complete as it is possible to make it by an extended research into the literature of mining operations in North America:

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF PRINCIPAL COAL MINE DISASTERS IN NORTH

The first recorded accident of considerable importance, involving a loss of 179 lives, occurred at Avondale, Pa., in September, 1869. This accident brought about the organization of the present system of mine inspection in the State of Pennsylvania, and in several other important instances far-reaching improvements in mine legislation have followed the occurrence of mine disasters of exceptional magnitude. The accident causing the largest loss of life occurred on December 6, 1907, at Monongah No. 8 mine, West Virginia, where 359. lives were lost as the result of a gas and dust explosion. In the aggregate 78 disasters, each causing a loss of more than 10 lives, involved a total loss of 4,671 lives, or 12.6 per cent of the 37,020 lives officially reported as having been lost in coal-mining operations in North America during the period covered by records. The significance of accidents of this kind is easily overestimated, but they constitute a

most serious menace, not only to the employees, but to the industry as well, on account of the material destruction of mine property and the interference with normal mine production. The fact, however, remains that accidents which have attracted national attention con-titute but a relatively small proportion of the vast number of accidents due to other causes, particularly falls of coal and roof, which in 1908 were responsible for 44.1 per cent of the deaths from all causes. Mine disasters of exceptional seriousness are, however, apparently increasing. Mine disasters, large or small, require to be reported upon by qualified authority, and the widest publicity should be given to the results. While some of the mine disasters which have occurred have been reported upon in considerable detail, there is urgent need of thoroughly scientific and exhaustive reports, accompanied with the necessary maps and illustrations. A vast amount of experience which would have been decidedly suggestive of far-reaching improvement in mining methods has been irrevocably lost because of indifference to the scientific needs of the problem. Full publicity should be given to all the facts which have a direct or indirect bearing upon the occurrence of mine disasters, as well as upon mine aceidents in general, so that the true facts may become known and understood and the lesson of experience be applied toward the deliberate purpose of preventing the occurrence of such disasters and accidents, as far as this is possible.

The chronological list of coal-mining disasters may be summarized by periods, with reference to the corresponding coal production and the fatality rate per million tons of coal mined. Such a comparison brings out the material increase in risk during recent times compared with the past, and without a lengthy discussion in detail it may be stated that during the period 1869-1888 there were 624 lives lost in the coal-mine disasters referred to in the chronological list, and since 1,592,000,000 tons of coal were mined during this period, the fatality rate was 0.39 per million tons of coal mined. During the twenty year period, 1889-1908, 3,460 lives were lost in the coal mine disasters referred to in the chronological list, and during this period 5.442,000,000 tons of coal were mined. The fatality rate during this period was, therefore, 0.64 per million tons of coal mined. Comparing the rate of 0.39 for the first period with 0.64 for the last, there has, therefore, been an increase in the fatality rate of 64.1 per cent. The contrast would have been still more suggestive if only more recent periods had been considered. It is extremely significant that the frequency of disasters causing a very considerable loss of life should have materially increased during recent years, although it must be considered that the great disasters constitute only about one-eighth of the mortality from fatal accidents from all causes in coal mining.

SUMMARY.

It has been the chief object of the preceding account of coal-mining fatalities in the United States and in the Provinces of Canada to assemble in a convenient form the essential facts of past mining experience in order to emphasize the industrial and social importance of a problem which vitally concerns the welfare of some 700,000 workmen engaged in the mining of anthracite and bituminous coal. The risk factor of this industry is only approximately indicated by an average fatality rate of 3.11 per 1,000 for the twenty-year period ending with 1908, but the true degree of hazard is clearly brought out by the analysis of the returns for the several States, mining districts, and particular occupations, in some of which the fatality rate attains to almost incredible proportions. Compared with other important coal-mining countries of the world the fatality rate in North America is decidedly higher, or, for illustration, 3.13 per 1,000 for the decade ending with 1906 against 1.29 per 1,000 for the United Kingdom, 1.35 for Austria, 1.81 for France, and 2.13 for Prussia. This contrast in the fatality rate reflects seriously upon American mining methods and conditions, more or less responsible for the occurrence of accidents, which, by every standard of conservative mining, are largely though not of course entirely preventable. The analysis by causes draws attention to conditions which are clearly traceable to indifference and neglect in mining methods as well as to a general disregard of the lessons of past experience. The appalling loss of life is inadequately measured by the more than 40,000 deaths officially reported to have been caused by coal-mining accidents in North America, for in addition to these there has been a vast amount of bodily injury through accidents not immediately fatal, but many of which, unquestionably, must have diminished the normal after lifetime of mine employees by many years.

