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In Harrison and Marion counties, where the greatest development has taken place and where most of the immigrants are found, the proportion of different races to the total number employed is about as follows:

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Per cent of total operating forces.

46. 7

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English-speaking and German..

Southeastern European races not specified..

3.8 21.6

6.3

6. 2

6.4

4.3

2.0

2.7

For the purpose of gaining a clearer conception of the history of immigration to this district and the resultant changes in the races of immigrants employed, a detailed account of immigration to a representative locality will be valuable. With this object in view a typical community has been selected which will be designated as Community Number 1. This locality, which is little more than a mining camp, is situated in Marion County, in the heart of the soft coal region of northern West Virginia." It is on the line of a traction company, about 6 miles from the county seat of the county in which it is located. A trunk line railroad also has a spur running out to the town. The 4 mines and coke ovens constitute its sole industries. The output of the 4 mines is between 3,000 and 4,000 tons per day.

The racial composition of the town's population is constantly changing, as the population itself constantly fluctuates. There is a large class of what may be termed floating labor, which greatly outnumbers the men with families who are more likely to remain in the community. This fact renders it almost impossible to give an accurate or clear account of the coming of each race to the community by periods. Moreover, the increases or decreases in the population all depend upon the amount of work available at different times in the mines.

The history of immigration to the community, however, is largely identical with the history of the development of the coal business in the locality. For this reason, and from the fact, as stated above, that it would be impracticable to take up the history of each race separately, it has been thought best to give a general account of the coal-mining industry in the community. A conception of the immigration question, as locally applicable, can be made clearer in this way than by taking up the history of each race independently.

Čoal mines were first opened in the community in the year 1890. At that time the production of coal in West Virginia was small as compared with that of the present time. The total output from the State in 1889 was only 4,663,859 tons. Competition was very keen, and for the first two years of their operation the local mines were able to secure sufficient native labor to handle their limited output of about 400 tons a day. The production of coal in West Virginia rapidly assumed noteworthy proportions, however, and West Virginia coal

a In 1907 Marion County stood fourth in point of coal production among the counties of West Virginia.

soon established itself in the commercial world. By 1892 the output for the State had reached 7,777,570 tons, and in 1897 had increased to 11,705,829. A very active demand had been created, and the operators in Community No. 1 as early as 1892 found themselves facing an insufficiency of labor supply.

To increase their producing ability, the operators first attempted the introduction of negro labor. In 1892 two carloads of negroes were brought in from North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia. These proved unsatisfactory. Recourse was next had to Italian labor, and during 1893 and 1894 many of that race were secured from New York. The Italians were found quite satisfactory as workmen, but it soon became necessary to employ more men. About 200 Slavs and Poles were consequently brought in from New York through labor agencies.

In 1894 occurred the great soft coal strike. The West Virginia fields were affected in common with the rest. The controversy was quickly settled at the mines in Community Number 1. The strikers were unsuccessful, and within a few days the district was definitely made nonunion, and is so maintained at present. Practically all of the employees soon went back to work and it was unnecessary to import strike-breakers. Shortly afterwards, however, large numbers of American miners began to go out to the union districts of Pennsylvania and Ohio, where the strike had been successful. To meet this second great deficit in the labor supply, the local mines were forced to seek foreign labor in earnest. Large numbers of immigrants, seemingly without distinction or preference of race, were brought in through labor agencies in 1894. From that time forward the employment of immigrant labor became a fixed policy. In December, 1907, there occurred an explosion in which a large number of men were killed. The whole energies of the company affected were concentrated upon the damaged mines with the object of reopening them as soon as possible. Within two months the mines had been cleared and were ready for operation. Full time was guaranteed for their operation, and forces were largely drawn away from the other shafts and concentrated in them. There was no lack of men. Attracted by the guarantee of full time, more than 150 Croatians, Magyars, and Austrians came in from the Ohio and Pennsylvania fields. A great many Poles who had been in the town previously also returned. At that time work was difficult to obtain elsewhere and these miners gladly availed themselves of this opportunity.

This, in brief, is the history of immigration to the locality. The races which have secured work may be seen at a glance from the tables following showing the racial classification of employees in the local mines in the years 1907, 1908, and 1909. The series of three tables will also exhibit the changes in racial composition of the forces from year to year.

• From the Annual Reports of the Chief Mine Inspector of West Virginia. Racial designations are confused, but are sufficient to indicate the racial composition of the operating forces.

TABLE 472.-Number of inside and outside employees in Community No. 1, by race, 1907.

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TABLE 473.-Number of employees in Community No. 1, by race, July 1, 1908, and May 1,

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As regards the total population of the community by race, the following table based upon careful estimates is submitted. In addition to an estimate of the total population, the effort was made to secure the number of boarders and families of the immigrant races in order to show the transitory character of a large element of the population. In this connection it will be noted that the floating element designated as boarders constitutes about one-fourth of the whole. It also should be borne in mind that the town has only been in existence since the year 1889.

