THE GREAT KANAWHA AS A MINING AND MANUFACTURING REGION.
We do not propose in this connection to devote much space to the consideration of salt, oil, or iron ore separate from their connection with coal; but we wish to call especial attention to this magnificent region, which has been so long overlooked or neglected by capital and enterprise,—locked up as it were by the evil genius of the slave power.
The salines of the Great Kanawha have been celebrated and productive for a period of fifty years; and, though the brine is not so dense or satu rated with salt as the production of many of our best salines, the availa bility and cheapness of the material and means of evaporation render the economy of manufacturing more favorable than that of most salines, and, we should infer, equal to the best.
Take one instance,—which will cover all ; for the same means are avail able to all. A salt-well is bored to the salt-strata and through the upper or heavy oils, and carefully tubed to the brine. The well is then bored from 500 to 1000 feet deeper, until the gas of the second or light oils is struck, as shown by figure 000 under the head of Petroleum. Sometimes
this gas exists in such a state of tension that, on being tapped, it bursts forth with the violence of gunpowder. But this violence is soon blown off, and the gas continues to flow with considerable force, or with force enough to blow the brine up the tube and into the salt-works, and then, passing on to the fire, under the evaporating furnaces, is there used as fuel instead of coal. The gas thus pumps the brine into the tanks and evapor ates it in the kettles. With proper fixtures and mechanical arrangements, the cost of producing salt under such circumstances would be merely nominal. We cannot see how any other mode could be more economical: even if solar evaporation be used, the cost of pumping is saved.
Our remarks on the oil or petroleum of this region will be reserved for a more appropriate place in another chapter. We may state, however, that the region of gas above mentioned lies immediately over the great reser voirs of oil which have been so productive in Pennsylvania and on the Little Kanawha in this State.