786 GEOLOGY or ohio. 



coal field lies so near the great lake market, that it has become the basis 

 of an extensive commerce, and the mainspring of the most important 

 iron industry of the west. Hence the land which holds the coal has 

 acquired great value, and workable deposits have been sought with 

 avidity through many years. Prom the fact that the basins which holds 

 the coal are so narrow and few, much of the exploration made has 

 resulted in disappointment ; but such explorations have borne this fruit, 

 that they have made the details of the local geology of Mahoning Val- 

 ley better known than that of any other district in the State, and they 

 have enabled us to trace the outlines of the productive coal areas and 

 the barren intervals, with a degree of accuracy which would otherwise 

 have been impossible. Since most of the coal basins are completely 

 buried, and show no lines of outcrop, the search for coal has for the 

 most part been conducted by boring. By this means the northern part 

 of the county has been, not thoroughly, but generally explored. Though 

 much yet remains to be learned in regard to the connections between 

 the diflEerent coal basins, they seem to lie somewhat in belts which have 

 a general direction a little east of north and west of south. For example, 

 the Mineral Ridge belt of mines extends from Warner & Go's, slope in 

 Weathersfield, to the southern part of Austintown, and includes the 

 mines of the Cambria Coal Co., Todd & Wells Coal Co., Baldwin Bros. 

 Harris, Maury & Co., and the Harroff Coal Co. A similar belt of mines 

 extends from Vienna through Liberty township, Trumbull county, and in 

 Youngstown includes the Brier Hill mines and those of the Powers Coal 

 Co., the Mahoning Coal Co., the Foster Coal Co., the Kyle Coal Co., etc. 

 There is another line of mines along the west side of Youngstown town- 

 ship, reaching into Coitsville. This includes the slopes and shafts of 

 Andrews & Hitchcock, Arms, Powers & Co , the Holland Coal Co., and 

 the Andrews and Powers mines south of the Mahoning. Between these 

 belts there is much territory, which, up to the present time, has seemed 

 barren, but it is possible that future explorations will prove the exist- 

 ence of valuable coal basins in the districts that are now regarded as 

 unproductive; and will also show that the linear arrangement of the 

 mines which has been referred to is merely accidental. 



Within the limits of the productive territory the coal b.isins have been 

 shown by the explorations and workings to form comparatively narrow, 

 irregular and often branching channels, such as would be produced by 

 the growth of peat in the excavated valleys of streams, if such streams 

 were dammed up, and their waters made to form marshes. How far the 

 basins now known are connected remains to be shown by future explora- 

 .tion, but there is little doubt that most of them form parts of continuous 



