An undated view of a typical colliery blacksmith shop.
From a series of articles that appeared in the Pottsville Republican and Herald in 1998:
The Girard Mammoth Colliery was located north of Girardville on the Raven Run Creek.
The colliery was opened by a drift driven east on the North Dip Skidmore Vein by John Donaldson and Frank Donaldson in 1856. They mined the drift to 1864, when a company was formed by Donaldson, Shoener, Tyler and Amrod, who developed and operated the colliery under the name Girard Mammoth Coal Company.
In 1865, the company drove a water-level tunnel 725 feet north to the South Dip Skidmore Vein and drove gangways eastward 1,500 feet and westward 3,000 feet by 1869.
In 1867, a second tunnel was driven 2,000 feet west of the water-level tunnel from the Skidmore Vein to the Mammoth Vein, intersecting a number of small veins.
The first coal shipped by the new company was 4,057 tons in 1866.
In 1871, it sank a slope 400 feet on the South Dip Skidmore Vein.
The Mammoth Vein Coal Company continued operating the colliery until 1879, when it was purchased by the Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Company, which in 1882, sank a new slope 480 feet on the South Dip Buck Mountain Vein and erected new hoisting machinery and boilers to operate it.
In 1895, the water in the old abandoned Cuyler Colliery workings was pumped out in connection with its other slopes.
The Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Company continued operating until 1906, when the James brothers came in possession and operated to 1908, then succeeded by Cockel, Christ & Company. It made many improvements and built a large new breaker, which was destroyed by fire in 1912, but rebuilt the same year.
It continued operating the colliery to 1918, when the Raven Run Coal Company (Wentz & Company) leased the colliery and operated it under the name Raven Run Colliery to 1923, when it was succeeded by the Hazle Brooke Coal Company.
The total shipment of coal from Girard Mammoth Colliery was 5,951,349 tons as of 1928.
_______________________________________________
Article by Frank Blase, Historian, Reading Anthracite Company Historical Library, Pottsville Republican & Herald, April 18, 1998. Obtained from Newspapers.com.
Corrections and additional information should be added as comments to this post.