An undated photograph showing Pottsville’s Coal Street (now Rote 61) at left, the Philadelphia & Reading Coal and Iron Company shops and the new railroad station under construction. The Philadelphia & Reading scrapyard is in the foreground and the Henry Clay monument is at upper right.
From a series of articles that appeared in the Pottsville Republican and Herald in 1998:
_________________________________________________
WESTWOOD COLLIERY
The Westwood Colliery was located at the western end of Pottsville on the west branch of the Schuylkill River.
It was opened by a drift on the Black Mine (Peach Mountain)Vein by John Stanton in 1834.
In 1837, Stanton sank a slope on the Tunnel Vein to a depth of 207 feet and mined both the drift and the slope until 1839 when J. G. Green became a partner and the colliery was operated by Stanton and Green to 1841.
In 1841, James Oliver succeeded Stanton and Green and made extensive improvements, sinking a new slope on the Black Mine Vein and a coal shaft 130 feet deep to the same vein. Oliver continued mining to 1844, when he was sold out by the sheriff.
M. O. Heilener and F. Heilener purchased the colliery at sheriff sale and operated it to 1847, when they were succeeded by the landowners, John Wood and Thomas Wood, who held the colliery only one year to 1848.
During that year, a shaft was sunk 24 feet to the water level in the Tunnel Vein.
Patrick Fogarty succeeded the Wood brothers in 1848 and operated the colliery to 1850, when a partnership was formed and mining continued under the firm of Fogarty and Fregs to 1853. It was succeeded by Richard Jones & Company, which continued mining to its abandonment in 1857,
The slope on the Black Mine Vein reached a depth of 720 feet and operated on four levels. The Black Mine Vein was irregular and faulty in places. The Tunnel Vein was not as large, but was more persistent in good coal. All the gangways were driven to their boundaries at the land lines by 1857.
The first record available of shipments was made in 1840, when 1,443 tons were shipped. The shipment in 1850 had increased to 18,420 tons.
The total shipment from the Westwood Colliery was 237,800 tons of coal.
Richard Jones & Company invested $25,000 in the colliery in 1853.
_______________________________________________
Article by Frank Blase, Historian, Reading Anthracite Company Historical Library, Pottsville Republican & Herald, August 8 – 9, 1998.
Corrections and additional information should be added as comments to this post.