smoothest plane of cleavage at the roof, that is first taken out; but if the choice coal lies at the bottom, then the lower bench is first mined. The reason for this is that a shot heavy enough to blast out effectually the section of rough, bony, or slaty coal which sticks to the roof or floor would be heavy enough to shatter the adjoining bench of clean brittle coal, and make a large part of it so fine as to be useless.
Let us now suppose that the miner has a clean, vertical wall of coal at the face of his chamber in which to begin work. Making sure that his tools and materials are all at hand, he first takes up his drill. This is a round or hexagonal iron bar about one and an eighth inches in diameter, and about five and a half feet long, tipped at the working end with steel. This end is flattened out into a blade or chisel, having a slight concave curve on its edge, and being somewhat wider at its extremity than the diameter of the bar. At the other end of the drill the diameter is increased to one and a half inches, forming a circular ridge at the extremity of the bar, in one side of which ridge a semicircular notch is cut into the face of the drill. The use of this notch will be subsequently explained. This, then, is the tool with which the miner begins his work. Selecting the bench to be first mined he chooses a point a few feet to the right or left of the middle line of the face and delivers upon it the first stroke with the sharp edge of his drill; and as he strikes successive blows he rotates the drill in his hands in order to make the hole round. The drill is never struck on the head with sledges. Its cutting force depends on the momentum given to it in the hands of the miner, and the stroke made by it is a jumping or elastic stroke.
Instead of the bar drill, which has been described, many of the miners use a machine hand-drill for boring holes. This machine works upon the same principle that the jackscrew does. It is operated by hand by means of a crank, and an auger-like projection forces its way into the coal. The work of turning the crank is more laborious than that of drilling with the bar-drill, but the extra labor is much more than compensated for by the greater speed at which boring is done. It is probably due to the spirit of conservatism among miners that this machine is not in general use by them. Coal-cutting machines, working by steam or compressed air, are not used in the anthracite mines. The character of the coal, the thickness of the seams, and the inclination of the strata make their employment impracticable.
When the hole has been drilled to a depth of about four and a half feet it is carefully cleaned out with a scraper. This is a light iron rod with a handle on one end of it and a little spoon, turned up like a mustard spoon, on the other end. Then the cartridge is inserted and pushed in to the farther extremity of the hole. The cartridge is simply a tube made of heavy manila paper formed over a cartridge stick, filled with black powder, and folded at the ends. Dynamite and other high explosives are not used, because they create too much waste. Ready-made cartridges in jointed sections are largely used, but as a rule the miner makes his own cartridge as he needs it.
The miner’s needle is an iron rod about five and one half feet in length, with a handle at one end. It is about five eighths of an inch in diameter at the handle end, and tapers to a point at the other end. When the cartridge has been pushed in to the extreme end of the bore hole, the needle is inserted also, the point of it piercing the outer end of the cartridge. The needle is then allowed to rest on the bottom or at the side of the drill hole while the miner gathers fine dirt from the floor of the mine, dampens it slightly if it is dry, and pushes it into the hole alongside. This dirt is then forced in against the cartridge with the head of the drill. More dirt is put in and driven home, and still more, until, by the time the hole is filled to its outer extremity, the packing is hard and firm. This process is called tamping. It can now be seen that the semicircular notch on the rim of the blunt end of the drill is for the purpose of allowing the drill to slip along over the needle, which still retains its position, and at the same time to fill the diameter of the hole. The tamping being finished the miner takes hold of the needle by the handle, turns it once or twice gently in its bed, and then slowly withdraws it. A round, smooth channel is thus left from the outside directly in to the powder of the cartridge, and into this channel the squib is inserted. The squib is simply an elongated fire-cracker. It has about the diameter of a rye straw, is about four inches in length, and its covering projects an inch or two at one end and is twisted up for a fuse. The covering of the squib may indeed be of straw, sometimes it is of hempen material, but more often, in these days, it is made of paper. It is filled with powder and is then dipped into a resinous mixture to make it water-proof, to coat over the open end so that the powder shall not run out, and to make the wick at the other end mildly inflammable. If the bore hole should be very wet an iron or copper tube, through which the needle is run, is laid to the cartridge before the hole is tamped, and when the needle is withdrawn the squib is inserted into the mouth of the tube. If inflammable gases are exuding from the coal through the bore hole, or if for any other reason it is feared that the cartridge will be exploded too quickly, a short piece of cotton wick, dipped in oil, is attached to the fuse of the squib to lengthen it, and this extra section of fuse is allowed to hang down from the mouth of the bore hole against the face of coal.
