970 GEOLOGY OF OHIO. 
These mines are all located in New York and Dover townships, 
Athens county, with the exception of one of W. B. Brooks & Sons’ 
mines, which is in Ward township. 
From Haydenville to Floodwood the coal has been cut out by 
the erosive action of the Hocking river. The area from which the coal 
has disappeared varies between one and two miles in breadth through- 
out this interval. 
Most of the mines named above are on the east or Nelsonville side 
of the river, but several are worked on the western side. The coal 
throughout the field is, however, quite uniform. Every large mine will 
show rooms or sections of slightly lower quality than the rest, but the 
averages of all of the principal mines agree quite closely with each 
other. More depends on the care with which the coal is mined and 
prepared for market than upon the mine from which the coal comes. 
The Nelsonville district was the first portion of the Hocking 
Valley coal field in which mining on a large scale was undertaken, and 
it consequently has advanced further toward exhaustion than any other 
district. The territory nearest the town has already lost almost all of 
its coal. The bad system of mining that prevailed in the earliear days 
led to much needless loss. 
The admirable character of this coal as a domestic and steam fuel 
is so well known that no detailed statements in regard to it are called 
for here. Nor will it be necessary to describe all of the mines in detail. 
One will be taken from the east side of the river and one from the west, 
and the main statement will be given in connection with these. 
The well-known mines of W. B. Brooks & Son, in Section 19, 
Ward township, are selected to represent the eastern side, and the 
new mine of Johnson Brothers and Patterson the western side. 
The section and structure of the seam in Brooks’s Snake Hollow 
mine are shown in the appended figure. 
The section, as here figured, represents the seam in full and normal 
development, but it is found in only a part of the mine. The upper 
portion has been cut away as far down as the bone coal in perhaps half 
of the territory already worked, especially in the north-western parts of 
the mine. In a few instances the upper bench of the coal has suffered 
a little, but it rarely falls below 2 feet. The roof is much better when 
- the full section is found than when the top has been cut away and 
replaced. In the latter case the shales that come in are slippery and 
