HOCKING VALLEY. | 649 
For purposes of comparison, the territory may be divided into four 
separate districts. 
STRAITSVILLE DISTRICT. 
This comprises the greater part of Salt Lick township, Perry county, 
embracing the mining villages of Straitsville, New Straitsville and 
Shawnee, and the territory north and west of them. In these directions 
from Shawnee, the Great Vein Coal is at first found near the tops of the 
hills, and at an elevation of about 150 feet above the valleys. Commene- 
ing at these points, with a varying thickness of from five to seven feet, 
it becomes thicker to the southwest, and is found lower in the hills, so 
that in the neighborhood of Shawnee and Straitsville it is from 30 to 50 
feet above the valleys, and averages about eleven feet in thickness. 
The following section of the coal at Straitsville gives the general char- 
acter of the seam in this neighborhood: 
Blue shale at top. . 
Coal eer len eae iia 5 sau Mac ebatitene! Wacta Sav tony nei Olea th LOnmches. 
SHANG HOV GSES Se oSo cous GUD aaa CUOD paTiGade soo oboaseon 34 to 4 inches. 
COR ayes ean areata oa hoe mean ceiee seal enierna cece a5 fOOb.e Inches: 
SiialespaLuin ges eae Paar are Ricte (Save eralorseqaie ar avec she Dats.t 2 to 3 inches. 
CORSE eva Loc aN Ne SINE oeeee he ent eS See ode cslchd ee mane LEU, 
Fire clay. 
There is but slight variation in the thickness of the different benches 
in the openings around Shawnee and New Straitsville, except where a 
part of the upper bench is cut away by the sand-rock above, in the east- 
ern part of the Shawnee district. A small part of this territory is here 
affected by the ancient valley of erosion, which passes down by the little 
village of Hemlock, and traveling eastward separates the Upper Sunday 
Creek or Moxahala region, from that of the Lower Sunday Creek, and 
which will be subsequently described. Near Shawnee, on the east, the 
erosion sufficed to cut away the shale overlying the coal and remove a 
part of the upper bench of the coal itself, leaving it with an irregular 
undulating surface, covered by a sandstone roof. When the coal has thus 
been disturbed it is generally somewhat deteriorated, and contains a 
larger percentage of sulphur. The roof, also, is not ordinarily evenly 
bedded, and more care is required in mining. The area of the coal here 
damaged by this disturbance is quite small, and in all other places it is 
of great excellence. The two lower benches furnish coal of the greatest 
purity, compact and homogeneous, containing a small amount of ash and 
a large amount of fixed carbon. The upper bench is more laminated, has 
generally a large percentage of ash, and occasional thin bands of ‘‘ bone 
coal.” The partings vary in thickness from one to four inches, and are 