When all is ready the tools are removed to a safe distance, a lighted lamp is touched to the fuse, the men cry “Fire!” to warn all who may be in the vicinity, and, retreating down the chamber, they take refuge behind some convenient pillar. The fuse burns so slowly that the men have ample time in which to get out of harm’s way, if ordinary care is taken. When the fire reaches the powder in the squib the same force that propels a fire-cracker or a rocket acts upon the squib and sends it violently through the channel or tube into contact with the powder of the cartridge. The explosion that results throws out a section of coal from the face, breaking it into large pieces. So soon as the place has settled after the firing of the shot the men go back to the face to note the result. The broken coal is pushed to one side, and preparations are made for drilling the next hole. It usually takes five shots to break down a single bench. When both benches of coal have been blasted out the length of the chamber has been increased by five or six feet. In blasting, the miner must take advantage of such conditions as are presented to him at the face of the working, and he will bore his hole and fire his shot where, in his judgment, the best result will be attained. He cannot always take one position at his drilling; it is rarely that he finds a comfortable one. Sometimes he must hold the drill at arm’s length above his head, at other times he must rest on his knees while working, still oftener he is obliged to lie on his back or side on the wet floor of the mine, and work in that position, with occasional respite, for hours at a time.
In nearly every chamber the miner has a powder chest which he keeps locked, and which is stored at some safe and convenient place, not too close to the face. In this chest he keeps, besides his powder, his cartridge paper, cartridge pin, squibs, lamp-wick, chalk, and such other little conveniences and necessaries as every workingman must have at hand. The other tools are usually at the face. He has there a mining pick. This pick is straight and pointed, and from the head or eye, where the handle enters, it will measure about nine inches to each end. It is used for bringing down slate and coal from roof, ribs, and face. The bottom pick is used by the laborer for breaking up the coal after it is down. This pick measures about two feet from tip to tip, and is curved slightly upward at the points. Each miner has two drills, and perhaps a hand machine-drill. He has also a steel crowbar for prying down loose portions of the roof, and for turning heavy pieces of slate or coal. He has an eight-pound steel hammer, with a handle two feet and four inches in length, which he uses in setting props; and he has a heavy sledge for breaking rock and coal. The list is completed by three large scoop shovels, used generally to shovel the smaller pieces of broken coal from the floor of the chamber into the mine car.
MINER’S TOOLS.
The miner must furnish his own tools. His powder, fuse, and oil he gets from the company that employs him, and they are charged to him in the account that is stated between them monthly. It will not do to omit the miner’s lamp from the list of appliances used in his calling; it is too great a necessity. Without it he could do absolutely nothing; he could not even find his way to his chamber. Formerly candles were much used in the mines; in Great Britain they are still common; but the anthracite miner invariably uses a lamp. This is a round, flat-bottomed tin box, about the size of a small after-dinner coffee cup. It has a hinged lid on top, a spout on one side, and a handle shaped like a hook with the point down on the opposite side. By this hooked handle the lamp is fastened to the front of the miner’s cap, and he wears it so at his labor, removing it only for the purpose of renewing the material in it, or of approaching the powder chest, or of examining more closely some portion of his work. In the lamp he burns crude petroleum, which is fed from a cotton wick emerging from the spout. Very recently electricity has been introduced into the gangways of some large mines, for lighting purposes, and has given great satisfaction. Perhaps the day is not far distant when an electric light will swing from the roof at the face of every working chamber.
