This article wes reFrinted with Ferffiissisn and srigninally aFpeered in hJ|ATRIX: A Journal of the Histsry sf Minerels Copyrishted/Puhlished by the Metrix Printing Co. Volume 3o Humbers 4 and 5, Fall, 1$94 The Minerals of Frostburg

by Jay L. I.ininger

Introduction fire day has been used to describe a twined with tne mineral wealth In the farthest southwestern region day variety found in Carboniferous which occurred all around it and even of Maryland near the headwaters of rocks in association with bituminous beneath it. The mountain perch the Potomac Rivel is a manmade coal. dis6sygred It was that fire clay which is now Frostburg, can trace its landmark called the Fairfax Stone. had considerable resistance to heat, roots to the year 1800 when thtee This monument which marks an and when vitrifred produced a supe- houses were built in the area. One of early boundary settlement between rior lining for furnaces. Out on Big the first settlers was an innkeeper by Maryland and West Virginia over- Savage Mounain near the coal min- the name of Meshach Frost. Because looks a region of great natural beautv ing village of Frostburg existed an ex- of the area's natural beauty, and early economic Frost wealth- Senleri ceptionaily high deposit of fire clay. named the settlement Mount pleas- moving westward over the Alleghany Shortly after the Civil War, the min- ant. In 1812, the fortunes of Mount Mountains found the rugged hills to ing of fire clay and the manufacture Pleasant took a turn for the better be- be rich in iron ore, coal, clay, and high of fire brick was established at Frost- cause of the construction of a tum- grade sandstone. While these narural burg. Mt. Savage Fire Brick was soon pike known as the National resources lacked glamour Road. for the established as the qualiry standard for This mountain conquering road (now mineralogist, they were impofiant to industrial refractory material. U.S. Rt.40) openedup commerce the early economic growth and of the Frequently the day deposits on Big transportation between Washington, young narion. By the end of the nine- Savage Mountain were contaminated D.C., Baltimore and the expanding teenth century the region of westem westward growth through pittsburgh. Maryland had contributed heavily to 'He observed the mineral Meshach Frost prospered as his tav- industrial growth through the mining assemblage at the Frostburg *act ern became a popular stopover for and processing of pig iron, bitumi- and made particular note teamsters engaging in the transporta_ nous coal, fire brick, and glass. of The the beoutifal quarts tion of goods along the National twentieth century, however, ushered crystals Road. The location soon became in a decline oI the region's industrial found in the nodules.. lnown to travelers as "Frost,s Town," strength. While the beauty of the re- a monicker which eyolved to Frost- gion yet remains, the mining empires by nodules of red to brown colored burg. h the meantime Frost ac- that spread from Cumberland to siderite. The iron carbonate nodules, quired large tracts of land ia the vicin- Friendsville have faded from former refered to by the miners as'ore balls,' ity of his business establishment, and glory The flavor of the region today ranged in size from a half dollar to began the subdivision of parcels with might best be described in rhe words several feet in diameter. Iio the de- an eye to the development of the of Maryland author and historian light of early mineralogists, the nod- town. Gilbert Gude: ules were frequently filled with min- The commercial development of "For the fint fifty miles from the erals. Frostburg minerals, particularly Frostburg took another Fairfax Stone region dramafic up- this is a iridescent siderite and water clear turn with the discovery of coal on the Brigadoon world--a misty green val- barite, can be found in collections "Sheetz Farm," located a mile and a ley of Alleghany coal country, lum- around the world. Ln spite of the pop- half east of the village. The 1839 dis, ber towns, company coal tolvns and ularity of Frostburg minerals, little in- covery spawned a flurry of explo- ghost towns. This piece is a of Ap- formation has been published about ration aaivity throughout the Frost- palachia, and is markedly different the location. This article was prepared burg region. Soon evidence of other from the foothills and plains coastal to provide a historical perspective of mineral occurrences in the Carbonif- of the east. Here, ar its beginning the an obscure locality that has produced erous rocks of the area were uncov- river runs vigorously through many collectable mineral specimens for ered. Deposits of iron carbonate ore small rapids and falls. whereas at its more than a century. were found in proximity to the end it flows leisurely with the tides.. coal beds and in t83T a coke-fired One treasures of the of this The Early Years furnace, the first in the region, was Brigadoon world was an earth sub- Frostburg is a mining town. It,s built along the Georges Creek Valley stance known as fire clay. The term gfowth and survival have been inter- to the south, at Lonaconing. By 1840 FALL 1994 . MATRTX r 1O9 ,r,t*.ril,,.,; , .