Thursday, July 21, 2011

When coal was briefly king

Albert B. Southwick
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When comparison tests with Rhode Island and Pennsylvania coal were done, the
Spy claimed that Worcester coal was just as good as the others, but not everyone
was convinced.

The plan to add 13 acres to the north side of Green Hill Park brings to mind an interesting
chapter in Worcester history.

The strip includes Coal Mine Brook and the remains of a coal mine where, from 1828 to 1838 or
thereabouts, sweating workmen toiled in the dark depths to load horse-drawn carts with coal, the
new and exciting energy source for the coming industrial era.

The plan was to load the coal in barges on Lake Quinsigamond to be transferred to the
Blackstone Canal and thence to Providence, but that part of the scheme never materialized.

The idea of a Worcester coal industry began after 1820, when coal deposits were discovered on
the Green estate. Finding coal in the 19th century was like finding oil in the 20th century. Even
though the Industrial Revolution was just beginning, a new source of energy was obviously
something important. Visions of riches and progress danced in peoples heads.

Leading the parade was the Spy, Worcesters main weekly and an enthusiastic Worcester
booster.

On Jan. 21, 1824, it reported on a test of the Worcester coal:

A great number of our citizens have been highly gratified by the exhibition of the fire made by
Worcester coal, at the brewery, where it has been used for malting for a few days past ... if any
doubts remained of the value of our coal, they have been removed. It makes a most brilliant fire,
producing an intense heat, and burns without any smoke or offensive smell whatever.

It went on to note that a Captain Thomas was burning nothing but Worcester coal to heat his
tavern, and that several Worcester homes had switched from wood to coal.

When comparison tests with Rhode Island and Pennsylvania coal were done, the Spy claimed
that Worcester coal was just as good as the others, but not everyone was convinced.

However, the project went forward. In 1833, William Green wrote to a New York man with the
following proposition: My terms for that land (50 acres) are as follows: $100,000 and to give
satisfactory security for the further sum of $150,000, payable by annual installments of cash and
interest of $25,000 each and until the whole sum is paid and I reserve one quarter of stock that
the purchasers shall have the privilege of raising coal, erecting buildings, and the use of the land
for any other purpose excepting for agriculture which use I retain for myself and heirs.

By contrast to the $150,000 that Mr. Green was asking for 50 acres 178 years ago, the city of
Worcester will now get 13 acres for $172,500. That still is a very good deal and is made possible
by the generous support of the Worcester Land Trust, a big player in the land conservation
movement.

I have no idea if Mr. Green was able to close the deal on his terms or even whether the 50 acres
that he offered for sale included the parcel that the city is now acquiring. But it plainly involved
the same seam of coal.

The Worcester Coal Company was incorporated in 1828 for the digging of anthracite coal, and
several of the towns most prominent citizens were listed as incorporators.

The actual digging had begun before 1828 and by 1834 it was a major project. The History of
Worcester County (1889) reports that fifteen or twenty young men and a blacksmith were
wanted to work there.

In November 1828, an opening twelve feet wide and eight feet high had been carried into the
hill about sixty feet, at a descent of about twenty five degrees, and a railway was laid, on which
the coal was carried from the mine to the place of deposit, in loads of fifteen hundred pounds.

That was a major project for the days of pick and shovel. The Spy reported in December that
several hundred tons of coal had been sold at the mine head for $3 a ton. It was used in various
local establishments, including the Trumbull & Ward brewery and the Burbank paper mill. But
despite the flackery of the Spy, Worcester coal was not as efficient or clean burning as
Pennsylvania coal and when the mine became flooded on a regular basis, it was shut down and
abandoned.

Accurate figures are hard to come by, but it seems that, from 1828 to 1838 or thereabouts,
several hundred tons of coal were extracted from the Worcester mine.

The current purchase will enable completion of the East Side Trail, a walking path 3.5 miles long
that will connect Lake Quinsigamond to the edge of downtown.

I hope that the trail will pass close to the old coal mine, where hikers can contemplate what
might have been if the coal had been of better quality.

Albert B. Southwicks column appears regularly in the Telegram & Gazette.