By Aurora Charlow, recent MS graduate of Simmons University, Metadata Assistant at Ohio University Libraries during the 2023-2024 academic year.

In its heyday, from about 1880 to 1920, mines in the Hocking Valley Coal Field produced hundreds of thousands of tons of coal every year. It was pried from the ground, processed through mining tipples, and dropped into waiting freight trains, which would carry it along hundreds of miles of winding track for sale and distribution. In the Hocking Valley, coal was sourced from dozens of independently owned coal mines employing thousands of miners. For these communities, life very literally depended on coal. 

Series II of the Frank Buhla collection captures this reality in beautiful detail. The series comprises over 250 black-and-white photographic copyprints, newly described at the item level to include 182 individual subjects and 290 unique names. This work was made possible by a Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) Metadata Mini-grant offered by the State Library of Ohio in conjunction with the Ohio Digital Network. The collection can be accessed digitally here.

Contained within this collection are many images of the coal mines, the railroads that connected them, and the people who worked in and around them. Having worked exclusively within the Buhla Collection for the last eight months, I would now like to take the time to highlight some of the images that had the most individual impact on me. These images were chosen for their potential to reflect some of the most important themes within the Buhla Collection, and for my belief that they may inspire continued collection research. I conclude with some personal reflections of my time spent working with the collection.

Placing Mines on the Map

Out of all the coal mines pictured within the Buhla collection, I have chosen to highlight what I know of the mine known as Trail Run No. 1. I do so, in part, to emphasize how complex and difficult it is to trace the history of these mines, but also to show how rewarding this research can be.

 

Trail Run No. 1 is one of the few mines pictured in the Buhla collection that is not officially located in the Hocking Valley Coal Field. It is located miles to the North, in Guernsey County, just Southeast of Byesville. 

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources assigns each known mine a unique code using county abbreviations and numbers — Trail Run No. 1 is GY-049. Coming to this conclusion was not a simple matter, however, because if you were to refer to the ODNR’s publicly available map of abandoned coal mines, GY-049 appears nameless, and its operator is listed as James W. Ellsworth & Co., not the Cambridge Collieries Company, as the photograph clearly shows. 

This situation is not unique. The management of Ohio’s coal mines doesn’t lend itself well to simple one-owner classifications. Often, mining companies did not own the land they were mining. Instead, mine owners and managers approached land-owners and acquired leases to mine the land in specific places for a period of years in return for either regular rent, or a share of earned profits. As a result, land deeds cannot always be used to accurately place coal mines. It was also typical for mining leases to transfer frequently between companies. Mines remaining under the same ownership for the duration of their use was comparatively rarer, so when the ODNR map lists one operator, it helps to remain aware that this is almost never the full story.

Mines could and often were referred to by a wide variety of nicknames. What one group of miners called the mine they worked in might not have been the same as what the next group called the same mine under a different lease, or maybe the mine’s real name had been shortened to form a nickname, but there were no written records, and so on and so forth.  

So, how did I eventually reach the conclusion that GY-049 was referring to Trail Run No. 1 without a matching operator name, town name, or mine name? In this case, I confirmed the mine code by referring to a digitized report published by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources in 1980, Abandoned Subsurface Coal Mines as a Source of Water for Coal Conversion in Eastern Ohio. Page 4 of the report features a map of coal mines in Southern Guernsey, with Trail Run Nos. 1 and 2 jointly labeled as 49. Still, questions remained. I wanted to be sure that the 1980 mine classification system had not notably changed in the last forty years, and I wondered about the named operators of the mine. 

In researching the name of the mine, I came across the blog post of a Guernsey County local and history and genealogy enthusiast, Betty Shinn. Ms. Shinn had written a post about the Guernsey County mines, including Trail Run No. 1. She included in her sourcing and directly transcribed passages from the 1943 book, Stories of Guernsey County, Ohio: History of an Average Ohio County by William G. Wolfe. These quotes revealed that the village of Robins, outside of Byesville, had once been known as Trail Run. 

