Keweenaw County Michigan

MINES AND MINERS.

Source: History of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan: containing a full account of its early settlement, its growth, development, and resources, an extended description of its iron and copper mines : also, accurate sketches of its counties, cities, towns, and villages ... biographical sketches, portraits of prominent men and early settlers. Publication Info: Chicago : Western Historical Co., 1883.

Statistical | Mines & Miners
Copper Harbor | Eagle Harbor  | Eagle River | Delaware | Copper Falls | Central | Phoenix | Allouez | Ahmeek (Ahmuk)

During the exciting times in the early rush to secure rich mines, permits were taken out by the hundreds, and nearly everything supposed to be within the limits of the copper-bearing belt was secured, and explorations, ofttimes of entirely impracticable nature, were indifferently conducted all along the line from the extreme end of Keweenaw Point across the county, and extending on through a large portion of Houghton and Ontonagon Counties. Some of these locations are being worked today, but by far the largest number of them have been abandoned by the old companies or sold to other parties, who are holding them for further operations or for speculative purposes.

The entire list of copper mines worked in the mineral land district of Lake Superior in 1850 comprised a total of nineteen. Today, in Keweenaw County alone, there are now working nine mines, and three more are preparing to start into active operations.

The mines in the copper region on which work was being done in 1850 were the Cliff (Pittsburgh and Boston); North America, afterward purchased by the Cliff Company in 1860; the Minnesota; the Northwest, afterward, in 1861, reorganized into a new company, known as the Pennsylvania Mining Company of Michigan; the Copper Falls, the Northwestern, the Phoenix (Lake Superior), Lac La Belle, the Bohemian, the Quincy, the Forest, the Forsyth, the Albion, the Ohio Trap, the Adventurer, the Douglas Hough­ton, afterward known as the Henwood; the Pittsburgh and Isle Royal, the Siskawit and the Ohio and Isle Royal. The mines at present worked in Keweenaw County, commencing at the northerly end, are the Conglomerate, the Central, the Copper Falls, the Ash Bed, the St. Clair, the Phoenix, the Cliff, the Ahmeek and the Allouez. Two men are work­ing at the Madison, and explorations are being made on the North Cliff with the view of opening up the property.

The Allouez Mining Company was originally organized in 1859, but for the first ten years did little except exploring work. In 1869, they decided to begin work on the conglomerate belt immediately underlying the greenstone, since known as the Allouez conglomerate. It extends the entire length of the trap range in Keweenaw County, and in some places, as at Delaware, is shown to be extremely rich in copper. From a different action of the catalytic forces operating in different parts of the structure, or a difference in the supply of cupriferous matter, there are found intervening spaces of barren rock alternating with those rich in copper. This vein differs in width from ten to thirty feet.

In 1869, No. 1 Shaft was sunk, No. 2 commenced, a drift extended, and a winze sunk. A temporary suspension followed, when in 1870, work was resumed, and in 1871, pushed forward on an extensive scale, and continued up to 1877. During this time, under the charge of Capt. A. P. Thomas, as agent, three shafts were sunk, the deepest 750 feet; the levels had been extended to the united length of 1,600 feet, houses for a working force of 400 men erected, together with agent's house, office, store, warehouse, shops, rock-house, stamp-mill and railroad.

The company had become involved, its capital stock was exhausted, and in September, 1877, the company suspended work and leased the property to Messrs. Watson & Walls on tribute, the company to have one-eighth of the product, clear of expense.

In September, 1880, the lease expired. A new company was organized, with a capital stock of $2,000,000; an assessment of $1 per share was made, and the company again commenced operations, with Mr. Fred Smith as agent.

The estate comprises 2,735 acres of land, mostly in Allouez Township. The stamp-mill is located two and one-fourth miles from the mine, at a point where they can get plenty of water from two streams—Hill's Creek and Gratiot Creek—and is connected with the mine by a railroad, four-foot gauge, operated by a locomotive.

The stamp-mill is provided with two fifteen-inch cylinder Ball's stamps, and forty-five Cullom washers.

