I had to go back and look at that slide. I whizzed by it quickly because I thought it was a lunch room/cafeteria or kitchenThe guy in the lab has a calendar behind him. I think it's May, 1937, the month the Hindenberg was destroyed at Lakehurst.
That's interesting. Never heard of dredging coal. I suppose it was not considered a pollutant in the river because it's just made of plant matter.The aerials are Dallin Aerial Services birds-eye photos. They are also available in the Hagley Digital Collection. (The Hagley might be interested in scanning your album--the original Martha Diary is also deposited there.)
I like the little dredge with the shanty on it, and attached pipeline. You can see a similar apparatus dredging coal fines from a dam pool on the Susquehanna River here: https://unchartedlancaster.com/2020...of-black-diamond-dredging-on-the-susquehanna/
Here are some the aerials. Note you can see the Maurice river and the Manumuskin as well as schooner landing rd being the main road into the sand plant. Port Cumberland rd is seen in the distance before Whibco was present.
Okay, yes, now I see why.Oh no, it definitely was a problem! Fine anthracite coal was not readily burned in standard fireboxes during the 19th Century, and was dumped together with waste rock in enormous heaps called "culm piles". From here, of course, the coal fines washed into rivers draining the coalfield, such as the Susquehanna, the Lehigh, and the Schuykill--"paved with derelict coal", says Henry S. Canby of the last. As the technology developed and mining became more expensive, it became possible to reclaim the culm piles, but that still left the coal washed into the rivers. There were quite a few of these coal-dredging operations, usually small and somewhat ramshackle enterprises. On the lower Susquehanna, the pools of the hydroelectric dams acting as settling basins for the coal fines; Holtwood Dam had an accessory power plant built to burn dredged river coal to augment the power from the turbines.
Caption for man standing in woods with hat removed reads as follows: Old pit-mined by Pipe Co.
Millville and Vineland were straight up barrens at one time.You can still see it in the woods that are left in some areasThis photo is very cool having walked those tracks many times. Assuming this is all the ruins by the osprey nests about 1-2 down from port Elizabeth road.
South jersey always looks so much more piney in any old photos, especially in Deep South jersey.