Aside from the loss of life and bodily injury, there is also the larger question of dependent survivors of mine-accident victims, including not only widows and orphans, but other members of the family. The social loss by mine accidents is unquestionably of very serious proportions, even though the direct evidence may not be obtainable from the returns of poor relief departments or other official

sources.

Aside from the question of social dependence resulting from coalmining casualties, the present inquiry brings out the needless waste of life in the mining of anthracite and bituminous coal. The average age at death of the men killed by accidents during 1908 was only 31.8 years, but some of the persons killed were mere boys, as young as 13 and 14 years, while there were also men who had passed beyond threescore and ten. The extended consideration of individual mine

accidents in the State of Illinois emphasizes the general aspects of the question of prevention which has not received the consideration required to bring about a material improvement and a reduction in the fatality rate. A single mine disaster causes the loss of a considerable number of lives and, therefore, attracts national attention, although from 1869 to 1910 the loss of life by such disasters in the aggregate represented only 12.6 per cent of the total loss of life; but the vast majority of accidents occur singly or in small groups, and thus fail to attract proper attention, even in the localities in which they occur. Heretofore most of the consideration of mineowners and managers has been toward the prevention of mine disasters, since it is these that involve not only a loss of life, but invariably a considerable destruction of mine property. The accidents due to falls of roof or coal or slate and to mine cars, as well as to the reckless or improper use of explosives and to many other causes, rarely involve a material destruction of mine property. This, however, does not fully justify the fact that such accidents receive merely incidental consideration in the reports of mine inspectors.

The problem of safety in coal mining is no doubt a much more complex and difficult one in the United States and in Canada than perhaps in any other coal mining field in the world. Within recent years the production of coal has greatly increased and new fields have been opened, regardless of the quality of the available labor supply. Economy in production and safety in operation have been of secondary consideration to the chief purpose of rapidly marketing coal in large quantities at a minimum cost of production. Mining methods are often crude, and known safety precautions are disregarded or not used at all. Child-labor laws have been, and still are, indifferently complied with in many States and a number of fatalities occur each year among children at an age when they should be in school. Foreign-born workmen, without actual experience in mining, are employed in large numbers, and through misunderstanding of orders or by reckless disregard of the necessary rules of operation, often imperil not only their own lives, but also the lives of the trained and experienced workers. In this connection it may be stated that a recent report of the United States Immigration Commission shows that at the present time the mining community in the Pennsylvania bituminous field is composed chiefly of the foreign-born who have been in the United States only a short time. Of the 37,016 individuals studied, 40.3 per cent had been in the United States less than five years, and 29 per cent less than ten years. The foreigners, moreover, were not miners abroad, but were in most instances farmers or farm laborers, nearly three-fifths belonging to the latter class in a group of 17.246 individuals selected for special study.

Regarding this showing by the Immigration Commission it was pointed out, in a mining periodical, with particular reference to the view that accidents are largely confined to those who have had no mining experience, that

Practically none of the southern Europeans had been miners. abroad. This condition undoubtedly has had its effect in enlarging the proportion of mine accidents, and the commission shows, by data drawn from State investigations and elsewhere in conjunction with its own figures for racial distribution, that accidents were probably more numerous in those regions where the inexperienced immigrants were found. (")

These conclusions are confirmed by the results of the present investigation and in particular by the analysis of the statistical data for the State of West Virginia, and the accidents in detail for the State of Illinois. The chief difficulty is not so much, apparently, the ignorance of the English language as ignorance of mining methods and the almost utter lack of discipline on the part of many of the foreign-born miners, of whom the large proportion have been in the United States only a comparatively short period of time. But lack of discipline and disregard of mining rules and regulations is not confined to the foreign-born miners, nor even to those of the more recent immigrant class. In the case of the Cherry mine disaster, causing the loss of 266 lives, the verdict of the coroner's jury was in part that "we find that they [the men who lost their lives in the third seam] came to their death by explosion and suffocation. We further find that the mining laws of the State of Illinois, in relation to means of escape, were violated, with the full knowledge and consent of the mine inspectors of District No. 2."

The true responsibility for many mining accidents is primarily the willful disregard of mine rules and regulations and failure of full compliance with the laws enacted for the safeguarding of life and limb in mining operations. The following argument in favor of the enforcement of existing laws, rather than the enactment of additional mining legislation, is from the Engineering and Mining Journal of September 8, 1906:

Every operator and mine manager should be held closely responsible for any violation of existing laws, and when found guilty should receive personal punishment. But let those who are considering this question not throw all the blame upon the management and ignore the responsibility of the employee. To point out the latter it is necessary only to call attention to the many accidents resulting from the negligence of the miner, or his willful disregard of the carefully prescribed rules intended to insure his safety.

There is a general opinion among colliery engineers that the number of mining accidents is too great and should be reduced. The

a Engineering and Mining Journal, September 3, 1910, p. 468.