The details of Mr. Frick's early career may be recited in very few words. He is the son of a farmer and was born at West Overton, Pa., in 1850. After gaining the rudiments of an education in the common schools of Fayette County, he began business life as a dry goods clerk in Mount Pleasant. Leaving the dry goods business he became book-keeper in his grandfather's distillery at Bradford. He lived economically and with the money which he saved out of his salary he embarked in the coke business with A. O. Tintsman and Joseph Rist. Although barely 21 years old, he was the senior partner of the firm, which began with an equipment of 300 acres of land and 50 ovens. The opening of the Mt. Pleasant and Broad Ford railroad imparted new life to the coke trade about this period and young Frick took advantage of the boom to add to his firm's plant. The firm also built the Henry Clay works of one hundred ovens on the Youghiogheny River near Broad Ford. In 1876 Mr. Frick bought out his partners and continued the business on his own account. In the following year a depression of trade placed the lease of the Valley coke works at his disposal. The young operator put Thomas Lynch in charge, and despite the dullness of the market, kept the works going every day in the year. In the fall of 1877 Mr. Frick took into partnership E. M. Ferguson, the owner of a plant of 70 ovens, and the new firm operated as H. C. Frick & Co. A year later the firm leased the Anchor works and the Mullen works near Mt. Pleasant and admitted Walton Ferguson as a partner. In 1879 the coke trade revived amazingly, prices advancing from a maximum of $1.15 a ton to $4 and $5 a ton. The Frick Company continued to extend its business until, in 1882, it controlled 3,000 acres of coal land and 1,026 coke ovens. Meanwhile Mr. Frick organized the Morewood Coke Company, limited, and built the Morewood works of 470 ovens, the largest works in the region. Carnegie Bros. & Co., Limited, were admitted into the firm in January, 1882. The Frick corporation now pushed its operations with such vigor that, in 1890, according to a semi-official statement, it "owned and controlled 35,000 acres of coal land and 43 of the 80 plants in the region, aggregating 10,046 ovens, three water plants with a pumping capacity of 5,000,000 gallons daily, and 35 miles of railroad track and 1,200 railroad cars. 11,000 men were then employed by the company, and for the equipment of its plants it had 23 locomotives, 72 pairs of stationary engines, 172 steam boilers and 816 horses and mules."