GEOLOGICAL PAPERS. 105 



COAL-MINING IN ATCHISON COUNTY. 



By E. B. Kneke, Atchison, Kan. 

 Read (by title) before the Academy, at Manhattan, November 28, 1903. 



SINCE the discovery in 1893 of the sixteen-inch vein of coal 

 about a mile and a half south of Atchison, a report of which is 

 given in volume XIV of this Academy's Transactions, that vein has 

 been worked to some extent almost every winter, though mostly in a 

 small way. One quite elaborate effort, however, at putting this coal 

 on the market was made by Mr. W. T. F. Donald, of Atchison, for 

 four years, from 1894 to 1898. In that time Mr. Donald removed 

 about twenty-three acres of the coal stratum from his mine, in an area 

 of a square about 1000 feet on a side, and amounting to nearly 50,000 

 tons. 



To work the vein, an electric plant was installed, at an expense of 

 $12,000. Boilers, engines, tracks, etc., raised the item of expense for 

 equipment to $15,000. The coal first entered the market at $2.50 per 

 ton delivered, but as its excellent quality became known to the pub- 

 lic, the price gradually rose to $4 per ton. 



The difficulties of mining this coal by machinery are such, how- 

 ever, that after four years of experimenting, attended by considerable 

 financial loss, Mr. Donald abandoned the enterprise. The method 

 employed was the "long- wall" system, and the machine used was a 

 toothed wheel about five feet in diameter, which was made to revolve 

 in a horizontal position by a sprocket chain, and undercut the seam 

 of coal to a depth of two and a half feet. The machine was propelled 

 by an electric motor, and was run along the face of the exposed vein, 

 making a daily undercut sometimes of 100 feet or more. During the 

 night the coal would break down of its own weight, frequently in con- 

 tinuous lengths of twenty or thirty feet, when it required only to be 

 broken up and hauled from the mine the next day. However the 

 "horses" and faults encountered were so numerous as to occasion 

 much dead- work and delay the progress of profitable mining ; but the 

 coal found a ready market, and was all disposed of in Atchison and 

 Doniphan counties. 



At the present time a new colony of four laboring men are at work 

 opening up a new entry in the property immediately north of Mr. 

 Donald's land. Indeed, the lay of the vein is so advantageous that 

 men of but little experience can readily handle it, and nearly every 

 winter parties of such men work it in a small way. They wagon the 