As for the operators, James W. Ellsworth & Co., quotes from the same book list James W. Ellsworth as being among the incorporators of the Cambridge Colliery Company. Unfortunately, whether the corporate name of the Cambridge Colliery Company was actually James W. Ellsworth & Co., or whether the name is an earlier or later version of the company remains unclear. 

As an interesting aside, James. W. Ellsworth had widespread reach in the coal mining industry, and eventually expanded his business into Pennsylvania, where he founded the town of Ellsworth. His papers are held by the Chicago Public Library. 

Each coal mine recorded in the Buhla collection has an equal or more complex story, and placing these mines is the first critical step to understanding the lives of the men who worked within them and the communities that depended on them. It is my hope that future researchers will take up the challenge of understanding more about the circumstances surrounding the mines, and will follow the breadcrumbs as far as they can to further expand our knowledge of these areas. 

The Long Reach of the Railroads

The intricate, interconnected railroad system allowing for the transport of coal across Ohio is another fascinating aspect to coal mining. After coal was mined it had to reach an ultimate destination, and although this was originally accomplished in the Hocking Valley with canals, freight trains eventually proved to be the easiest, most efficient option. 

In the late 19th and early 20th century, hundreds of separate railroad companies emerged to transport freight across Ohio. More locally based railroads included the Kanawha & Michigan Railway Company and the Toledo and Ohio Central Railway, both of which appear numerous times within the Buhla collection. An immediately noticeable detail in the mine tipple photographs are railroad tracks leading through the loading areas of even the roughest looking tipples, a recurring affirmation of the railroad’s central importance to regional commerce. 

Railroad companies follow similarly confusing patterns as mine owners and operators. Lines, from their creation, would expand and merge with other lines. Railroad companies changed names and owners, merged with other small companies, or were absorbed by larger ones at a dizzying rate. As coal mining increased in regional importance, so too did the railroads, seen in the encroachment of the New York Central Railroad Company in the mid-20th century.

 

This photograph of a Rogers Locomotive operated by the Toledo Central Railway Company is one of the best in the collection for observing close details of locomotive and freight car design, as well as a sense of scale. The men stand beside the locomotive where it sits atop a massive railroad turntable, showing some of the impressive infrastructure required to maintain a freight railway network as comprehensive as the one connecting southeastern Ohio’s coal mines to commercial markets.  The photograph also serves as a glimpse into national industry — Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works was based out of Paterson, New Jersey, where they constructed locomotives for use around the world. 

Company Stores and Commerce

One of the most infamous facets of the industrial revolution was the lengths that factory owners went to control and retain workers. These same practices, such as providing workers with accommodations rather than encouraging them to own homes, and paying workers in scrip that was only redeemable at company stores, also appear in coal mining communities. 

In many cases, the mines and mining companies built the towns rather than the other way around. Company-built mining towns usually included hastily constructed housing, a small church, a school, and, crucially, a company store, so that miners and their families never had to venture far for supplies, and the company could effectively create self-contained economic systems. Several examples of these company stores are present within the Buhla collection, most from pre-1920. 

 

There is a detached element felt through this photo from the building itself, which may come from the store being numbered, rather than named. Although the print quality of the photo is too low to read the store number clearly, it appears to be in the double digits, emphasizing that Sunday Creek Coal Company operated dozens of these stores in the area. Although the convenience of these stores was undeniable to residents, seen from the vantage provided by the 21st century we can understand that the operation of these stores made worker advocacy and solidarity more difficult. It is harder to advocate for oneself in the workplace when that workplace is also your family’s direct source of food. 

 

It stands out, then, to find a photograph showing the opposite scenario. There is a charm captured within the interior of Ben Achauer’s Novelty Store. Mr. Achauer stands unassumingly within the crowded store, which, according to census records, he owned and ran for most of his adult life. On the shelves in this store are an array of pots, pans, kettles, and baskets. I can spot a jar of fountain pens and containers of stationery. 

