North of England Institute of Mining Engineers

Transactions Volume I, 1852-1853

Report

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The Committee appointed on July 3rd, have annexed to this Report, a draft of the Rules prepared, and now recommended by them for the government of the proposed North of England Society for the Prevention of Accidents in Mines, and for the advancement of Mining Science generally.

It does not appear necessary for the Committee to enlarge upon the objects of the Society, which are already so well understood by the Meeting. The remarks will, therefore, be confined mainly to questions of financial detail.

It must be obvious, that the Society will require to be sustained by adequate funds; especially as so many branches of science are connected directly, and indirectly, with Mining — involving it may be, the purchase of expensive apparatus — the construction of models — and the prosecution of such particular courses of experiment and research as fall legitimately within the province of the proposed Society, and which may, together with a library of scientific works, be deemed essential to its success.

Suitable apartments for the use of the Society will also be required.

It seems advisable, however, to defer carrying out these arrangements until the means at the disposal of the Society shall be more clearly ascertained.

The annual subscription of ordinary Members is recommended to be £2 2s.; but the Committee submit, that the subscription from this source alone will prove inadequate to meet an expenditure sufficiently large to render the Society really effective. The Committee would, therefore, respectfully suggest, that the deep interest which must be felt by the Trade in an Institution of this nature, one of the results of which may be a material reduction in the expense of mining operations, might justify the appropriation of a fund, calculated to render the Society, in a great measure, independent of the more precarious sources of support, arising out of the annual subscriptions of individual members.

The Committee, therefore, trust that the meeting will take this very essential part of the subject into consideration; and that the Trade will be induced to further the objects of the Society, by a provision calculated to render it permanently useful and prosperous, and to make it rank, in a manner to which this district is fairly and peculiarly entitled, with other institutions of a scientific character throughout the kingdom.

The Committee would, perhaps, step beyond the line of their duty in suggesting the particular mode of raising the funds in question; but they may state, that the probable current expense of properly conducting the Society cannot be estimated at less than from £400 to £500 a-year: and assuming the permanent number of paying Members to be 100, a deficiency of between £200 and £300 a-year would thus require to be made up.