When the coal has been blasted down and the props have been set the miner’s work is done; the rest belongs to the laborers. They must break up the coal, load it into the cars, run it down to the gangway, pile up the refuse, and clear the chamber for the next day’s work. The mine carpenters have laid a track, consisting of wooden rails set into caps or notched ties, as far up the chamber as the working at the face would permit. Up this track the mule and driver boy have brought the empty car and left it at the face. The laborers throw into it first the smaller pieces of coal which they shovel up from the floor of the chamber, then huge chunks are tumbled in and piled skillfully on top until the car is almost overbalanced with its load. It is then pushed out to the gangway to await the coming of the driver boy, who attaches it to his trip of loads and takes it to the shaft.
The mine car is usually but a smaller edition of the coal cars that can be seen any day on the surface railways of the country. The running portion is of iron, and the box is stoutly built of hardwood, braced and stiffened by iron tie-rods, bolts, and shoes. At the end of the car is a vertical swinging door, hung from the top by an iron rod, which crosses the box. This door is latched on the outside near the bottom, and the coal is dumped from the car by tipping it up and letting the unlatched door swing outward. The size of the car depends greatly on the size and character of the workings in which it is used. Perhaps an average size would be ten feet long, five feet wide, and five feet high from the rail. Such a car would contain about one hundred cubic feet, and would hold from two and one half to three tons of coal. The track gauges in common use vary by three inch widths from two feet and six inches to four feet. The miner and laborer start to their work in the morning at six o’clock. If they enter the mine by shaft they must go down before seven o’clock, for at that hour the engineer stops lowering men and begins to hoist coal. Immediately after arriving at the face of his chamber the miner begins to cut coal. If the vein is thick and clean, if his shots are all effective, and if he has good luck generally, he will cut his allowance of coal for the day by ten or eleven o’clock in the forenoon. It will be understood that by the system in use by most of the coal companies not more than a certain number of carloads may be sent out from each chamber per day. And when the miner has blasted down enough coal to make up that number of loads his day’s work is done. It is very seldom indeed that he is not through before two o’clock in the afternoon. But he never stays to assist the laborer. It is beneath his dignity as a miner to help break up and load the coal which has been brought down by means of his judgment and skill. So the laborer is always last in the chamber. His work is seldom done before four or five o’clock in the afternoon. He has just so much coal to break up, load, and push down to the gangway, no matter how successful the miner may have been. He consoles himself, however, by looking forward to the time when he shall himself become a miner.
Blasting is always a dangerous occupation, and the law in Pennsylvania, embodied in the act of 1885, has recognized its especial danger in the mines, by making certain provisions concerning it for the protection of life and limb. The rules laid down are strict and complete, yet, in spite of them, accidents from powder explosions and premature blasts are frequent and destructive. But it must be said that these accidents are due, in most part, to violations of these rules. It is impossible for colliery authorities to keep constant watch over the workmen in every chamber. The conduct of these men must be largely governed by themselves, and the frequency of accidents, both serious and fatal, as a result of carelessness on the part of workmen, does not seem to deter other workmen from constantly running the same risks. The most prevalent and the most serious source of danger to the miner is not, however, in blasting, but in falls of coal, slate, and rock from the roof, ribs, and face of the chamber. Material that has become loosened by blasting is pulled down carelessly, or falls without warning. In many cases the roof is insufficiently propped, and large sections of it give way. Men are caught under these falling masses every day, and are either killed outright or seriously injured. Yet, as in the case of blasting, their injuries are largely the result of their own carelessness. Any one who reads the reports of these cases cannot fail to be convinced of this fact. The mine inspector’s reports of Pennsylvania show that during the year 1887 there were in the anthracite district three hundred and thirteen fatal accidents which occurred in and about the mines. Of this number one hundred and forty-seven were due to falls of roof and coal, while only twenty-one were caused by explosions of blasting material. These figures indicate plainly the direction in which the skill and supervision of operators and the care and watchfulness of workmen should be exerted for the protection of life.