TABLE 474.-Estimated population of Community No. 1, by race, 1909.

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NEW AND KANAWHA RIVERS DISTRICT.

The New and Kanawha rivers coal field is situated in the south central part of West Virginia, reached by the Cincinnati and Ohio Railroad and its many branches. The Virginian Railway also taps this field and connects it with the eastern coast, and the Kanawha and Michigan Railroad affords an outlet to the Lakes.

This field ranks second in point of production of the four fields under discussion. Until the year 1906, with the exception of 1902, when its output was greatly reduced by a severe strike, it was first in point of production. After the settlement of the strike it again took the lead, and did not relinquish it until 1906, since which year the Pocahontas field has had first place. For several years prior to 1888 the production of the New and Kanawha rivers field was more than the combined production of the other three. This field includes Clay, Fayette, Kanawha, Nicholas, Putnam, and Raleigh counties. For the purposes of this report only the three counties, Fayette, Kanawha, and Raleigh will be considered, as they produce 96 per cent of the coal of the area and employ 95 per cent of all men working at mines, together with all immigrant mine workers. The conditions in three counties under discussion vary considerably in some features, Fayette and Raleigh counties constituting what is popularly known as the New River Field.

Small numbers of immigrants have been employed in both Fayette and Kanawha counties since 1897, but they were very few and confined only to certain mines and one locality until 1902. In 1893 one company, operating at Glen Jean, brought in a small force of Magyars and Slovaks from the mines of Pennsylvania, and since that time these races have been employed at that mine. Many of those originally introduced are still in the employment of the company, and others have come in from time to time. About 100 men were brought in during 1893, almost equally divided between the two races above mentioned, and including from 15 to 20 families. At this time the field was thoroughly unionized, and through the efforts of the miners' union immigration was checked, and no immigrants entered the other mines in the vicinity. About this same time a few were employed in several mines in Kanawha County, but they were men who had drifted in, were scattered about, and were not in sufficient numbers to have an influence on any mine, or to cause more to come.

In the year 1902 there was a very severe strike which greatly reduced the output of the field, as a majority of the mines were closed for a considerable period. This strike occurred at the time of the anthracite strike in Pennsylvania and owing to the unsettled conditions of labor generally prevailing in the coal-mining regions coal was commanding a very high price. The operators, after being convinced that the union would not agree to their terms, began to bring in men to break the strike. Any man who was willing to work in or about the mines was employed, and great numbers of immigrants, as well as Americans from the North and negroes from Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, were induced to come. These men were secured principally by agents of the companies, who visited the industrial and mining districts of the North and the towns in

agricultural sections of the southern States above mentioned. By means of regularly organized labor agents a large number of immigrants were also secured. In parts of the Kanawha field the strike was settled without resorting to strike-breakers, and this section is still unionized.

The operators, by using the methods above mentioned, were successful throughout the New River field and in one part of the Kanawha. Consequently the mines resumed operations and have never recognized labor organizations. During all this strike period the mining company which had introduced the immigrant labor some years before operated steadily with two shifts, and was the only mine in the section which was not closed during the strike.

In addition to the fact that the strike marked the entrance of the southern and eastern Europeans into the field, it also seriously affected the production of coal. The production in 1902 in this field was 1,337,769 tons less than the year preceding, and if the future growth of the field and the increase shown by other fields not affected may be used as an indication, these figures are not more than onehalf the actual loss in production.

After the strike was broken a great many American miners of the better class began to leave the field and go to the organized coal districts of the Middle West. This action on the part of old employees continued for several months after the mines had resumed operations, and left a vacancy which had to be filled. Those of the strike breakers, therefore, who could be induced to stay, were prevailed upon to do so, and to these many more have since been added. The demand for men was made much greater by the growth of the field both in output of mines already in operation and in new ones opened, and since the period of the strike the influx of immigrants from continental Europe, and of negroes from Virginia and North and South Carolina has been constant.

Owing to the fact that a large number of the immigrants coming to this field were secured from labor agencies and "brought in on transportation" and to the further fact that the supply of laborers has always been inadequate, very little preference has been shown for certain races, and a great number of races are represented in the field. There are a few races, however, which have been employed throughout the period, are more numerous and stable than the rest, and seem to be the races from which will come the greater part of the future immigration for the development of the field. These races are discussed below in some detail.

Magyars and Slovaks.-Although not kindred races and rarely found socially commingling, the Magyars and Slovaks are treated together, because the history of one is, with the possible exception of some minor details, the history of both. Both races entered the field at the same time and have been important factors in its recent development. As stated before, the first members of these races to come to this field came in 1892 and 1893 from Pennsylvania. Owing to the fact that all the other mines in the locality were organized they were confined to this one plant. Although occasionally members of these races left either to go to other fields or to return to their native land, the force was constantly replenished by the advent of friends from Europe and from other sections of the United

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