At the time Mr. Smith took the work in hand, after the expiration of the tributer's lease, much needed work of repairs had necessarily to be done to get things in working order. Besides these repairs, many improvements have been made, both above and below ground. A new stone building for a compressor-house has been erected, a 16½x30 inch Rand compressor put in, equal in capacity to twelve No. 3 Rand drills.

They are sinking to the fourteenth level, over 1,200 feet, on the main shaft, and putting down No. 3 to connect the fifth level with the tenth level.

The rock-house is connected with the shafts by an automatic elevated railway, by which the rock is run into the top and delivered to the Blake crushers, six in number, to be broken up and dropped into the bins, from which it is loaded into the cars to be taken to the stamp-mill.

During 1881, there was added to the construction account $63,336.71. A large expenditure had also been made in opening the mine ahead while furnishing ground for present stoping. An assessment was made July 8, 1881, calling in $80,000, which left on December 31, 1881, a net surplus of $87,120.74 in the treasury.

The product of ingot copper for five and one-half years from and including 1877, has been as follows: In 1877, it was 2,026,729 pounds; in 1878, 827 tons 25 pounds; in 1879, 735 tons 1,611 pounds; in 1880, 685 tons 1,088 pounds; in 1881, 1,204,224 pounds; and for the first six months of 1882, 286 tons of copper had been produced.

The metal is taken to Calumet and shipped by the Mineral Range Railroad to Hancock, where it is refined and cast into ingots.

Office, No. 29 Drexel Building, 25 Wall street, New York. Emerson Coleman, President; William C. Stewart, Secretary and Treasurer; Fred Smith, Agent.

The Albion Manhattan Mining Company commenced operations in 1848, working on two locations. Only a small amount of copper was taken out up to 1857, perhaps five tons, when work was suspended till 1862. The location was afterward abandoned. Some ruins now mark the location.

The Arnold, owned in Boston, is situated on the west of the Petherick, and comprises 1,200 acres of land crossed by the ash-bed formation. It was reorganized in the winter of 1879-80, but no active work has yet been done on the location.

The Atlas Mining Company was organized November 24, 1863, with a capital stock of $500,000. It is located between the Cliff and Phoenix, holding an estate of 280 acres. L. W. Clark, of Boston, was Secretary and Treasurer.

In 1849, D. D. Brockway bought over 1,700 shares, and was elected President, removing the office to Phoenix.

After a shaft had been sunk fifty feet and some drifting done, work was suspended for want of capital, and has not again been resumed.

D. D. Brockway is now the principal owner, President and resident agent.

The Ahmuk (sic Ahmeek), as we have seen, was formed out of a part of the old Seneca property, and from being located in damp grounds, is given the Indian name for the beaver—ahmuk. They are operating two shafts, the north shaft being down 430 feet, with a drift east of the conglomerate—which is '70 feet thick—of 186 feet, and west of 183 feet. They have made a cross cut of the conglomerate to the hanging wall 74 feet, and drifted on the vein about 1,000 feet. They expect to cut the Calumet conglomerate vein in about 1,000 feet to the northwest, and about 1,100 feet southeast to tap the Wolverine vein. The mine has been sunk to the fourth level. They are working twenty-six men. Capt. John Daniels, Agent; John M. Richards, Mining Captain.

The Amygdaloid Mining Company was organized in July, 1860, with a capital stock of $500,000. The owners were mostly Philadelphia men. Mining was begun on the southeast quarter of Section 16, Town 58, Range 30, and prosecuted on an extensive scale. An expensive mining plant was put in, a stamp house with thirty-two heads Gates' stamps, and a large number of miners' houses erected. Three fissure veins were worked, but the main mine, which was called the Drexel, was south of the Greenstone. Up to the close of 1862, the company had received from the sales of copper the sum of $44,458.88, and from the sales of silver $558.50. During that year, an inclined railroad was built from the mine to the stamps, a distance of 1,600 feet. A rock house, with six rock breakers, a drum house and seventeen log tenements were erected, a powerful engine, and winding and pumping gear were put in. The yield of mineral for 1862 was 190,514 pounds, yielding 72½ per cent ingot.

During a period of dry weather the following June, the surface improvements were nearly all destroyed by fire—including saw-mill, stamp-mill, tenements and change house. The fire originated in the woods and had been running for several days, when a strong gale of wind arose, and, blowing in the direction of the settlement, soon obliterated it.

