Henry Wilson Storey's History of Cambria County, V.II, p.480

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History of Cambria County, V.2

480 HISTORY OF CAMBRIA COUNTY.

stitute of Mining Engineers, and the British Iron and Steel Institute.
    John Fulton, a native of Ulster, Ireland, was born October 16, 1826. He acquired a fair education in Dublin, and entered the service of the engineering corps on an English railroad when he was twenty-one years of age. In 1848, with his parents, five brothers and one sister, he disembarked in new York, a stranger in a strange land. Not finding employment there he moved on to Wayne county, Pennsylvania, where he secured work on a little canal at seventy-five cents a day, and paid $2.25 per week for boarding in a slab shanty. The following year he was promoted to the position of foreman, and then to the more important one of general foreman, or “Walking Boss,” which included the construction of masonry for a large aqueduct and locks at Tunkhannock, Pennsylvania. From the years 1852 to 1854 he was assistant engineer on the Junction canal, which connected the Pennsylvania and New York states canals, and the two years following he was employed as assistant engineer on the Barclay railroad from Towanda to the coal fields on Schraeder creek.
    In 1856 Thomas T. Wierman, the principal engineer under whom Mr. Fulton had worked, became the general superintendent of the Huntingdon and Broad Top railroad, and knowing the energy and ability of the latter, invited him to accept the position of resident and mining engineer of that road, with the management of the coal mines. In the eighteen years spent among the hills of Bedford county, Mr. Fulton devoted much time to the study of geology, and the vast fund of knowledge he then acquired has made him one of the leading mining geologists of this country. The last four years at Saxton he was also chief engineer for the Pennsylvania railroad in extending its line from Mt. Dallas to Cumberland.
    At the age of forty-eight Mr. Fulton accepted Mr. Morrell's invitation to become general mining engineer for the Cambria Iron Company, and removed to Johnstown. This position gave him charge of all their coal and ore mines and coke ovens. In the early history of the manufacture of Bessemer steel, the complaint of Thomas Collins, superintendent of the furnaces, that the native coke was not giving satisfactory results in the blast furnaces, was a great surprise to the officials, as great expense had been incurred in the erection of a great coal washer with the

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480	HISTORY OF CAMBRIA COUNTY.
stitute of Mining Engineers, and the British Iron and Steel Institute. John Fulton, a native of Ulster, Ireland, was born October 16, 1826. He acquired a fair education in Dublin, and entered the service of the engineering corps on an English railroad when he was twenty-one years of age. In 1848, with his parents, five brothers and one sister, he disembarked in new York, a stranger in a strange land. Not finding employment there he moved on to Wayne county, Pennsylvania, where he secured work on a little canal at seventy-five cents a day, and paid $2.25 per week for boarding in a slab shanty. The following year he was promoted to the position of foreman, and then to the more important one of general foreman, or “Walking Boss,” which included the construction of masonry for a large aqueduct and locks at Tunkhannock, Pennsylvania. From the years 1852 to 1854 he was assistant engineer on the Junction canal, which connected the Pennsylvania and New York states canals, and the two years following he was employed as assistant engineer on the Barclay railroad from Towanda to the coal fields on Schraeder creek. In 1856 Thomas T. Wierman, the principal engineer under whom Mr. Fulton had worked, became the general superintendent of the Huntingdon and Broad Top railroad, and knowing the energy and ability of the latter, invited him to accept the position of resident and mining engineer of that road, with the management of the coal mines. In the eighteen years spent among the hills of Bedford county, Mr. Fulton devoted much time to the study of geology, and the vast fund of knowledge he then acquired has made him one of the leading mining geologists of this country. The last four years at Saxton he was also chief engineer for the Pennsylvania railroad in extending its line from Mt. Dallas to Cumberland. At the age of forty-eight Mr. Fulton accepted Mr. Morrell's invitation to become general mining engineer for the Cambria Iron Company, and removed to Johnstown. This position gave him charge of all their coal and ore mines and coke ovens. In the early history of the manufacture of Bessemer steel, the complaint of Thomas Collins, superintendent of the furnaces, that the native coke was not giving satisfactory results in the blast furnaces, was a great surprise to the officials, as great expense had been incurred in the erection of a great coal washer with the