This view of a rail car hauling waste shale and rock up tracks for dumping at the top of a coal slag pile dates to January 1973. The stockpile, containing more than one million cubic yards of material still stands in Black Diamond, but today is covered by a thick canopy of blackberry vines and trees. Last weekend this hill, located just west of Highway 169 was used by over 6,000 runners participating in an endurance and obstacle event sponsored by Tough Mudder. It was the nineth Tough Mudder contest at Palmer Coking Coal Company’s former mine yard located in a town whose roots stretch back to 1885.
The mechanics of this operation were simple. A steel cable strung through a pulley hoisted each load to the top of the hill where waste material dumped from both sides of the rail car. The disposed waste shale and rock had previously been separated from raw coal after passing through a wash plant located under the roof to the right in this photo. The coal car was then lowered down the hill, under the plant for reloading, followed by another climb back to the top. Each car carried five cubic yards, which means the hoisting and dumping process occurred over 200,000 times after beginning in 1945 until stopping in the late 1970s. The hill eventually grew to 100 feet above surrounding topography.
This site, originally called Morgan Slope and later known as Mine #11, had previously been used for underground coal mining from 1896 to 1927. That pit was once the deepest underground coal mine in the U.S. A steel-framed tub from the old wash plant is all that remains of the various operations. This photo by Larry Abele was taken for the Sunday supplement, “Now” to illustrate a January 14, 1973, feature story about coal mining carried in the Renton Record-Chronicle, the Kent News-Journal, and the Auburn Globe News newspaper chain.
