Mine Index 6373 Illinois Coal Mining Company, Illinois Mine

Mine Index Number: 6373

Company Name:	Illinois Coal Mining Company
Mine Name:	Illinois Mine
Start Date:	1885	End Date:	1899
Type of Mine:	Underground
Total acres shown:	None
Production Indicated Acres:	12	General Area of mining acres shown:

Shaft, Slope, Drift or Tipple Location(s)

Type	County	Township-Range	Section	Part Section

Main shaft

McLean

23N 2E

6

NW SE The location is deduced from various text descriptions, and is designated on the accompanying map by an uncertain location point symbol. The descriptions from the Coal Reports were: “one mile west of town”, “one mile west of Union Depot in Bloomington”, “halfway between the Chicago and Alton and the Big Four Railroads.”

Geology

		Thickness (ft)
Seam	Depth (ft)	Min	Max	Ave	Mining Method

Springfield

287-289

3.67

LW

Colchester

372-400

4.0

LW

Geological Problems Reported

While sinking the shaft, 10 feet of water-saturated sand was encountered 50 feet below the surface. The sand dipped and was difficult to get through. The upper seam had a poor roof and was of lower quality coal than the lower seam, which was developed when the mine was re-opened in 1897. The lower seam (Colchester Coal) had a good black shale roof.

Production

Company

Mine Name

Date

Production (tons)

Bloomington Co-operative Coal Company (add)	Bloomington (add)	1885-1887	17,300

Illinois Coal Mining Company (add)	Illinois (add)	1898-1899 The mine had been abandoned in 1887 because of inadequate financial resources to invest in the machinery needed to make the mine efficient. The shaft was deepened to the Colchester Coal in 1898 and both seams were mined. The mine was economically viable, and suspicions were voiced in the 1899 Coal Report that the McLean County Coal Company bought the mine to shut it down in order to remove competition.	25,000

Total Production: 42,300

Production Notes

Coal Report production (if available)

Sources of Data

Source Map

Map Date

Original Scale

Digitized Scale

Map Type

Coal Reports

1885,1898

(text only)

1:24000 The mine location was plotted on a 1:24000 USGS topographic map from the mine location description and digitized.

Secondary source

Annotated Bibliography (Data source - brief description of information)

Coal Reports - Production, ownership, years of operation, seam, depth, thickness, mining method, geologic problems, shaft location.

Directory of Illinois Coal Mines (McLean County) - Mine names, mine index, ownership, years of operation.

Mine notes (McLean County) - Mine type, shaft location, geologic problems.