 The rancho later fell into the hands of the pioneer and horticulturalist William Wolfskill, and finally James Irvine, before becoming part of the Cleveland National Forest in the late 1880s.After discovering coal deposits in the canyon, August Witte founded the Black Star Coal Mining Company in 1879, which gave the canyon its current name.The coal was originally dug from a shallow pit on the hill just east of the canyon mouth, used almost exclusively by the canyon's few residents.