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

Ex. Doc] Reports of the Inspectors of Mines, 53
officer, of whatever grade, from the lire-boss up to and including the su-
perintendent—in fact, each operator and land owner—should be able to
secure a cop}^, if they so desire, of these annual reports, as the}' contain
certain matters of much interest to them all, in some particular or other.
There are upward of three thousand of actual miners employed in this
district, and about four or five hundred officers, ha^dng charge of about
fifteen thousand persons.
Now. then, should each of these officers and actual miners be supplied
with a copy of these annual publications, it would require about tliirty-
five hundred for this district, whereas, at present, the Inspector receives
only eighty-three (83) copies for distribution ;
and only through the good
efforts of Honorable H. B. Payne, while serving in the Senate, in 1875, did
we succeed in having that many. It is true that the Senators and Repre-
sentatives have a certain number for similar purposes, but it is hardly
worth mentioning, among their large constituenc3^
These reports are the only State literature that our miners care anything
particularly about, except the reports of the statistical bureau, which they
would also like to be in possession of annually.
Our miners and mine officers are charged with being ignorant, careless,
reckless, and incompetent, &c., &c. ; and these reports having more infor-
mation upon the art of mining anthracite coal than any other book or
magazine published, and every one of our public men agree that our mining-
population should be better educated, then, I say, why do the State au-
thorities not publish a sufficient number of these reports to supply the demand
for them, that they may be better posted in the matter of their call-
ing, free gratis ; or, otherwise, charge a price for them sufficient only to
pay the expense of their publication, thus giving all persons desirous of
such information an opportunity to get the same. There are hundreds
yes, thousands—of our mining population that would be very glad to haA^e
an opportunity of securing an annual copy of these reports, that have been
deprived of doing so, although willing to pay any reasonable price for the
same.
To the scientific, these reports may be of no great value ; in fact, they
were never intended for such, being created by a class of persons who
have devoted more time to the actual art of mining, than to that of bookmaking
relating to the same, or upon any other subject. I close this ap-
peal, by saying that I hope that some of our legislative members will take
this matter up, and act upon these humble suggestions for the reasons
above advanced.
Legal Proceedings.
On the 14th day of November, a laborer named Richard Coon, working
for a miner named Patrick Langan, in the No. 1 shaft, Kingston Coal
Company's mines, was so seriously injured by fall of coal from roof that
he died of his wounds the following day.
In section nineteen of the mining law of 1870, the miner is required to