A large conveyor carried coal from the mine entrance high on the gorge wall to the tipple below at New River Gorge, using an innovative but expensive way to move coal downhill while minimizing breakage. At 1,385 feet long, it was one of the longest such conveyors ever built. New River coal was prized for its quality but was very friable, so reducing breakage helped lower operating costs. Completed in 1926, during the period when Henry Ford upgraded facilities here, the conveyor used state-of-the-art button-and-rope technology to replace an obsolete, more dangerous, labor-intensive system. It consisted of upper and lower wooden troughs lined with steel plates and enclosed in a steel gallery. A heavy wire rope with iron disc buttons spaced at 4-foot intervals moved coal slowly down the lower trough and returned empty on the upper. An electric motor started the system, but once it was moving, the weight of the coal and gravity, controlled by sprockets and gears, were enough to power it. The conveyor moved at 80 feet per minute and could deliver 125 tons of coal per hour. It was built for Nuttallburg by the Fairmont Mining Machinery Company of Fairmont, West Virginia.