SUPPLEMENTAL REPORT — HOCKING VALLEY. 881 



pressioii — evidently an old world notion— that the iron in the heating 

 furnace cinder had, by its second heating, been so burned that it was 

 worthless. This has proved to be a mistake, for an intelligent iron 

 manufacturer of Ohio, who had learned of the foregoing investigations, 

 made a large quantity of iron from the heating cinder alone, and found 

 the quality to be exceptionally good, and affirmed that the knowledge 

 derived from these researches had been worth thousands of dollars to • 

 his company. Similar testimony has been received from others. 



I have, in the foregoing pages, given all the more important facts 

 known to me concerning the Hocking Valley coalfield. The feature of 

 the first importance is the Nekonville seam of coal. While some of this 

 <;oal is too sulphurous for the higher uses, the best coal of the seam is of 

 superior quality, and has authenticated itself as suitable in an uncoked 

 state for the blast furnace.. The vast quantity of furnace coal here to 

 be obtained at the very lowest cost of mining, will, I think, more and 

 more invite attention to the, region as a desirable district for the manu- 

 facture of iron. For that class of iron, generally included under the 

 name of foundry iron, the local ores will prove serviceable. For special 

 uses, the iron will be improved by a mixture with Lake Superior ore. 

 None of the ores of this field, found as yet in quantity, will serve to 

 make pig-iron adapted to the manufacture of Bessemer, or Siemens Mar- 

 tin steel. For steel, other ores, free from phosphorus, must be brought 

 from the rich iron mines of the Lake Superior region and of Missouri. 



It is doubtful whether the northern ores can be brought to any 

 cheaper fuel than the Hocking Valley corl-field afibrds. By the rail- 

 roads now built, and others building from ports on Lake Erie, to the dif- 

 ferent parts of this field, it is believed that the lake ores may be brought 

 so advantageously that, at a day not far distant, that iron for Bessemer 

 and Siemens-Martin steel will be made from the coal of this part of Ohio. 

 Should the displacement of iron by steel continue at the same rate for 

 ten years to come as in the ten years past, the demand for pig-iron con- 

 taining phosphorus will be limited to foundry iron. Ohio has long been 

 remarkable for its production of the first quality of the latter class of 

 iron. For more than fifty years the famous "lime-stone ore" of the 

 Hanging Rock iron district, smelted with charcoal, has afforded a foundry 

 iron of almost unequaled excellence. Whether in that district a suit- 

 able quality of mineral fuel can be cheaply obtained, so that this finest 

 of Coal Measure ores may be converted into iron in coming years, re- 

 ma*', s to be seen. The future supply of foundry iron will be derived 

 from fields where, other things being equal, its manufacture is the cheap- 



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