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KITTS, KY

Clover Fork Coal Co. operated the coal mine at Kitts, Kentucky from 1914 until 1958. Amazingly enough the wood products company that owns the property now has preserved much of the colliery. And it is amazing.

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Company store and tipple.

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Elevation view of the Kitts tipple. This is probably the last really old coal tipple in Eastern Kentucky.

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The railroad tracks have been taken up, but you can see where the different grades of coal dropped out of the bottom of the tipple into waiting train cars.

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Detail of the Kitts tipple shows it was built by Roberts and Schaefer Engineering. They were the number one builder of tipples and prep plants in American probably into the 1970s or 80s.

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Another view of the tipple shows what is probably either a slack coal chute or house coal chute.

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Old underground coal mining machinery sitting around the tipple.

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A coal undercutting machine. I was told that the building in the background was once a church. Heck of a location for a church.

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The red brick building is the former bath house.

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Mine buildings and tipple.

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The "church" and company store.

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On the left is the old company store, and on the right is the colliery.

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Clover Fork Coal Co. sign is still on the company store, or commissary as people in Harlan County like to say.

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Clover Fork Coal Company bulletin board on the commissary.

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Most of the Kitts coal camp has been destroyed, but these structures may be leftover from the Kitts company town.

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