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DATE OF FIRST-AID MEET IS
CHANGED TO OCTOBER 27th.
The date for the national first aid meet at the
Arsenal Testing Station of the Bureau of Mines.
Pittsburgh, has been changed from Sept. 16 to
Oct. 27. The decision to make the change was
announced on July S.
The change of date was made to enable President
William H. Taft to lie present.. The President had
been invited to attend and the date was fixed for
Sept. 16, when it was believed he could be present,
but this was found to be impossible and, as he was
to come to Pittsburgh on Oct. 27, the latter date
was chosen for the first aid meet.
ARBITRATOR SELECTED FOR SOUTH­
WESTERN DISTRICT LABOR DISPUTE.
Mr. W. L. A. Johnson, for 14 years commissioner
of the Kansas Bureau of Labor, is to arbitrate all
labor difficulties between the miners and mine
owners in Kansas, Missouri. Oklahoma and Arkansas.
It is Mr. Johnson's job to prevent strikes and to
decide labor difficulties that may come up in the
coal mines of the southwest district, and when
he settles the question both sides must adopt the
decision.
The new position was decided upon by the
Southwestern Coal Operators' Association and the
district branch of the United Mine Workers. It
was more or less as an experiment. The miners
had been out of work for four months, and the big
mines had been going to rack and.ruin because
they were not being operated throughout all of
last summer.
The miners wanted to work and the operators
wanted the coal mined, so it was agreed that the
coal operators would pay some $3,000 a year and
the coal miners $2,000 a year and hire a professional
arbitrator—a man who had been a laborer,
had handled strikes and knew something about
arbitrating labor difficulties.
The new plan was agreed upon and it went into
effect recently. Mr. Johnson is paid $3,000 a year
and expenses. He makes his headquarters in Topeka,
but travels over the mining sections of the
four states in the district most of the time.
If the miners object to some labor condition, or
the manner of operating a mine, they file their objections
with the arbitrator. He sends a copy
to the operator and asks what the operator has to
say about it, and as soon as his reply is received.
Mr. Johnson will give each side notice of a hearing.
The operators and miners appear with their witnesses,
and each side tells about the complaint and
the reply to this. Lawyers are permitted to be
present, but they do not take any hand in the discussion
except to answer legal questions. The
THE COAL TRADE BULLETIN. 25
men and the operators simply tell their side of the
complaint and make the rebuttal as simple as possible
and without legal technicalities.
After taking all the evidence, the arbitrator goes
to the mines and makes a personal investigation
and then will make his decision. Under the contract
between the miners and operators, the decision
of the arbitrator is final in every respect.
If the operators have a complaint against the
miners, they go through the same formalities.
Each side has equal rights in submitting propositions.
The arbitrator is bound to hold hearings
and investigate every complaint, no matter how
trivial, and to make a written decision, and this
decision stands.
COAL OPERATOR DEEDS PROPERTY TO
TRUSTEES FOR BENEFIT OF CREDITORS.
A deed of trust from Mr. Thomas T. Bosnian,
president of the Big Vein Pocahontas Coal Co.,
with offices in the Continental building, Baltimore,
conveying his property to John F. Sippel, William
Hopps and Benjamin F. Caston, trustee, for the
benefit of creditors, was filed July 2. in the office
of the clerk of the circuit court at Towson. Md.
The trustees filed a bond for $80,000, with the
American Bonding Co. as surety. No statement of
the assets and liabilities of Mr. Boswell has been
filed.
The deed of trust stipulates that the trustees
shall take charge of all the property of Mr. Boswell,
and after the payment of the wages due his
clerks and other employes, shall devote the proceeds
realized to the payment of Mr. Boswell's
other creditors without preference or priority.
Any surplus left over shall be paid to Mrs. Boswell
to tbe extent of the amount of the insurance
policies a' ove referred to.
LAKE COAL TONNAGE EXCEEDS 1910.
Coal tonnage records of various carriers to ports
on the Great Lakes for the 1911 season up to and
including May 31, as compared with last year,
show that, with one exception, tonnage is in advance
of last year. The figures are as follows:
Pennsylvania. 1911, 957,034 tons; 1910. 7S3.490
tons: Baltimore & Ohio. 1011. 333,282 tons; 1910,
408,493 tons; Hocking Valley, 1911, 132,541 tons;
1910, 101.415 tons; Chesapeake & Ohio, 1911, 395,-
S18 tons; 1910, 243,372 tons, and Norfolk & Western.
1911. 26S.337 tons; 1910. 259,956 tons.
The railroads, on an average, make a profit of
29 per cent, on lake cargo coal at existing rates,
which are highest on the Norfolk & Western-Pennsylvania
haul to the Sandusky (Ohio) docks, $1.12
per ton from the Pocahontas field, which are farthest
away from the lakes.