Discovery of Coal By Nicholas Sheran

Nicholas Sheran was an adventurer and businessman who came to the Northwest following the American Civil War. He accompanied John Jerome Healy and Alfred Baker Hamilton from Fort Benton, Montana to the Canadian Northwest in order profit from the whiskey trade.

Early prospectors to the Lethbridge area had noticed an exposed 1.5 metre thick seam of coal on the banks of the Belly River about 10 kilometres upstream from the whiskey trading post, later known as Fort Whoop-up. The Blackfoot natives had known about the coal deposits for some time, and referred to the coal deposits as sik-ooh-kotoks or "black rocks". Local prospectors had come to translate this as “the Coal Banks” and soon the area containing the deposits became known as the Coal Banks. In 1874, when Nicholas Sheran established his ferry service over the Belly River (later to be called the Oldman River) he also noticed the seam of coal exposed on the valley wall. Realizing the possibilities, Sheran started a small coal mining business. However, both his quarry and sales were initially small, with most of the coal being sold to the traders and merchants operating in the area.

Later, after the North West Mounted Police established themselves in Fort Macleod, a larger, more permanent market opened up. Sheran then moved his ferry service down river 10 kilometres to a place called "The Crossing" at the Coal Banks, where he began to focus more time on quarrying coal. It was at this location that Sheran opened up the first commercial coal mine in the region and by December 1874, he began to supply coal to the N.W.M.P. for use at Fort Macleod.

Natives and Coal