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October 2, 2013

Scavenger Hunt Challenge #1

Filed under: Uncategorized @ 10:39 pm

So in starting this scavenger hunt I first tried using the Yahoo Search Engine. I typed in “Early 20th Century Coal Mines in Virginia” and the results that came up were primarily for coal mines in West Virginia (very frustrating)! I then went to Google and entered same search parameters; I received much better results. Entries for wikipedia were the ranked one, two, and three and were mainly about the history of the coal industry.

The fifth result was titled “A Guide to the Bond Coal Company Ledger, 1905-1913; #1097978” (ead.lib.virginia.edu/vivaead/published/lva/vi01752.xml.frameā€Ž) It is part of the Library of Virginia Collection and is found on the Virginia Heritage, Guide to Manuscript and Archival Collection in Virginia website. The scope and content of the this document per the website is “Ledger, 1905-1913, of Bond Coal Company records the individual accounts of customers and the company’s controlling accounts. Each account includes the name of customer and the name of city and state where the customer was located. The accounts list transactions in chronological order, amount owed, amount paid, and form of payment. Most entries contain the general term “by invoice.” The store’s controlling accounts include an expense account, construction account, repairs account, stable expense account, mine supplies account, etc. Numerous pages record transactions between Bond Coal and Company next hit and Bruce previous Coal and Coke Company next hit. The ledger includes an index that lists the names of customers in alphabetical order and the page number where their accounts can be found.”

Result number seven was for “Virginia Iron, Coal & Coke Company Records AC 001s” (http://lib.radford.edu/archives/findingaids/VICC-records.htm) and is part of the McConnell Library Archives and Special Collections found on Radford Library page.

Scrolling through the next few pages of Google’s search results, I could not find a likely third coal company operating in Virginia during the early 20th Century. So I went back to the Virginia Heritage website and conducted a basic search on coal companies. I received 128 hits! As the scavenger hunt asked me to find records for early 20th century companies I chose “A GUIDE TO THE CLINCH RIVER COAL COMPANY PAYROLL LEDGER, 1910-1912. A COLLECTION IN THE LIBRARY OF VIRGINIA BARCODE NUMBER 1129986” (http://ead.lib.virginia.edu/vivaxtf/view?docId=lva/vi01524.xml;query=coal%20companies;brand=default#scopecontent_1.1) Scope and content of the document as per the aformentioned webesite is “Payroll ledger, 1910-1912, of Clinch River previous Coal Company next hit records the daily earnings and deductions of employees. Entries record the name of employee; the number of hours worked or tons hauled per day; the number of deductions; totals for the month; rate of pay; total earnings; deductions for purchases at company store, rent, services of previous company physician, insurance, coal smithing, powder, and cash advances; total of worker’s earnings; total of deductions taken from employee’s pay; and balance due employee or to the company.”

I liked how this site listed the results much like Google: title, number of hits, etc. It was also remarkable too me how by using Google’s search engine it led me to a a website with its own search functions that resulted in 128 hits that I could parse through to find the detailed information I was looking for.

1 Comment

  1.   Erin Bush — October 3, 2013 @ 9:52 am    Reply

    Nicely done!

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