Notwithstanding this serious set back, the energetic agent, Mr. A. C. Davis, set to work with so much vigor that by November of that same year he had forty-one tenements built. The saw-mill had been rebuilt, and furnished the lumber and shingles. An agent's house, smith shop, change house, barn and office had also been built. A new stamp-mill building and boiler house, both of stone, were completed, and the stamps got in in June, 1863.

The destruction of the stamp-mill, and the necessity of devoting the labor of most of the hands to making the needed repairs, necessarily crippled the mining operations. One hundred and nine thousand five hundred and ninety pounds of mineral were shipped that year. Purchases of additional lands were made, making the estate 1,760 acres.

In 1864, the new stamp-mill, which it was supposed was built so strong as to bid defiance to the elements, was ab­ruptly stopped by the explosion of both boilers, said to have been caused by the engineers mixing too much whisky with the water used. The mine at the time was reported as presenting the most excellent prospects for a future yield.

In 1864, the stamp-mill was completed, 3,000 feet of railing laid on trestle work, rock crushers put in, and some dwellings, shops, barns and roads built. On account of the scarcity of workmen, some hands were imported from Canada, but the men ran away as soon as they arrived to avoid paying their fares and their board, leaving the company short some hundreds of dollars on that experiment. The yield this year was 135,795 pounds of refined copper; for 1865, it was 418,964 pounds. In 1866, the product decreased and the company shut down.

For the next four years it was worked on tribute, yielding from sixteen and a half tons to eighty tons a year.

In 1872, a final assessment of $10,000, exhausting the capital stock, was made, and a feeble attempt made for two years to work the mine. But a small amount of copper was obtained. In 1878, 1,259 pounds of copper were taken out on tribute, since which time no copper has been mined. It is another deserted village, and presents a striking contrast to the active, busy, energetic work now going for­ward on the conglomerate mine which adjoins it on the east.

In these chapters the vicissitudes of mining operations are well illustrated, and the kaleidoscopic changes produced from unforeseen causes which operate to prevent anticipated expectations from being realized, is also, to some extent, brought into view. In the future, much of this wasteful expenditure of time and money that has heretofore been to a great degree thrown away, will be prevented by proper explorations with the diamond drills or some equally useful appliance, and before hundreds of thousands of dollars will be uselessly squandered in barren explorations, by sinking pits, shafts, adits, levels and cross-cuts, the history of the deposits will be written on the drill-cores, extracted at a nominal expense and revealing the structure in its completeness.

The prospector, without this adjunct to actual knowledge, is only knocking at the outer door of Nature's great treas­ure house, while the hordes of stored mineral treasure lie buried deep in her secret vaults, awaiting the searching operations of the drill to reveal their hidden location.

We look for these means in the future to correct the mistakes of early operators, and place them on the road to successful mining on many locations heretofore abandoned as worthless.

The Ash Bed Mining Company, formerly the Petherick, was organized in 1861 by the Copper Falls Company.

That company having more territory than they could profitably work, their agent, Capt. Petherick, suggested that a new company be created to work the Hill Mine and the Copper Falls Mine, while the Copper Falls Company could operate the veins farther east. Accordingly, a company was organized, and the western part of the Copper Falls location was purchased by them for $30,000, and mining work continued as it had formerly been done under Capt. Petherick, the new company adopting the name of the Petherick Mining Company, the Captain acting as agent for both companies. After a few years, work on the Petherick was suspended. In 1873, the company purchased the stamp-mill of the Indiana Company, and again resumed opera­tions. Up to this time, their rock had been stamped at the Copper Falls Mill. In 1874, they shipped 167,976 pounds of mineral, yielding 141,199 pounds of ingot copper.

The mill could only be ran a portion of the year, owing to the insufficiency of water, and the expenses greatly exceeded the income. The indebtedness increased so that, in 1877, the property was closed out at Sheriff's sale and purchased by Mr. Delano, agent of the Phoenix, for some Bos­ton parties. The property not being redeemed, in 1880 a new company was organized, called the Ash Bed Mining Company, with a capital stock of $1,000,000, and the company went to work on the plan of the Copper Falls Com­pany. A deep adit has been run in 2,700 feet to the Ash Bed, to cut it 600 feet below the surface on the lay of the bed. A stamp-mill is to be built below the mouth of the adit, and water pumped from the lake. The old stamp-mill meanwhile was repaired and set to work on the ore raised at the old opening. The estate comprises 1,100 acres of land, on which are twenty dwelling houses and some other buildings.

