Husband James "Little Jim" Cochran 1 2
Born: 15 Jan 1823 - Tyrone Twp, Fayette Co, PA 3
Christened:
Died:
Buried:
Father: Isaac Cochran ( - ) 4 5
Mother: Rosanna Sample ( -Abt 1836) 3
Marriage: 24 Feb 1848 3
Wife Clarissa Huston 2 3
AKA: Kersey Huston 6
Born:
Christened:
Died:
Buried:
Father: Joseph Huston ( - ) 2 7
Mother: Mary Ann Hazen (1805- ) 2 3
Children
General Notes: Husband - James "Little Jim" Cochran
Tyrone Twp, Fayette Co, PA
He owned eleven hundred acres of valuable coal lands on the west side of the Youghiogheny River in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, and for seventeen years or more was largely engaged in the development of the coal and coke interests of that vicinity.
He attended in childhood the subscription schools till he was about thirteen years of age, when his mother died, and he then left home and went out to shift for himself, to try "the battle of life" in the school of experience, which Mr. Cochran emphatically declared to be "the best school that anybody ever attended." At the outset he engaged himself to a farmer to help him "put in seeding,"-that is, to sow his fields; and for pay the farmer gave him "an old, worn-out, long-tailed blue coat," which the boy's pride would not allow him to wear. So he went home across the fields in shame and anger. He would work for that farmer no more. He next bought, on credit, some red flannel for a "wa'mus,"- i.e., a sort of buttonless wrapper,-and got, also on credit, from Sample Cochran, his brother, lumber for a flat-bottomed boat large enough to carry a hundred tons of sand, built the boat, and sold one-half of it to Sample to pay the lumber bill, and then went into partnership with him in washing sand at their uncle's bank near the later village of Dawson, preparatory to carrying it to the glass-makers at Pittsburgh. For this load they got two dollars a ton; and they sold the boat, and had as the result about a hundred dollars apiece in pocket, which sum, Mr. Cochran says, was more of a fortune in his young mind then than were all his later possessions. They continued boating, carrying sand, glass-stone, cinders, etc., mostly to Pittsburgh, for several years. Thereafter he and his brother and uncle, in the summer of 1842, feeling quite rich, leased two coke-ovens at what was later styled Fayette Works, and made two boat-loads of twenty-four-hour coke, having themselves previously made two boats, which they loaded. A boat held 6000 bushels. With their loaded craft they left for Cincinnati, Ohio, April 1, 1843, without money, and with no shelter over their heads, and with no place to lie for rest except on the coke. At Pittsburgh they bought, on credit, provisions, for which they paid on their return. Below Pittsburgh the coke got on fire (from a fire built for cooking purposes upon a quantity of sand laid over the coke), and they found that the more water they poured upon it the lower the fire went, and they were obliged to dig down and get out the embers. At this period little was known about the "character" of coke and how best to handle it. Having gathered lumber along down the river, when they arrived at Wheeling they made a shanty over the coke and so secured shelter. Arriving at Cincinnati, they were obliged to lie there for several days before they could dispose of the coke, and allow Miles Greenwood, a foundryman, to try it. He used the same quantity which he had before used of the Monongahela coke, and finding theirs much better than the latter kind, bought both loads, paying seven cents a bushel, half down, and giving for the other half his notes, which he paid before maturity. This was the first of the Connellsville coke ever sold for money.
Mr. Cochran thereafter engaged in manufacturing coke. He was the principal of the firm of Cochran & Keister, owning the Spring Grove Works, of one hundred ovens, on the old Huston farm, at Dawson. He was also owner of a large interest in the Fayette Works (one hundred ovens), which he conducted beginning in 1866; and he was interested in the Jackson Mines, in Tyrone township, his son, John T., being in charge of those. He was concerned in two works in Upper Tyrone, the Franklin Mines and the Clinton Mines, both of coking coal. In company with John H. and George R. Shoenberger, Solomon Keister, N. A. Rist, and his three sons, John, Philip G., and H. T. Cochran, he owned in Dunbar township over twelve hundred acres of bituminous coal lands, lying mainly on the line of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad.
As an item of interest in the history of navigation on the Youghiogheny River, it should not be over-looked that during a portion of his life, extending from about 1846 forward for twenty-five years or so, or as long as boating was done on that stream, Mr. Cochran safely piloted boats down its dangerous channel, on occasion, three or four times a year. This was a work which only very few men had sufficient skill to do. [HFC 1882, 805]
He and his wife had eleven children, seven of whom, six sons and one daughter, were still living in 1882.