|
|
|
|
| Central Mine & Coke Works (United Mine No. 2 & Coke Works) (ca.1880?-1953), Located on the North Branch of Buffalo Run, off Central Road, 4/10's mile north of PA Rte. 31, Tarrs vicinity, Central, East Huntingdon Twp., Westmoreland Co., PA [Name was later changed to United No. 2 Mine & Coke Works] [Location on USGS Mt. Pleasant Pennsylvania 7 1/2 min. Quad. Map.] [Mine Map - PA-DEP, Uniontown Map Depository A - File # - Shelf location - E1.] Owners: (ca.1880?-1886), Painter Coal Company, (ca.1886-1890), Central Connellsville Coke Company, Scottdale, PA (ca.1890-1891), McClure Coke Company, Scottdale, PA (ca.1891-1893), Connellsville Coke Company (ca.1893-1896), United Coal & Coke Company, Greensburg, PA (ca.1896-1925), H.C. Frick Coke Company, Scottdale, PA Company Store: Union Supply Company [Coke Works contained 303 bee-hive coke ovens ca.1910.] United States Steel Corporation (ca.1932-1949), Bortz Coal Company, Uniontown, PA [United Mine No. 2 Closed ca.1949, Coke works kept in operation.] (ca.1949-1953), Bortz Coal Company, Uniontown, PA [United No. 2 Coke Works in operation only] [United No. 2 Coke Works Closed in ca.1953.] |
| Meyer Mine & Coke Works (Myer Mine & Coke Works) (ca.1909-1930's), Located on the Southwest Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Tarrs Branch, northwest of Central, and east of Tarrs, along the north branch of Buffalo Run, Rocktown, East Huntingdon Twp., Westmoreland Co., PA. [Myers Coke Works contained 32 bee-hive coke ovens ca.1910.] [Myers Coke Works contained 32 bee-hive coke ovens ca.1917.] Owners: (ca.1909- ? ), Brownfield Connellsville Coke Company, Uniontown, PA (ca.1913- ? ), Brownfield Connellsville Coke Company, Uniontown, PA (ca.1916- ? ), Brownfield Coal & Coke Company, Uniontown, PA (ca.1917- ? ), Brownfield Coal & Coke Company, Uniontown, PA (ca.1919-1930's), Brownfield Coal & Coke Company, Uniontown, PA
|
|
| Map of Central, ca.1902. A portion of the 1902 15min.
Connellsville, Pennsylvania Quad. map showing the coal patch town of Central,
the mine and coke works, and the surrounding coal patch towns.
(Map courtesy of United States Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey, Washington, D.C.) |
| DESCRIPTION: Although no structures remain from the Central Mine (United No. 2 Mine), two partial batteries of bee-hive coke ovens survived, greatly deteriorated, up to ca. 1994. These coke oven batteries were reclaimed in the late 1990's, and no longer exist. The coke ovens batteries were composed of bee-hive block coke ovens. A battery of bee-hive bank coke ovens stood just south of the block coke ovens. The coke ovens were of red-brick construction with coursed rubble stone retaining walls. The mine reclamation project has reclaimed all the remaining coke works at the Central Mine site. The town of Central contains two paved streets. First Street and Second Street, that run north-south, and three roads on the north side of the town, that run east-west. First and Second Streets feature about fifteen two-story red-brick houses. These residential buildings are among the region's few brick houses constructed by a coal company. The brick houses were occupied by company managers, coal miners and coke workers. The brick houses were probably built in the mid 1880's by Maurice Painter's Painter Coal Company, which founded the Central Mine and Coke Works at Central. The brick houses are two-story buildings with gable roofs, common-bond red-brick walls, wood floors and rafters, and stone foundations. The eight brick houses on First Street were occupied by the coal company managers of the Central Mine and Coke Works. The six brick houses on Second Street were occupied by the coal miners and coke workers. Most of the brick houses have been modified by porch additions and enclosures, window alterations, and changes in the roofing materials. |
 |
The brick coal company miners houses that line the two
remaining streets in the coal company patch town of Central. (Photo by Chris Dellamea, Mining Historian, courtesy of Chris Dellamea, Mt. Pleasant, PA) |
| Second Street also contains three wood-frame
single-family dwellings. These are two-story buildings with gable roofs,
brick chimneys, and rubble stone foundations. Three streets to the
north that run perpendicular to First and Second streets have single rows
of two-story wood-frame double houses. These are typical of the double
houses found in western Pennsylvania's numerous coal patch towns. These
houses were probably built by the H.C. Frick Coke Company.