William P. Hunt, President; William C. Coffin, Secretary and Treasurer; office, Boston, Mass.; Mr. M. A. De­lano, Agent.

The Bluff Mining Company was started in 1852, and did considerable work on the northwest quarter of Section 15, Town 58, Range 29, but, after working two or three years, abandoned it.

The Calumet Belt Mining Company have1,800 acres, located between the Cliff and the Central Mines.

The amygdaloid and conglomerate belts extend two and a half miles on the property. No mining has yet been done on the location.

The Caton Mining Company's property is located on Sections 20-29, Town 58, Range 31, comprising 280 acres. The mine was opened in 1856 by S. W. Hill, and was then called the Hill Mine. It was shortly afterward sold to the Chicago Mining Company, and called the Garden City Mine, Capt. Joseph Paull, Agent. Some time about 1868, Judge Caton came into possession of the property by virtue of his mortgage. Capt. Gattis relieved Capt. Paull in 1859, and has remained since in charge of the property as local agent. The stamp-mill was erected in 1858, and supplied with twenty-eight patent rotary Gates' stamps. This was the first use of these stamps. Over two hundred tons of copper were taken out. The works were closed in 1861. In 1881, the property was sold to a Boston company, and preparations are being made to unwater the mine preparatory to commencing active mining.

The Central Mining Company is working on the east half of Section 23, Town 58, Range 31, and is situated between the Winthrop on the west and the Northwestern on the east, about midway to the south between Eagle Harbor and Eagle River, and is so well up on the bluff that the greenstone formation passes east and west through the north half of it at an elevation of 700 feet above the lake. It is supplied with water from the East Branch of the Eagle River, which runs at the foot of the bluff through the property.

The vein, a vertical fissure about twenty inches wide, running at right angles with the formation, was first discovered in 1854 by Mr. Slawson, agent of the Cliff Mine, at a point about 600 feet to the south of the greenstone. An ancient excavation was opened at the place of discovery by a party of men under the charge of John Robinson, in which was found a mass of pure copper, and a well-defined vein was uncovered. Further opening of the mine disclosed the existence of copper in unusual quantity.

Immediately after Slawson's discovery, before explorations were made, the property was purchased by some Lake Superior gentlemen and a company organized November 15, 1854, a Board of Directors, consisting of S. W. Rill, John Slawson, A. A. Bennett, John Robinson and Waterman Palmer, duly elected and an assessment of 10 cents a share voted to be raised. In that month the first shaft was start­ed seventy feet north of the ancient pit, but water proving troublesome, an adit was driven to secure drainage and the shaft continued down fifty-three feet below it, disclosing the existence of a large amount of copper. The buildings and improvements of the Winthrop were secured, and A. A. Bennett engaged as agent.

In the year succeeding the discovery of the vein, there were taken from it eighty-four and one-half tons of mineral, yielding 80 per cent of ingot copper. Up to July 1, 1855, the expenditures and liabilities were, all told, $29,711.29, which sum was exceeded by the value of the copper $7,251.07—the first instance of a mine being opened on Lake Superior which produced and sold during the first year's operations enough copper to more than pay all the expenses of the company.

Two shafts had been sunk and considerable drifting done. Three houses and a horse-whim had been erected; the controlling interest had, however, passed into the hands of the owners of the Cliff, and, in July, 1856, C. G. Hus­sey, Thomas M. Howe, James M. Cooper, John Slawson, Waterman Palmer, William Bagley and A. A. Bennett were chosen as the second Board of Directors. Dr. Hussey, President; Waterman Palmer, Secretary and Treasurer. These gentlemen continued to control the mine until 1859, when a majority of the stock having been purchased in New York, a new Board of Directors was elected, with Jordan L. Mott, President, and James M. Mills, Secretary and Treasurer; office in New York.

