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NOTES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE YORKSHIRE COALFIELD 
IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF DON CASTER. 
BY WALTER ROWLEY, F.S.A., M.INST.C.E., F.G.S. 
{Read I2th November, 1908. Manuscript received 
2Qth December, 1908.) 
To-day recalls to my mind a meeting of this Society, which 
has for half a century done more than any other institution for 
promoting the geology of mining in its early days, at Doncaster 
on the 28th September, 1870, when as a very young man, just 
out of his teens, I ventured, with the confidence of youth, 
to read a paper on " Some Observations on Coal and Coal 
Mining,"* Perhaps it might be of interest to read you an 
extract from that paper where it refers to Doncaster at that 
date, as follows : — 
" To our local friends in the neighbourhood of Doncaster 
the econoinical working of our cuaifield is a matter of great 
interest, standing, as at present we do, upon those coal 
measures underlying the Permian Rocks, a section of which 
I have added to my illustrations, calculated • from what I 
consider the most reliable data ; their value and extent may be 
estimated by one fact, viz., that in this section are represented 
all the seams belonging to the Yorkshire Coalfield, numbering 
ne?.rly 40, with an aggregate thickness of nearly 90 feet, at 
least 30 feet of which will be workable sooner or later in this 
district The above rocks will have to contribute the 
coalfields of future generations ; at the same time, situated as 
the upper portions of this coalfield are, within a practicable 
depth, 1 do not see any reason why it should not contribute its 
share to the requirements of the present century, and I express 
my astonishment that it has not already been developed, and 
thus locally derive the advantage of the excellent colliery sites 
Some Observations on Coal and Coal Mining, and the Economical 
Working of Our Coalfields. By Walter Rowley, Mining Engineer, Leeds. 
Proc. Geological and Polytechnic Society of the W. Riding of Yorkshire, 
Vol. v., pp. 229-246. 