-'..,r.r.ri..;., .,-ii. -'t.,-r,"i==J.. clay deposits found on their tracts. JA$. H. rrtURDucK. C. C. r*UR$OCl(. Among the larger ones were the Union Mining Company and the & CO- Maryland Coal Company. The Savage Ill ,lTTTEDOCK a.GlriNTEr fltt A Mountain company was operating its Big Savage tract and tunnel near the lVlount Savage Fire Brick, top of the mountain when it opened its Frostburg No. 6 mine in 1906. It ,t'Nt) r.()e()tfolrlatD TrLIt, was on this tract west of town along Road, interest- Chicago Steol Locomotive Tires, Locomotive and Car Springs. the National that an ing assemblage of minerals was first Brslcsrr: Iroo Orc, Plg lrcn, *nr1:lOiirrn"Iron rad Stect Rrilr, Old Reilr ul noticed by mineralogists. That same year the noted mineralogist Waldmar Bissell Block, Seventh Ave. and $mithfield St.' PtTTSBUn$l' PA. Schaller described the crystallo- graphic properties of siderite and An 789O adeertisefient prominently featuring Mt. Savage ftre brick. Repro- barite from the Frostburg Mine. The duced from the Alleghany Centennial Directory. material described in the American Journal of Science artide, had been several more furnaces were con- interconnecfed pillar support system obtained from the Foote Mineral structed to north of Frostburg at the which enabled the mines to operate Company. village of Mt. Savage. The growth of in relative safety. About 1915, a geological study of the coal industry continued to in- A brick manufacturing plant was the westem Maryland fire day de- crease and soon attracted the devel- established in the south end of Frost- posits was undertaken by the Mary- opment of rail transportation to the burg. When the operation attained land Geological Survey and the U.S. region. By 1850 the population of peak production, the mine and plant Bureau of Mines. The joint venture Frostburg was primarily made up of employed 40 men and boys and man- utilized the services of a number of miners and their families. These res- ulactured l0,O0o bricks per day. The scientists. Information and evaluation idents, mainly foreign-born were of flint claywas cmshedand mixed with of the clays and the technology to English, Welsh, Scotch, Irish or Ger- water in order to reduce the mass to process them was the responsibility of man extraction. a putty-like consistancy. After blend- H.G. Schurecht and Arthur Watts of By the middle of the century sig- ing the llint day with the naturally the Bureau of Mines. The geology, nificant interest in the Frostburg clays softer variery the mixture was mineralogy and stratigraphy of the had been aroused, and in 1865 the molded into bricks and fired in the day deposits was assigned to Charles Savage Mountain Fire-Brick Works kilns. Savage Mountain bricks be- K. Swartz and George M. Hall of the was founded by L.M. Gorsuch. The came popular with the steel industry Maryland Geological Survey. Geolo- clay deposits occurred in two distinct in Pennsylvania and received high gist Hall visited each fire clay deposit varieties. One form was a soft putty- praise in the trade joumals of the that was active in the Frostburg dis- like variety while the other was a time. As the durability of the Savage rrict at the time of the investigation. hard "flint" day. Through experi- Mountain brick became known" He observed the mineral assemblage mentation it was discovered that a more companies opened up opera- at the Frostburg tract and made par- quartz proper mixture {25a/o soft and 75"/" tions in the Frostburg area. The Sav- ticular note of the beautiful hard) of the clays produced a supe- age Mountain Fire-Brick Works ex- crystals found in the nodules. The re- rior heat-resistant brick suitable for panded it's own business in Frostburg sult of this joint investigation pro- lurnace lining. Mining the Savage by acquiring additional clay deposits duced a monograph entitled "The Fire Fire clay proved to be dangerous from throughout the region. Following the Clays of Maryland" in 1922. the outset. The seams of day were re- same geological horizons northward, covered in much the same fashion as the Savage Mountain company dis- The Mineral Years the coal. Mine shafts were developed covered additional deposits and The beautiful iridescent microcrys- as the seams were followed and day opened another brick manufacturing talline siderite clusters from Frostburg extracted. Unlike the coal beds how' plant in Pennsylvania, at Fairhope in are numbered among the classic min- ever, there was little tangible warn- Somerset County. erals of Maryland. They are abundant ing prior to a tunnel collapse. Gor- . By the turn of the century the