Bluefield Daily Telegraph McDowell Co. WV JOHN COOPER OPENS UP RR GATEWAY TO McDOWELL Today, of course, only the N &S Railroad operates in McDowell Co., WV, and, in fact, N & S owns at least a third of McDowell County. Beore the turn of the century (1900's), however, there existed a McDowell without the NW/NS. Others graded beds, lay rails, and opened tunnels that N&W would eventually incorporate into its system. The man most responsible for opening up McDowell County to railroads and coal mines was John Cooper. John Cooper, a British immigrant from a coal-mining family, was mining coal in Fayette County when the Panic of 1873 struck. The Panic greatly depressed the coal market and Cooper suffered financially until the early 1880's, when he learned of a land full of coal to the south. He became one of the first operators in the Pocahontas Coal Field, which, having a 13-foot seam, was one of the richest in the world. With no railroad nearby, Cooper and his first employees carried their tools and implements over Flat Top Mountain from Pocahontas, where the South West Improvement Company had first tapped into the seam in 1883. Beginning with one mule and a borrowed harness, as a fellow operator remembered later, Cooper's Mill Creek Coal and Coke Company shipped its first coal on the N & W in November of 1884, making his Mercer County operation the first mine in West Virginia in the Pocahontas Coalfield (Richard Fauss). In 1884 Mill Creek shipped 2, 368 tons of smokeless coal. By 1990 Cooper sold nearly 200,000 tons from one tipple alone. He added the Coaldale and McDowell Coal Companies to his rapidly expanding empire, and by 1886 he ran three tipples and 260 coke ovens. The Mill Creek and Caswell mines opened in 1884, the Booth-Bowen Mine in 1886, and the Goodwill Mine in 1887. So far as McDowell County is concerned, it is the Mill Creek Mine that was the most significant. Cooper drove the The main entryway for this mine straight through Flat Top Mountain, and it eventually became the main line of the N & W when it was completed in 1887. This entryway, opened by Cooper, became the Gateway to the Pocahontas coalfield in McDowell County when the N & W completed an extension----Elkhorn Tunnel--and thus opened McDowell County for development of its Pocahontas coalfield. Bluefield Daily Telegraph August 31, 1987 JOHN COOPER OPENS UP RR GATEWAY TO McDOWELL Today, of course, only the N &S Railroad operates in McDowell Co., WV, and, in fact, N & S owns at least a third of McDowell County. Before the turn of the century (1900's), however, there existed a McDowell without the NW/NS. Others graded beds, lay rails, and opened tunnels that N&W would eventually incorporate into its system. The man most responsible for opening up McDowell County to railroads and coal mines was John Cooper. John Cooper, a British immigrant from a coal-mining family, was mining coal in Fayette County when the Panic of 1873 struck. The Panic greatly depressed the coal market and Cooper suffered financially until the early 1880's, when he learned of a land full of coal to the south. He became one of the first operators in the Pocahontas Coal Field, which, having a 13-foot seam, was one of the richest in the world. With no railroad nearby, Cooper and his first employees carried their tools and implements over Flat Top Mountain from Pocahontas, where the South West Improvement Company had first tapped into the seam in 1883. Beginning with one mule and a borrowed harness, as a fellow operator remembered later, Cooper's Mill Creek Coal and Coke Company shipped its first coal on the N & W in November of 1884, making his Mercer County operation the first mine in West Virginia in the Pocahontas Coalfield (Richard Fauss). In 1884 Mill Creek shipped 2, 368 tons of smokeless coal. By 1990 Cooper sold nearly 200,000 tons from one tipple alone. He added the Coaldale and McDowell Coal Companies to his rapidly expanding empire, and by 1886 he ran three tipples and 260 coke ovens. The Mill Creek and Caswell mines opened in 1884, the Booth-Bowen Mine in 1886, and the Goodwill Mine in 1887. So far as McDowell County is concerned, it is the Mill Creek Mine that was the most significant. Cooper drove the The main entryway for this mine straight through Flat Top Mountain, and it eventually became the main line of the N & W when it was completed in 1887. This entryway, opened by Cooper, became the Gateway to the Pocahontas coalfield in McDowell County when the N & W completed an extension----Elkhorn Tunnel--and thus opened McDowell County for development of its Pocahontas coalfield. Bluefield Daily Telegraph August 31, 1987 JOHN COOPER OPENS UP RR GATEWAY TO McDOWELL Today, of course, only the N &S Railroad operates in McDowell Co., WV, and, in fact, N & S owns at least a third of McDowell County. Beore the turn of the century (1900's), however, there existed a McDowell without the NW/NS. Others graded beds, lay rails, and opened tunnels that N&W would eventually incorporate into its system. The man most responsible for opening up McDowell County to railroads and coal mines was John Cooper. John Cooper, a British immigrant from a coal-mining family, was mining coal in Fayette County when the Panic of 1873 struck. The Panic greatly depressed the coal market and Cooper suffered financially until the early 1880's, when he learned of a land full of coal to the south. He became one of the first operators in the Pocahontas Coal Field, which, having a 13-foot seam, was one of the richest in the world. With no railroad nearby, Cooper and his first employees carried their tools and implements over Flat Top Mountain from Pocahontas, where the South West Improvement Company had first tapped into the seam in 1883. Beginning with one mule and a borrowed harness, as a fellow operator remembered later, Cooper's Mill Creek Coal and Coke Company shipped its first coal on the N & W in November of 1884, making his Mercer County operation the first mine in West Virginia in the Pocahontas Coalfield (Richard Fauss). In 1884 Mill Creek shipped 2, 368 tons of smokeless coal. By 1990 Cooper sold nearly 200,000 tons from one tipple alone. He added the Coaldale and McDowell Coal Companies to his rapidly expanding empire, and by 1886 he ran three tipples and 260 coke ovens. The Mill Creek and Caswell mines opened in 1884, the Booth-Bowen Mine in 1886, and the Goodwill Mine in 1887. So far as McDowell County is concerned, it is the Mill Creek Mine that was the most significant. Cooper drove the The main entryway for this mine straight through Flat Top Mountain, and it eventually became the main line of the N & W when it was completed in 1887. This entryway, opened by Cooper, became the Gateway to the Pocahontas coalfield in McDowell County when the N & W completed an extension----Elkhorn Tunnel--and thus opened McDowell County for development of its Pocahontas coalfield. Bluefield Daily Telegraph August 31, 1987