From 1770 to 1777 it was common for maps of certain portions of the Ohio River country to have marked on them sites of coal beds along the shores of that stream in regions which are now known to contain seams of the great bituminous deposit. Probably the Susquehanna River region was the first in which this coal was dug systematically and put to use. It was burned by blacksmiths in their forges, and as early as 1785 the river towns were supplied with it by Samuel Boyd, who shipped it from his mines in arks. In 1813 Philip Karthaus took a quantity of coal to Fort Deposit, and sent it thence by canal to Philadelphia. After this he sent cargoes regularly to Philadelphia and Baltimore, and sold them readily at the rate of thirty-three cents per bushel. This trade was stopped, however, by the building of dams across the Susquehanna, and it was not until many years afterward that the mineral resources of this section of the coal field were developed again through the introduction of railroads. In the Pittsburgh region the demand for coal increased with the increase of population, and at the beginning of the present century it was in general use, not only in the manufacturing industries but also as a domestic fuel, throughout that section of country. The first coal sent from Pittsburgh to an eastern market was shipped to Philadelphia in 1803. It was carried by the Louisiana, a boat of 350 tons burden, and was sold at the rate of thirty-seven and a half cents per bushel. From that time the increase in the mining of bituminous coal in the Pittsburgh region has been steady and enormous. Its presence, its quality and abundance, have induced the establishment of great manufacturing enterprises in that section of the State, and many millions of tons of it are sent every year to the markets of the seaboard. Pennsylvania was a region much in favor with the North American Indians, and it is more than probable that they were aware, to some extent, of the existence of mineral wealth beneath her soil, long before white men ever came among them.