Coaldale or Flat Top?

[NW Mailing List]

On Fri, Oct 15, 2010 at 11:54 AM, Gordon Hamilton wrote:


>  One clue might lie in the N&W Ry. Annual Reports, which are available on

> a CD from the N&WHS Commissary.  The Reports for 1898 thru 1902 refer to

> "Flat Top Mountain" and/or "Flat Top Tunnel."

>

> Certain Annual Reports 1900 thru 1925 refer to Coaldale only as the

> settlement and railroad location at the west end of what  the *Bluefield

> Daily Telegraph* newspaper and some employees frequently called "Coaldale

> Tunnel." (My grandfather was an engineer on the Pocahontas Division who died

> when I was young, but I remember my grandmother speaking of "Coaldale

> Tunnel.")

>

> Annual Reports 1901 thru 1903, 1911 and 1947 thru 1952 refer to "Elkhorn

> Tunnel."

>


There is only consistency in the inconsistent use of names. In the early
discussions of how to get further into the coal fields in the 1880s, mention
is made of the "Great Flat-Top Divide" as the barrier to progress. When the
contract was finally let for the tunnel on February 1, 1887, it was for
"Flat Top Tunnel" through "Flat Top Mountain." (see
http://filebox.vt.edu/users/bharper/nwrwy/FlattopContract.html)

Not too many years later, after having solved the problems of getting loaded
coal trains through that tunnel and removing the exhaust gases via a
ventilation system with fans at the western portal, Charles Churchill, chief
engineer for the N&W, wrote an article for the Railroad Gazette on
"Ventilation of Tunnels" about the experience (published in the May 10, 1901
edition).

He opened with:

"Elkhorn Tunnel, on the Norfolk and Western Railway, is at Coaldale, West
Virginia, on the divide between the waters of New River and of Big Sandy
River. This divide, in Flat Top Mountain, is crossed, at an elevation of 2
386 ft., by means of Elkhorn Tunnel, which is 3 000 ft. long, and has a
single track, between two sections of double-track railroad."

So in that one paragraph there is reference to the mountain, the settlement
that later gave another name to the tunnel, and another name for the tunnel.
At least he was consistent with what Gordon provided, with the annual
reports of that time calling it "Elkhorn Tunnel" and the settlement there
"Coaldale." That coincides with the topo map from around that time period.

Bruce in Blacksburg
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