New Galilee, Pennsylvania
Clay was an abundant resource in Beaver county. According to the 1955 circular of the Pennsylvania Geological Survey, In 1955 Beaver County produced 13.7% of Pennsylvania's total clay output. There were 13 companies that mined clay in Beaver county at that time. Two of these companies, The Negley Fire Clay Co. and Ralph A. Veon, Inc. mined fire clay of the plastic variety from open pits and marketed the output for use in manufacturing fire brick and block, foundries, and heavy clay products. In addition, Ralph A. Veon, Inc., mined and sold fire clay of the burley variety. In 1955, New Castle Refractories mined stoneware clay from an underground mine near New Galilee for use locally in manufacturing pouring channels
Bone Valley
One byproduct of the extraction process is clay, which is stored in settling ponds and eventually comprises 30%-40% of a mine site. Some of these ponds can measure thousands of acres. Rain drains slower through these clay-laden ponds than typical soil. Critics argue that this, in turn, reduces baseflow to the Peace River. Some studies have indicated that reclaimed lands actually provide a more consistent baseflow because the sandier soils of the reclaimed land provide faster baseflow, while the clay provides a slower steady flow, creating more flow during dry periods than native land. Since the 1960s, the average annual flow of the middle Peace River has declined from to per second (38.23 to 22.65 m³/s). Critics argue that this flow reduction is due to phosphate mining, but studies by the Southwest Florida Water Management District have shown that the reduction in flow is due to multidecadal oscillation in Atlantic Ocean temperatures.