110 F\ KEPORT OF PROGRESS. E. W. CLAYPOLE. 



which geologists deny the existence of workable coal in Perry 

 county. The rocks are too old. They were made before 

 the great coal-making age of the earth's history began. It 

 seems as if the process of coal-making had been begun by 

 Nature on a small scale, as if she were trying her "'prentice 

 han' " at the work. In her Cambro -Silurian days she suc- 

 ceeded in making the little thin layer in the Horse valley, 

 and abandoned the attempt. In Devonian days she tried 

 again, and obtained rather better success, forming the little 

 ki coals' ' above described of several inches in thickness. 

 Again, she laid the task aside as beyond her strength, and 

 not till the Lower Carboniferous (Pocono No. X) age did 

 she take it in hand again. By this time the conditions of 

 the earth had become more favorable, and Nature succeeded 

 in producing such coal seams as that at Mt. Patrick and in 

 the Buffalo and Cove mountains. These were fine achieve- 

 ments compared with her previous failures, but miserable 

 failures compared with her subsequent triumphs. They are 

 coal beds which have burnt the lingers of those who at- 

 tempted to handle them ; coal beds from which it costs a 

 dollar to obtain fifty cents' worth of coal. 



If it be asked why the coal near Duncannon (which is 

 the same as that near Liverpool) is not workable, the an- 

 swer is easy. In the first place, the beds are too thin. Beds 

 of coal two feet thick will scarcely pay to w T ork, even in the 

 anthracite region, and I know no bed in Perry county even 

 as thick as that. In the second place, it is often necessary 

 to take out a great deal of rock, sometimes hard sandstone, 

 in '•getting'' the coal. This is very expensive. In the 

 third place, where the coal is obtained, though ''burnable," 

 yet it leaves between 30 and 40 per cent, of ash — one ton out 

 of three. Good coal should not exceed 10 or 15 per cent., 

 and the best coal has but 5 or less per cent of ash. 



An examination of the sections will show that over New 

 Bloomfield the coal measures, when they existed, lay at a 

 height of about 22,000 feet above the present surface. Is 

 it surprising, in view of these facts, that geologists speak of 

 coal-seeking in Perry county as folly and infatuation I 



Analyses of Pocono (Duncannon) coal are to be found in 





