A century ago, during cold snaps such as we’ve had this week, coal was gold.
This local newspaper ad from 1896 shows that coal was a popular heating fuel in Fort Worth in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The 1899 city directory lists twenty-three coal dealers.
Coal chute door of the former Central Methodist Church building (1911) on Lipscomb Street.
Coal chute door of the Mitchell-Schoonover house (1907) on 8th Avenue.
By 1930 the number of coal dealers had greatly decreased.