The rental of the buildings of the Winthrop and the buildings and the stamp-mill of the Northwestern had here­tofore afforded facilities to carry on the work at a small expense for surface improvements, but, in 1860, the Directors decided to build their own stamp-mill and to push forward the mining work more vigorously. The mill was built in 1861. The product that year was over 204 tons, of 79.1 per cent mineral. In 1862, the product increased to 242 tons, 764 pounds of refined copper.

Four shafts had been sunk, and, in 1863, an inclined shaft for a double track was begun midway between No. 3 and No. 4 Shafts, and carried down on the angle of inclina­tion of the greenstone. Besides, surface improvements were rendered necessary, as they could no longer get the use of the Northwestern property. In this work, $44, 000 was expended and 7,000 acres of timber land purchased to obtain the necessary timber for the mine.

The product this year was 805,545 pounds of mineral, yielding 619,268 pounds of ingot. A dividend of $2.50 a share was made from the earnings, and it has never since failed to pay its annual dividends. A drawback was en­countered by a fire which destroyed its engine-house and shaft-house, which occasioned considerable delay on account of the scarcity of mechanics, but the work was kept going and 207 men employed.

In 1864-65, No. 2 and 4 Shafts were straightened and equipped and work steadily carried forward, notwithstand­ing the previous high rate of copper had correspondingly increased the wages, and it was found impossible to reduce them at once to correspond with the reduction in the value of the product.

In previous working, some extraordinary masses of copper had been found, and, in 1866, the product was about equally divided between stamp and mass copper, amounting to 876 tons 1,160 pounds of mineral, yielding 79.44 per cent of refined copper. The stamp rock yielding 2 per cent of mineral. The product continued about the same up to 1873.

The year previous, there were strikes among the miners, which operated to their detriment, as well as of the mine owners. While there were no overt acts of lawlessness, the general unrest was detrimental to the interest of all par­ties. Gov. Bagley promptly ordered the troops from De­troit to the copper region, but they had no riots to quell, as there were no overt acts beyond the power of the local au­thorities to quell.

To that date the general expenditures had reached the sum of $2,958,132.22; the total sales of copper were $3,­904,496.51. The total depth of shafts was 4,180 feet; total length of levels, 22,979 feet.

In 1875, a powerful hoisting engine and two large winding drums were put in, a new stone engine-house erected, and a new engine for pumping and working the main en­gine shaft was procured, and eighteen new dwellings erect­ed. Notwithstanding all this expenditure, a dividend of $5 a share was declared.

The product for 1875, 1876, 1877 was respectively about 733½, 1,403 and 1,408½ tons of mineral, averaging over 71 per cent of refined copper. For 1878, 1879, 1880, it ranged a little less than for the two years previous. The total product for 1881 was 1,271 tons, 560 pounds, and, for the first six months of 1882, 951 tons, 1,445 pounds.

In 1878 or 1879, the Madison Mine was sold at Sheriff's sale and bought by the Central Company, but the prop­erty was redeemed the next year.

They have introduced ten power-drills, and employ 200 men. Their shipping point is Eagle Harbor, where they have a warehouse and dock. They have been running twenty-four heads of stamp, but lately have increased the number. Employ in the stamp-mill ten hands, and make about sixty tons a month.

Officers at the mine: Capt. James Dunstan, Agent; Samuel Bennett, First Captain; Thomas Satterly and William Trethway, Second Captains; H. C. Burns, Surface Cap­tain; Allan Yowel, Master Mechanic; John F. Robert, Mining Clerk.

To keep up with the latest improvements, a telephone was erected in July, 1882, connecting them with Eagle Harbor and the central office in Houghton. The Central Mine Post Office was established about 1872.

Chicago Mining Company, formerly the British American Mining Company, is located on Sections 1 and 2, em­bracing 440 acres.

It was opened in 1856 by William Petherick, who explored for a London company. Capt. Paull afterward made some explorations with a few men, and drove a drift for a short time on the vein under the direction of the Garden City Mining Company. But little progress, however, was made until 1862, when Mr. Gattis was authorized to develop it, but only worked it for a short time. One shaft had been sunk and another one started when the company the London City —suspended the work to devote their attention to the Garden City Mine. It was afterward purchased by William Lill, Joel Ellis and J. H. Gattis, and reorganized as the Chicago Mining Company—William Lill, President; Joel Ellis, Secretary and Treasurer, and J. H. Gattis, Resident Superintendent and Director. Some masses have been taken out, but no mill built. No work has been done on the property since 1871.

