Consol Coal Mining Central Shop Sees Afterlife

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[An April tornado that destroyed 90 percent of Bigham Farms' grain storage facility three miles south of Pyatt's Wye in Perry County has opened the door to a stunning makeover of the old Consolidation Coal Co. Central Shop acreage near the wye.

Brothers Greg and Allen Bigham, with the blessing of their mother Irma Bigham, are constructing a new 400,000-bushel grain storage and grain handling facility on the 40-acre land tract.

It's super farming at its best, but the Bighams are very humbled by the new beginning.

It has become an agricultural visitor's center for wellwishing farmers who come and go to watch the construction evolve.

Their late father Roy Dean Bigham would be very proud.

"It fits our operation well," Greg Bigham said of the chance to relocate to this property after the April 19 storm. "We don't know if it was a tornado or a stright line wind," he said.

Greg said the family has had its eyes on the property for several years. The large central shop had been purchased by Heiser Aeronautical of St. Louis, owned by a family of Hungarian immigrants who escaped through a mine field at the close of World War II to come to this country. It's a billion dollar company that had plans to build a parts company in the Consol shop, but the project sank because of the 9/11 attack on New York and a short-lived decline in the airlines and aerospace industry.

Bigham said the shop had been robbed of any copper wiring that hung down less than 15 feet. "They must have had a 15-foot ladder," he smiles. Windows were broken and the shop doors were falling apart. Enough wiring has been replaced to make the shop operational. Doors have been repaired and the entire property leveled and groomed, just what you would expect from the Bigham family. The 29,000 square foot shop even has three floors of offices with a lookout over the shop.

Wedekemper, Inc. of Carlyle is building the 400,000-bushel storage facility which should be completed in the coming weeks. "Right now, we have no storage and are taking our grain straight to Mounds, Ill.," Greg said. A 10,000 gallon propane storage tank for grain drying complements the entire operation.