Reports of the Inspectors of Mines of the anthracite coal regions of ...

Ex. Doc] Reports of the Inspectors of Mines. 131
to admit that I was right, and as a further proof of my correctness, they
have coramenced to make the ver}^ improA^ements that I had suggested.
They have not gone so far as I had asked them to go, hut they are moving
in the right direction, and are making valuable improvements. One new
fan has been erected which will help the ventilation very materially in that
section. The}^ have erected a new fan also at No. 10 shaft, and still another
at No. 13 shaft, which makes four new fans for this company' to put in dur-
ing the year.
The following small companies and individual operators have also
erected fans during the year 1877 : Alva Tompkins, at the Tompkins shaft,
Pittston ; Pittston Coal Company, at the Ravine shaft, Pittston ; Penn-
sylvania Anthracite Company, at the Sibley shaft. Old Forge township ;
Park Coal Company, at their slope, Hyde Park ; Green Ridge Coal Com-
pany, at their Green Ridge slope, Dunmore ; and a second fan has been
put in by John Jermyn, Esquire, at his Green Ridge shaft, Scranton—making
the whole number of new fans put in during the year, thirteen. Hosie,
Archbald & Hosie are sinking an air shaft for their Fair Lawn slope, and
purpose putting in a fan soon.
Plans, or Maps of Mines.
The first section of the mine ventilation act has a clause which required
that a complete and true map of all the workings of each coal mine or
colliery, as they stood when the law was enacted, should be furnished to
the inspector within four months from that date. The marking of those
maps with the words " Worked out," or " Old workings," covering all up
to the time the act was passed, in my opinion, was not a compliance with
the law. I feel positive that it was intended that the inspector should have
a true and correct map of all the workings up to that date ; and circum-
stances may arise at any time when it may be of the greatest importance
that he should have them in his possession. Extensive caves are liable to
happen at any time, closing up the main traveling ways, and inclosing the
men employed inside of the cave, when it would be necessary to find a way
in to the men through those very old workings, the maps of which are re-
fused to the inspector, and which would be guides for him if he had them.
Such caves have already occurred, and I have myself experienced the pain-
ful sensation of being entombed in this manner ;
and had it not been that
there was one man, Alexander Bryden, Esquire, who knew every yard of the
workings, and who was brave enough to work his way through the old
workings and over the edges of the cave, aboiit sixty men would have been
lost. I refer to the extensive cave at Carbondale on the 12th of January,
1846, where fifteen lives were lost.
It may be argued that there are second openings now to all collieries
which, howevei-, so far as tunnels and drifts are concerned is not the case
—but even admitting that there are second openings now to all our collieries
so there were at Carbondale in 1846. There were five openings there, but
they were all closed.