While Mr. Achauer was not selling foodstuffs, which would have been essential goods at company stores, there is still an encouraging quality to the presence of sustainable small business within the Hocking Valley even at the height of the coal boom. Achauer’s census profession being recorded as “Novelty Store Owner” among a sea of coal miners serves as a brief reminder that industry, no matter how pervasive, is never the only thing that defines a community. 

Solemn Reminders within Community Images

This photograph is one I find myself thinking of frequently during off-hours. I spent a lot of time with it, researching each named person to try and link them to existing records. What stands out to me most is what an expression of joyful childhood fun has been captured here. The boys in this group, likely a scouting troupe, have dressed up in the trappings of cowboys for an event. Although they stand or sit mostly expressionless, as photographs taken using longer exposure times often demanded, their poses are playful and almost self-serious. It is easy to picture this group breaking into laughter as soon as the camera flash subsides. Most subjects in this picture are also quite young, ranging in age from under ten to around seventeen years old. 

There is another reason, however, that this photo stays in my mind. This event took place in 1911. Six years later, in April of 1917, marked the United States’ entry into World War I. The records of a significant number of these boys end with their enlistment into the U.S. Military over the next year. The photo in retrospect becomes a very tangible reminder of community loss, and one that inspires, for me, deep sadness.  

Final Reflections

As is now likely obvious, the Buhla collection encompasses such a range of subjects that it defies attempts at easy summary. The photographs I have highlighted because they spoke to me are a minor fraction of the collection. The many group portraits of miners are likely some of the most impactful material found in the collection, for instance, as they put names and faces to the men who worked daily in grueling conditions in order to support their families. The photos of mine tipples are also fascinating, showcasing a diverse range of structures in these ingenious buildings, which used internal screens to sort coal by size using gravity before they were loaded onto freight cars. 

The Frank Buhla Collection features aerial views of towns which have long since been abandoned and reforested, community photographs of amateur actors and sports players, meetings of private societies and fraternities, as well as over one hundred photographs of Ohio’s covered bridges, many of which no longer exist. The story told by the Buhla Collection is incomplete, and shared in glimpses, as all photographs are, but in those glimpses is a picture of extraordinary industrial accomplishment and the rich communities responsible. 

On a final, personal note, I would like to take a few lines to reflect on lessons I have learned from the Frank Buhla Collection, of a more general nature, rather than strictly archival. 

Speaking bluntly, coal kills. Its mining pockmarks the land, its burning heavily contributes to the ongoing climate emergency — it is literally dirty. Before adequate safety measures were invented, miners engaged in brutal work, hunched in spaces so tight they could not stand up straight for the duration of their shifts, victim to structural collapses, black lung, falls and explosions, and so often exploited with low wages, or worse, pay in company scrip, for the trouble. Children worked and died in these mines, as did many animals.

And yet, knowing all of this does not deter me from thinking that the photographs within the Buhla Collection are some of the most beautiful images I have ever seen. There is genius hidden within the mine shafts, carts, and tipples, and I see mechanistic beauty when I look at them. In the faces of so many of the miners I see love, the love it takes to subject one’s body to the traumas guaranteed by the mines, and still return day after day to support wives, children, parents and siblings. 

The sense of community within these photographs is overwhelming at times, seen from afar in aerial views in the design of town streets leading to churches, and up close in the expression on a child’s face as he sits on his father’s knee. 

There are lessons to be learned from the mono-industrial sprawl of the past, including what happens when the industry shrinks and leaves no work behind, as happened to so many of the towns in these photos, but to look on these records with any kind of condescension or disrespect does a disservice to history. It is my sincerest hope that future researchers will see similar beauty and potential within the Frank Buhla collection, as it certainly has many stories left to tell.