Wattis

Wattis. . , Wattis Coal Company was organized in 1917 by W.H. Wattis, E.O. Wattis and M.S. Brownin. A surface tramway and 2.5 miles of standard gauge track was built to connect to the Utah RR at Wattis Junction. Coal first went over the tramway in March 1918 and was first shipped on the railway in April 1918. In May 1918 Wattis was sold to the Eccles family and merged with the Lion Coal Co. The new company built boarding houses and frame homes for the miners In Nov. 1919 Lion Coal Co. sold their spur to the Utab RR for $20,000 cash and free shipping at $0.15 per ton until the purchase price of $170,954.00 was met. During world war two there were about 250 miners employed. Like most coal camps in the area, the 1950's brought a sharp decline in demand for coal and Wattis ceased to exist as a town. In 1964 the mine was purchased for salvage by Mountain States Machinery of SLC. The salvage company realized that only 10% of the coal reserves had been mined and reopened the mine as Plateau Mining Co. In 1967 Plateau was sold to United Nuclear Corp., in 1980 it was sold to Getty Minerals and in 1985 it was sold Cyprus Minerals. Cyprus mined until 1999 when the property was sold to RAG American and closed. Reclamation began in Feb. of 2000 and was completed in 2003., Dedicated July 22nd, 2017 (6022) , Matt Warner Chapter 1900 , E Clampus Vitus ,