Coy Junction, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA
[A railroad station located on the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburg Railway, Tearing Run Branch.]
See: Coy No. 1 Mine, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA
       Coy No. 2 Mine, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA
       Coy No. 3 Mine, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA

Coy No. 1 Mine (ca.1913-1930 ? ),
Located on the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh Railway, Tearing Run Branch, Snyder Mine Spur Line, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA
[Coy No. 1 Mine was listed as a new mine in ca.1913.]
[USGS 7 1/2 min Quad map: Indiana, PA.]
[UTM: E. 17 657300 - N. 4487900.]
Owners: (ca.1913- ? ), Brush Creek Mining Company, Indiana, PA
                                     [A sudsidiary of the Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Company, Indiana, PA]
              (ca.1916-1930), Brush Creek Mining Company, Indiana, PA
                                     [A Sudsidiary of the Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Company, Indiana, PA]    
              (ca.1917-  ?  ), Brush Creek Coal Mining Company, Indiana, PA

Coy No. 2 Mine (ca.1918-1930 ? ),
Located on the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh Railway, Tearing Run Branch, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA
Owners: (ca.1918-1930), Brush Creek Mining Company, Indiana, PA
                                      [A Sudsidiary of the Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Company, Indiana, PA]

Coy No. 3 Mine (ca.1918-1930 ? ),
Located on the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh Railway, Tearing Run Branch, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA
Owners: (ca.1918-1930), Brush Creek Mining Company, Indiana, PA
                                      [A Sudsidiary of the Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Company, Indiana, PA]

The typical coal company house is built on a random rubble stone foundation, and is topped by a side-gable slate or shingle roof.  The walls are clad in weatherboard siding, at one time all the coal company owned houses were painted a uniform gray color, the standard company house color used on all Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Co. owned houses.  A single corbeled brick chimney is located on the roof ridge at the center.  Full length shed porches extend across the front of the houses;  other smaller shed porches at the rear have been enclosed on almost all the houses.  The houses are laid out to either side of a single main street, with a few houses clustered off a side street near the center of the villege.  Most of the original coal company built houses remain.

The coal in this "Brush Creek Coal Field," though relatively high in sulphur and ash content, was considered to be efficient for steam purposes.  The Robinson family held approximately one-third of a total of 12,500 shares of stock in this new company, the Brush Creek Coal Mining Company.  As Lucius Waterman Robinson was president of R. & P. C. & I. Co. at the time of Brush Creek Coal Mining Company organization, two of the new mines and mining towns, Waterman and Luciusboro, were named in his honor.  The two remaining mining sites and their company towns were named Coy and Snyder, for J. B. Coy and William and John Snyder, whose properties had been bought by the Brush Creek Mining Company to form the nucleus of the Brush Creek coal mining operation.

A unique aspect of the Brush Creek Coal Field was that due to the proximity of the several mine openings, the miners' houses in the several coal patch towns were located as to be available for any of the mines, with the exception of Luciusboro.  The first of the coal company patch towns was built at Coy, where 23 double family frame houses stood by ca.1928.  Many of the miners from the Snyder Mines lived in Coy, while other men commuted the short distance from Indiana and Homer City.

The Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh Railway began working on the construction of the Tearing Run Branch of the railroad in ca.1913 passenger and freight service was provided the mines in the Brush Creek Coal Field.

The Brush Creek Mining Company opened its Coy No. 1 Mine on May 15, 1913.  Heyl & Patterson Company of Pittsburgh, PA began work on the construction of the coal tipple on July 9th, and by September 10, 1913, an amazingly short time later, the first coal was loaded into the railroad hopper cars on the Tearing Run Branch of the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh Railway.

In 1914, the first full year of production, 110 men and boys worked at Coy No. 1 Mine, and produced 118,783 tons of coal.

Coy No. 1 Mine was a drift Mine, that mined the 63 inch thick Upper Freeport coal seam.  In 1917 the Coy No. 1 Mine produced 172,442 tons of coal, using 147 men and boys.  Ventilation was provided by a 6 foot diameter Stine fan.

Two additional mines, Coy No. 2 Mine and Coy No. 3 Mine followed Coy No. 1 Mine development.  Coy No. 2 Mine was developed and opened in ca.1918.

The Brush Creek Coal Mining Company built a 24 foot x 36 foot electrical substation at the Snyder No. 1 Mine in ca.1913, at the terminal of the Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Company's electrical transmission line from the Lucerne Mines central power house.  The total cost of the substation and its equipment exceeded $12,000. Sometime shortly after the opening of the Coy No. 1 Mine, an electrical transmission line was run to Coy from the electrical substation at Snyder, to supply electrical power to the mines at Coy and the coal company houses in the company patch town of Coy.  Later electrical feeder lines were run to the Waterman Mines and the Luciusboro Mines.  The Lucerne Mines Central Power Plant supplied electrical power to all subsequent Brush Creek Coal Field Mines.

The mines in the Brush Creek Coal Field produced from ca.1913 until the 1950's.  The operations at the Coy Mine and Luciusboro Mines closed in ca.1930.  Snyder Mines were abandoned in ca.1932.  Waterman No. 2 Mine closed and was permanently abandoned on April 12, 1954.  The Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal Company retained ownership of the houses until ca.1947, when it sold all is company patch towns.  Most of the company built miners houses in the former coal company patch towns remain and are now privately owned.
(History of the Coy Mines, Coy, Center Twp., Indiana Co., PA, adapted with additional data from "Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal Company, The First One Hundred Years," by Eileen Mountjoy Cooper,  formerly of Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Indiana, PA.  Published by Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal Company, 1982.)

(History and description of the Coy Mines, adapted with additional data  from "Indiana County, Pennsylvania: An Inventory of Historic Engineering and Industrial Sites, 1993,"  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.)

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