At 10:55 a.m. on the morning of Saturday, November 28, 1908, an explosion occurred in the mine which killed 154 men and left only one survivor. Although the mine was quickly refurbished by the Pittsburg Buffalo Company, the colliery's fortunes flagged. By 1914, the mine was sold to the Union Coal and Coke Company and later to Bethlehem Steel which continued to extract coal until 1988, when the main conveyor caught fire. The fire was extinguished, but the mine closed anyway.