Coal in Seattle

John Ross and OJ Humphrey Sr seem to me to be such opposite men. And yet, it turns out they both had links to the coal business in Seattle. Coal was (of course) one of the first drivers of industry in Seattle. Everyone needed it and Seattle had it -- but had no reliable way to get it from the hinterlands to the "port" (such as it was) of Seattle. One of the biggest lodes was found at Newcastle, which I think is near Renton. I know from Aunt Ida's oral history that John Ross has a claim out there.  And I know from the same history that he was irked by the development of it and sold it. But then I found this, in Frederic James Grant's History of Seattle:

“A company to mine the coal (in Newcastle, outside of Seattle) was formed in 1866. It was called the Lake Washington Coal company, with P. H. Lewis, Daniel Bagley, Josiah Settle, John Ross, Rev. Geo. F. Whitworth and Seleucius Garfielde as incorporators. Garfielde was a resident of Olympia, and as a man of public influence, surveyor general at the time, was of much service in giving prestige and influence to the enterprise. Owing to a disagreement Lewis and Ross withdrew from the company and the prosecution of the work fell upon the others—Bagley, Settle and Whitworth.”

And this (Spencer and Alla, take note) is what makes this sort of history such fun.  Here is Aunt Ida's account....

"Father had a certain amount of work to do on his homestead (the one at Newcastle, not Ballard) to be able to prove up on it.  He cleared about five acres in the bottom land; the land was very rich. Then came trouble for him again, trouble that most pioneers had more or less of, for the country was moving along and developing and my father was not as I said before progressive along such lines. So here meant trouble for him.  The mines at Newcastle wanted a railroad built to the coal mines for shipping out their product and they wanted a right of way through Father's cleared 5 acres. That seemed to be the most feasible route and they had gotten the road built up to his land and there they had to stop or thought they did. He wouldn't give them the right of way, nor could he stay upon the land and keep them off all the time. He had to get back to his work at (Yesler's) mill. So while he was away they crossed his land right through his clearing. Back we all went for his summer work and found the coal train running through and what do you think he did? His rifle went with him, of course. He chopped down big trees and felled them across the tracks. Of course, that wrecked their night running trains and they would clear their track  only to have him block it again and again. At last they compromised and paid him something. Finally, they bought his homestead site and opened up coal mines on it."

So I assume that Ida's account was after he withdrew from the Lake Washington Coal Company, but I'm not sure. Anyway, it's interesting to hear both histories. And it reinforces my notion that John Ross was definitely not a businessman!  I still have to figure out OJH's coal connection....it just lists him some time in the 1910s as president of a coal company.