Five other houses built by the H.C. Frick Coke Company in the early 1920's are located on Central Road south of Central near PA Route 31. These five cottages are in a single row and are one-story wood-frame single-family residences with clapboard siding, gable-roofs, brick chimneys, and stone foundations. The Company Store which was located on First Street in Central, burned around ca.1970. |
| Meyer Mine & Coke Works
(Myer Mine & Coke Works): In an area known as Rocktown, along the North Branch of Buffalo Run, northwest of Central, there was another small battery of bee-hive coke ovens called the Meyer Coke Works (Myer Coke Works). Operated by the Brownfield-Connellsville Coke Company, the Meyer Coke Works contained only thirty-two coke ovens. It operated in the 1913 and perhaps through the early 1930's. Nothing remains of this facility. |
 |
| The Myers Plant of the Brownfield Coal & Coke Company,
at Tarr, East Huntington Township, Westmoreland Co., PA (Print courtesy of the "Daily News Standard," Uniontown, PA, Oct. 21, 1913, page 13.) |
| Crescent Brewery: The former Crescent Brewery stands in a small community called Snydertown, located between Rocktown and Tarrs. This brewery began in the late nineteenth centruy, shut down during prohibition, and reopened briefly before closing its doors forever in the early 1930's. The brewery constructed about a half dozen houses for its employees. These one-story wood frame single-family houses are extant and are located next to the former C & C Lumber Company, the lumber company acquired the brewery property. |
| HISTORY: Located along the North Branch of Buffalo Run the coal patch town of Central and the Central Mine & Coke Works was originally developed ca.1880 by the Painter Coal Company, Maurice L. Painter, owner. The Central Mine was a slope entry mine. Around 1886 the Central Connellsville Coke Company acquired the property through a merger of the coal companies. Maurice L. Painter, one of the owners of the concern, was appointed Superintendent of the Central Mine & Coke Works. |
 |
| An early photo of the United No. 2 Mine
& Coke Works. The Company Store is the large buiding in the forground.
The railroad spur in the extreme right of the photo leads to the mine,
the retaining walls of the coke works loading dock can also be seen. The
miners houses on the hill around the the main part of the town have all been
torn down sincew the mines were closed. (Photo courtesy of the collections of John G. King, Photo Studio and Railroading Historian, Belpre, OH) |
| Between 1890 and 1893 the Central Mine &
Coke Works had three different owners. Around ca.1890 the McClure Coke
Company, of which H.C. Frick had acquired a controlling interest, acquired
the property. By ca.1891 the Connellsville Coke Company had acquired
the Central Mine & Coke Works, and operated the works until 1893. In
March, 1893 the United Coal & Coke Company purchased the Central Mine
& Coke Works and renamed the Central Mine & Coke Works, as their
United No. 2 Mine & Coke Works.
By 1896 the H.C. Frick Coke Company had assumed control of the United No. 2 Mine & Coke Works through its controlling interests in the other coke companies. The United No. 2 Mine & Coke Works was served by the South West Pennsylvania Railroad Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad. The United No. 2 Coke Works contained 300 bee-hive coke ovens. By 1906 the United Mine No. 2 was producing about 230,000 tons of coal with 292 miners employed. That year the United No. 2 Coke Works produced over 148,000 tons of coke. The H.C. Frick Coke Company ceased its operations at Central in 1925, after the long 1922 coal miners strike. |
|
| The ca.1925 H.C. Frick Baseball Team from
the Central Mine & Coke Works. (Photo courtesy of the Coal & Coke Heritage Center, Penn State University Fayette Campus, Uniontown, PA.) |
| DESCRIPTION: Around the late 1920's the H.C. Frick Coke Company began to sell off the coal company owned houses in the coal patch Village of Central to private owners. The United No. 2 Mine & Coke Works remained idle. In ca.1932 the Bortz Coal Company, of Uniontown, PA, acquired the Central Mine & Coke Works property, but not the Village of Central, the company merely was going to operate the mine and coke works. After repairing the facilities and installing new railroad trackage to the United No. 2 Mine and the Coke Works, the company recommenced mining operations at the Central property. The Bortz Coal Company produced coal at the United No. 2 Mine until ca.1949. After ca.1949 the United No. 2 Mine was permanently closed the lay abandoned. The Bortz Coal Company continued to operate about seventy bee-hive coke ovens at the United No. 2 Coke Works, using coal trucked in from other local mines and strip mine operations until ca.1953, when the complete operation was permanently closed and the coke works abandoned. (History and description of the Central Mines & Coke Works, and Meyer Mine & Coke Works, with additional data and pictures adapted from "Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania: An Inventory of Historic Engineering and Industrial Sites, 1994," America's Industrial Heitage Project, National Park Service, Historic American Buildings Survey / Historic American Engineering Record, U.S. Department of the Interior, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.) |
 |
Coke Works Dinky John S. Melago, coke works dinky locomotive engineer for Bortz Coal Company, and granddaughter Theresa Dzambo, ca.1939. This small locomotive hauled the Larry cars to charge the coke ovens at United No. 2 Mine Coke Works, Central, PA. (photo by John E. Melago courtesy of HABS / HAER, National Park Service, Washington, D.C.) |
| To Select another Index to Westmoreland County Coal Mines Click on the Larry cars for Index Page or on a Letter below |
 |
| Select another Index to the Coal Mines
of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania [Click on a letter to take you to that Index]
|
| Return to the Main County Index for Southwestern Pennsylvania Coal Mines |
| Local History
Sites Links to other coal mining sites |
Reference Sources for Southwestern Pennsylvania Coal Mines | The New Message Boards have not worked, Use our guestbook. Email the Editor. | Have
information to add on Westmoreland County Coal Mines? E-Mail the Editor |
|
View the "Old Miner's" Guestbook |
Let the Old Miner know you've been here. Sign the "Old Miner's" Guestbook |
 FastCounter by LinkExchange |
If you have additional information or pictures on the Coal
Mines of Westmoreland County, PA Contact: Ray Washlaski, Editor Copyright 2001, All rights reserved, by Raymond A. Washlaski, Ryan P. Washlaski & The 20th Century Society of Western Pennsylvania. Web site Design by "Mercers, an Undertakers" Web Design Company |
