Great value of coal and iron
231. Coal and Iron. Next to the great farm crops, coal and iron are the most valuable products of our country. The coal that is mined in one year is worth five times as much as the gold and silver combined. Our iron mines yield as much wealth in one year as the gold mines do in three. Gold and silver are luxuries without which we could get along, but our great factories, railroads, and steamship lines could not exist without an abundance of iron and coal.
A hundred years ago there was almost no coal mined in this country. Now we use more of it than any other land, and almost a million men make a living by mining it.
Hard coal in Pennsylvania
Factories need coal
At first most of the coal produced was the hard anthracite of eastern Pennsylvania. But this hard coal is found only in one small section of Pennsylvania, whereas great beds of soft coal stretch from Pennsylvania west to Washington. At present there is far more soft coal used than anthracite. Pennsylvania is the leading state in the production of both hard and soft coal, but West Virginia, Illinois, and Ohio are also great coal states. Generally, where there are productive coal mines, factories have been built, because most of them need a great deal of coal for fuel.
IRON AND STEEL WORKS IN A SOUTHERN CITY
From a photograph
Largest iron-ore deposits in the world