History of Springfield, Illinois, its attractions as a home and advantages for business, manufacturing, etc. Pub. under the auspices of the Springfield board of trade, by J. C. Power.

ITS ADVANTAGES FOR MANUFACTURING. 43
COAL AND COAL MINING.
The other minerals in this State are so thus recklessly throw away all that had
meagre in supply as to be deserving of been accumulated. The interposition of
but a bare mention; but when we speak the veto by Governor Yates wrested the
of coal, to say that it is abundant, gives work from the hands of the destroyers.
but a meagre idea of its extent. It is At the session of 1865 an appropriafound cropping out of the bluffs, along tion was made for the publication of
the water courses, over a large extent of the reports of the State Geologist. Early
country, and was mined in a rude man- in 1866 the first volume of 504 octavo
ner by the first settlers. It is but a few pages, with numerous illustrations, was
years since the first attempts were made published, and the second volume of 470
at mining on scientific principles. pages appeared the same year.
A law was enacted by the General As- February 28, 1867, an act of the General
sembly of Illinois, in February, 1851, au- Assembly was approved by Governor
thorizi ng the Governor, Auditor and Oglesby, providing for the publication of
Treasurer of the State to employ a Geo- the third volume of the reports, which
logist, with the view of making an en- appeared in 1868. It contained 574pages.
tire survey of the State. Three thousand When the first volume of reports were
dollars per annum was appropriated for prepared for the press there had not been
the purpose of defraying the expenses of a coal shaft sunk in Sangamon county,
the same. The appropriation was to and Prof. Worthen says: "No coal has
continue until the work was completed, given me more trouble and has left me
or its discontinuance ordered by the more uncertain about its geological horiLegislature. zon, than the bank of the Sangamon
At the session of 1853, the annual ap- River."
propriations were increased to $5,000, In the third volume of his reports,
and an additional $500 per annum for speaking of the stratum mined in Sanagamaking maps of the several counties of mon county, by the shafts sunk since his
the State. The survey was commenced first report, he says: "The coal from this
in 1852 by Dr. J. G. Norwood. seam is of excellent quality, and at some
In 1858 Prof. A. H. Worthen, the pre- localities, as at Howlett, in Sangamon
sent State Geologist, was commissioned county, the coal is remarkably free from
by Governor Bissell to take charge of the sulphuret of iron. * * * It is a harder
work. Annual reports were made to the and heavier coal than that from the seam
Governor, without any appropriations above it, and appears to be by far the
for their publication until 1865. The most valuable coal yet discovered in this
general knowledge on the subject was portion of the State."
so limited, and the desire of men of In the same volume he says: "The prosmall calibre to make political capital duct of our coal mines for the past year,
under the convenient plea of economy, 1867, according to the most reliable stathat a bill passed both Houses of the tistics we have been able to obtain, is
General Assembly, at the session of 1861, fully 1,500,000 tons. There is, perhaps,
to repeal all laws on the subject, and no other area of equal extent in the Uni