attenuated condition, if not total absence, of many of the Paleozic rock-groups usually found between No. V and the coal measures, has brought about a proximity of the raw materials required in the manufacture of pig iron, upon which much of the success of the Birmingham district is founded. Indeed, this condition of affairs is unique; for, while geologically the same condition may exist in many other places in the State, the same important development of the economic strata can hardly be carried far out of the district described. For instance. East Red mountain ore group has a thickness of twenty-two feet for a few miles south of Birmingham, but no such development is found to the north or south of this area.”

The red iron ore is also extensively mined on the west side of Murphrees valley, along the western border of the Coosa valley above Springville, and at Attalla, near the base of Lookout mountain, and along the eastern part of Lookout mountain, at intervals up to Round mountain.

The deposits of brown iron ore in Alabama are also very large and rich, and constitute some of the most valuable properties in the State. This ore is mined extensively in Shelby, Talladega, Calhoun and Cherokee counties; in the Cahaba valley, near Brierfield; in Roups and Jones valley, near Woodstock, and again at points near Tannehill station; in Murphrees valley, in Blount county, above Oneonta, and in Wills valley, between Attalla and the Georgia line.*

ores.

Most of the furnace companies own large bodies of ore Jands, but there is no prospect of anything like a monopoly of There is a large area of desirable ore properties still on the market at from $25.00 to $200.00 per acre. Several furnace concerns buy all their ore, preferring to pay a little more for their supplies and save the large interest charge that necessarily attaches to extensive holdings of land.

Valuable deposits of this ore are found in many other places in the State, but its mining is done principally at the points named.

For the occurrence of iron ore in the several counties or near the several cities of the State, see parts Eighth and Ninth, ante.

COOSA VALLEY.

ANALYSES OF ALABAMA SILURIAN ORES.(DOLOMITE) LIMONITES.

57.97 59.02 59.06 57.71 48 45' 47.69 51.55 60.00 50.53 53.79 45 95 55 20 56.19 54.28 48 25

56.10 51.96) 55.05 57.91 61.27 50.07 58.89 51.43, 58.821 59.15 52.55 58 01 50 68 58.75' 59.00. 40.24

ANALYSES OF ALABAMA SILURIAN ORES.-(CLINTON) FOSSILIFEROUS RED HEMATITES.

8.16
451

6.80 12.09 10.24 4.40

6.41 6.07

Combined water..
Siliceous matter..
Ferric oxide.
Alumina.
Manganese oxide

Lime

3.23 9.23 17.47 34.74-23.48 12.32 47.86 78.28 80.05 81.18 82.39 66.68 61 20 47.64 30.89 76 54 44.00

0.76

0.22 1.34 0.71

5.53

9.40 14.08
0.34

2.35

197

Metallic iron...

54.80 56.04 56.82 57.67 48.28 42.84 33.35' 35.63 53.60 30.80

Cost of Making Pig Iron in Alabama. It is conceded that Alabama can manufacture pig iron at the lowest possible cost and at figures which enable the State to sell at a profit in nearly all the principal markets of the Union. The chief saving of the Alabama iron master, as against northern furnaces, is in the cost of his ores, while even as against his southern competitors, whose ores at some points come to them almost as cheap, he has the advantage of cheaper coke. It is an acknowledged fact that the materials which enter into the manufacture of pig iron may be collected in the iron districts of Alabama at a less aggregate cost than in any other portion of the United States. This is a consequence partly of geological conditions that make the original cost of individual materials low, and, possibly, in larger measure still, of the exceptional proximity of coal and limestone † to iron ore.

Prof. N. S. Shaler, geologist of Harvard University, in a recent, paper says:

66

The peculiar ease with which the southern irons are mined is in good part due to their geologic conditions. They are generally in the form of true beds which once were limestones, and have been converted by percolating waters containing iron in a dissolved form into iron ores; being beds of this origin, the deposits are more continuous than those of other nature, such as those about Lake Superior, where the ore occurs in much more irregular deposits. Moreover, the southern country was not occupied by the glaciers of the last

See Part Fifteenth, The Coal and Coal Mines of Alabama.

For the occurrence of limestone in the State, see "Sketch of the Geology of Alabama," pages 387-422, ante. Limestone in abundance is found in immediate proximity to the iron ores in the State, and is very cheaply quarried.

ice period; thus the soft oxidized ores were not worn away, as has generally been the case in the glaciated fields, nor have the outcrops been hidden by the deep accumulations of drift materials which are so common in northern districts. In part, also, their advantageous conditions are due to the fact that the southern climate permits work to be carried on in open pits throughout the year."

The following estimate of the cost of making pig iron in the Birmingham (Alabama) district is from a reliable source:

214 tons iron ore at $1 05 per ton..
11⁄2 tons coke at $2 25 per ton...

34 ton of limestone at 672 cents per ton
Add labor at furnace

Total cost of making pig iron

$2 3614

3 372

59%

2.00

88 32% per ton.

.82c. per ton.

.80c. per ton.

45c. per ton.

422c. per ton.

Cost of mining ore for all labor f. o. b. mine.. Cost of mining coal for all labor f. o. b. mine.. Cost of making coke for all labor f. o. b. ovens. Cost of quarrying limestone for all labor f. 9. b. quarry Labor.-The mineral industries of Alabama have drawn their unskilled labor mainly from the plantations of this and adjacent States, though at present convicts are worked to some extent in mines and quarries. Skilled labor has come from the northern manufacturing centres. The former is, even within the observation of a hurried visitor, abundant; the latter quite sufficient in quantity for all ordinary demands.

In soft red ore miners are paid from 25 to 40 cents per ton; in hard ore, 40 to 60 cents; in coal, 40 to 65 cents. Brown ore is dug at the price of earth excavation, $1 and $1.25 per day. The common furnace laborers are paid the same daily wages. The rolling mills pay Pittsburg prices; the shops and foundries much the same rates that obtain throughout the United States.

There has been very little disturbance of labor in Alabama. Probably in no other manufacturing region of the United States are relations between employer and employe so generally satisfactory.

Steel Manufacture in Alabama.-It is universally recognized that the most pregnant problem for Alabama is the practicability of making steel of the native pig iron. As yet but one venture has been made in this line. In 1887, a small and cheap experimental plant was built at Birmingham to

The Henderson Steel Company's plant.