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Gary Coal Cleaning Plant - Gary, WV. The United States Coal & Coke's sprawling McDowell County industrial complex known collectively as Gary was for half a century among West Virginia's most productive coal mines. The model company towns making up Gary Hollow employed thousands of miners and shipped more than 200 million tons of high-quality ''smokeless'' fuel in its 54 years of full operation.
( Photographs furnished by: BuddyFrench )
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Gary's Alpheus Coal Preparation Plant was once the largest of its kind in the world. Then in July 1986, U. S. Steel shut down all its mines in Gary Hollow that had been in operation since 1902 and the Alpheus Coal Preparation Plant that had been in operation since 1948 because of the slackening demand for coal. Buddy French wrote that in 1986, he was working at U. S. Steel's District Rebuilt Shop as the evening shift maintenance foreman. In January he took his twelve-man crew on a three-month temporary assignment to work at the Gary Coal Cleaning Plant where his crew was tasked with making repairs in the plant on the midnight shift. Buddy stated that It took the whole eight-hour shift to and walk through the plant twice. He would make his first round between twelve midnight and 4:00 A.M. and his second round between 4:30 A.M. and 8:00 A.M. to check on work in progress. In July 1986, U. S. Steel shut down all of its mines in Gary Hollow that had been in operation for 84 years. The Alpheus Coal Preparation plant that took up the entire narrow valley floor, was torn down in 1991.
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Alpheus Coal Preparation Plant Construction at Gary, WV - 1946.
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Alpheus Coal Preparation Plant at Gary, WV -1957 - Capable of loading coal cars on six tracks simultaneously.
Alpheus Coal Preparation Plant at Gary, WV -1958 - Capable of loading coal cars on six tracks simultaneously.
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