One Hundred Years of Federal Mining Safety and Health Research

2.3.1 Initial Safety Research
In 1910, the United States had more than 700,000 coal miners working in 15,000 coal mines,
producing about 500 million tons of coal annually. Much of the initial work by the Bureau was
educational. During its first year the Bureau trained over 50,000 miners in first aid, mine rescue,
and fire-fighting. The Bureau’s mine rescue cars were used to train miners and mine rescue
teams throughout the country (see Figure 10).
Figure 10. Dr. Joseph A. Holmes and miners being trained in front of mine rescue car, 1913.
When the Bureau was established in 1910 the fatality rate in US coal mines was 3.91 per 1,000
miners employed. By comparison, fatality rates were 1.70 per 1000 in England and 1.98 in
Prussia. In U.S. metal mines, the fatality rate was also above 3 per 1,000 employees.
In response to these troubling fatality rates, the Bureau’s initial mine safety research focused in
these areas:
• Explosibility of mine gas and coal dust and prevention of explosions and fires;
• Safety of explosives used in mines;
• Electrical safety in mines;
• Safety of mine lights and their use as gas detectors;
• Emergency breathing apparatus.
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