fire and can be found in many older min- such appointed Thomas Hulbertson, clay industry in western Maryland eral collections. In spite of the wide- a knowledgeable mining engineer as had become an important economic spread abundance, little mineralogic superintendent of the underground contributor to the state economy. mention was made in the older liter- workings and assigned to him the re- Along with the Savage Mountain ature. The Ostrander and Price 1940 sponsibiliry of mine safety. Hulbert- Fire-Brick Works, several area coal dassic'Minerals of Maryland- gives son employed an intricate and closely companiss began to exploit the fire scant notice of the occurrence by ob- Sweral dews of the Frostburg Mine as it appeared about 1950. W vie$' shouts the stripping operation. On the right, mineral allectott Cra*vfmd Is- sac, John Glasert and Hmold lzvey pose in front of open shaft- PhoUs courtesy of Harold lpvey. serving that siderite and barite were "reported" at Frostburg. This citation was undoubtedly in reference to the Schaller article in the American Jour- nal of Science. Some time during the 1940's the Frostburg Mine was visited and collected by noted Virginia min- eralogist, Ned Blandlord (letter, Harold Levey to Fred Parker). Be- cause of the need for gasoline ra- tioning during the war years, this ef- fort was likely to have transpired after 1945. During that same period some interest in visiting the location was generated by members of the Natural History Society oI Maryland. As news and interest in the Frostburg. miner- als gained in popularity, information about them became more available. In addition to siderite and barite, a number of other species were found and identified. In addition to quartz crystals, other species induded pyrite, sphalerite, galena, goethite, hematite, marcasite, millerite, and dickite. The discovery of millerite by Ned Bland- 111

field trips and graciously loaned to MATRIX. They have never before been published, but are part of the same sequence of photographs used in the 1953 article. At the time of the Levey visit, fire clay was being re- covered by shaft mining and strip mining methods. Fred Parker reports (personal communication) that many of the Frostburg mineral assemblage can still be collected at the strip mine location. He noted that millerite was not among the recent species to be found. Do other Frostburg fire clay occur- rences still occur? It is likely that a number of collectable locations yet remain. In 1986 the author and George Buchanan collected a similar suite of minerals at the abandoned Savage Mountain Fire-Brick mines at Millelite on sideite from the Frostburg mine. Specimen mllected in 19t$ by Fairhope, PA. Clay mines were also Grenier. Ned Blandford, now in the Fred Parker colleaion. Photo by Gary located at a number of other western Maryland locations including Gra nts- ford was a first for that species in tion of the late Paul Desautels, who ville, Mt. Savage and Ellerslie. Unlike Maryland. The nickel sulfide was was living in Baltimore at that time. many historic locations in eastern found in beautiful needle-like sprays, During the collecting season of 1950, Maryland which have been lost to ur- and remains the rarest and most de' 1951, and 1952, Harold Levey and a ban development, a number of fire sirable of the minerals to occur at number of other eastem Maryland clay occurrences in the Frostburg area Frostburg. collectors visited and collected the yet remain. In 1953, Rocks and Minerals mag- Frostburg occurrence- These avid azine published the first contempo- mineralogists were able to collect the rary article about collecting minerals entire suite of Frostburg minerals in- Referenc-es at Frostburg. The article entitled duding the elusive millerite- The ar- Brugeq, Robert G.: 'Maryland: A Middle Tem- permem" 1988 Johns Hopkins University "Minerals of the Frostburg Fire Clay tide vwitten by Levey for Rocks and Press and the Maryland Historical Society, Mine" (May*June 1953) was written Minerals magazine remains the best p$s.3'2-t4t. by Harold Levey of Baltimore. Levey collector description of the Frostburg Gude, Gilbert: 'Where the Potomac Begins: A became acquainted with the Frost- location in print. The location pho- flistory of the North Branch Valley" 1984, burg occurrence after having seen tographs featured with this story Seven Locks Press, Washington, D.C. Levey Harold: 'Minerals o[ the Frostburg Fire some microspecimens the collec- were taken during one of tJre Levey in Clay Mine' 1953, Rocks and Minerals Magazine Vol. 28, Nos. 5-{. May-June 1953, pgs. 2]2-2vJ. Ostrander: Charles W. and Price, Walter E, Jr.: 'Minerals of Maryland" 1940, the Natural History Society of Maryland, pg. 63. Schaller, Waldmar T.: 'Siderire and Barite from Maryland' 1906. American Journal oI Sci- ence, Vol. XXI May 19O6. Sdrarf, J Thomas: 'Ilistory of Westem Mary- land' 1882 Y