Coal was first discovered in North America on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, and was described in 1672. In the United States, the earliest recorded discovery of coal is that of Louis Joliet and Father Marquette in 1673 on the Illinois River between the present sites of Utica and Ottawa, Ill. The first coal mine opened was near Richmond, Va., about 1730. Mines in that vicinity were operating commercially by 1750, and by 1789 shipments were being made to Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, where coal imported from Scotland, England, and Nova Scotia had been used as early as 1738.

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PITTSBURGH EXPERIMENT STATION, U. s. BUREAU OF MINES, PITTSBURGH, P A . HE Eschka method for the determination of T sulfur in coal has long been recognized as a standard method for use as a basis for specifications for the purchase of coal. It was recommended by the joint committee on coal analysis of the American Society for Testing Materials and the AMERIChN CHEMICAL SOCIETY, and has been adopted as a standard method by these ~ocieties.~ Laboratories making calorimetric determinations find it convenient to determine sulfur in the washings from the bomb calorimeter. Another rapid method is the sodium peroxide fusion method. Both of these methods were Sixteen samples of coal and coke, ranging in sulfur content from about 0.5 to 17 per cent, have been analyzed for sulfur by five laboratories by the Eschka, bomb-washing, and sodium peroxide fusion methods. Detailed methods of procedure are given for the three methods.The bomb-washing method requires care in the slow and uniform release of the gases after the combustion, and thorough washing of the inside of the bomb, including the valve opening in types not equipped with needle valves. Most of the laboratories were able to obtain good checks in making duplicate determinations by any of the three methods. The best average checks between duplicate determinations were obtained with the sodium peroxide fusion method.In general, the laboratories were able to obtain results with the bomb-washing and sodium peroxide fusion methods which checked those of the Eschka method sufficiently close to show that these methods may be used alternately with the Eschka method, which has for long been the recognized standard for sulfur determination in coal and coke.

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