The Cliff Mine.-The Cliff Mine is the historic mine of Keweenaw County. It was discovered in the greenstone bluff about three miles from the lake, by a party of explorers under the direction of Mr. Cheny, in 1845, and is lo­cated in the southwest quarter of Section 36, Town 58 north, Range 32 west. On the upper surface of the green­stone when first discovered it was narrow, and gave little indication of the wealth it held in keeping.

It was geologically examined by Dr. Jackson and Mr. Whitney, who, on finding it grew wider as they traced it downward on the wall of the bluff, advised to uncover it at the foot. Accordingly the debris of rocks was cleared away and an adit was driven about seventy feet, when a mass of copper, the first one found in place in the copper region, was discovered. This exploded the theory that all the masses found by the early explorers and voyageurs had been floated over from Isle Royale, and demonstrated that they belonged to the locality where found.

The Eagle River location was purchased of the Government and other leases abandoned. About five thousand acres were purchased for $11,600.

Prior to the discovery of the Cliff vein, articles of agree­ment had been entered into by the gentlemen holding the leases for the formation of a company. These parties were H. G. Hussey, Dr. Avery, T. M. Howe and four others. May 13, 1844, the association was formed as the Pittsburg & Boston Mining Company, and was incorporated under that name, by special act of the Legislature, approved March 18, 1848, with a capital stock of $150,000, divided into 6,000 shares, which were subsequently increased to 20,000 without increasing the capital stock.

The Cliff vein is an amygdaloid trap in character, and has proved from the start remarkably rich in mass copper, while yielding from its amygdaloid beds some excellent rock for stamping.

From 1846, when Dr. Avery took the decisive stand to deepen the mine and placed the money with which it was to be done at the disposal of the company, for the seven years next ensuing sufficient copper was taken out to realize from the sales a net sum of $1,328,406.83, from which $77 per share had been paid—amounting to $462,000; while the entire assessments which had been made amounted to only $110,000, or $18.50 per share--over $4 for one in­vested. At the same time the shares were worth $175 each on the Boston market.

The first dividend paid in the copper region was earned by the Cliff Mine and paid in 1849, amounting to $60,000.

In 1854, while driving north in the seventh level, a mass was found eighty feet in length and twenty feet in breadth, and of such an enormous bulk that a sand blast of several kegs of powder failed to stir it. This year, the company raised on their farm thirty tons of hay and 3,000 bushels of potatoes and turnips. They built a dock at Eagle River, constructed a road to it from the mine and erect­ed warehouses at the mine and at the harbor. They also built a stamp-mill and made other surface improvements.

About 70 per cent of the product was in masses, the re­mainder about equally divided between stamp and barrel work. Their smelting works were located in Pittsburgh. Its success was unprecedented, and one of the most remark­able features of this remarkable mine was, that all the rock excavated more than paid the cost of getting it out.

In 1858, the shares were increased, as before stated, to 20,000, the market value of which were about $300. They also set off 1,000 acres from the estate to form the North Cliff Mining Company, and appropriated $50,000 to aid the enterprise.

The capital stock of this new organization was divided into 20,000 shares of $25 each. These were afterward distributed pro rata to the stockholders of the Cliff.

Up to this time, there had been but little variation in its annual product for several years, but thereafter considerable anxiety was excited by an appreciable falling off in the production.

In 1860, the company purchased the estate of 2,300 acres with the mining plant of the North American Mining Company, at a cost of $100,100. This mine adjoined the Cliff and had been extensively worked on two veins, but without success. It proved still less profitable to the purchasers, for besides the purchase money they sunk all they employed in explorations.

The new North American—South Cliff—was opened on the southerly prolongation of the Cliff vein, in the south range as it is called, and, though it yielded some copper, was not worked to any great profit.

After the Cliff Mine attained a depth of 1,200 feet, the ground appeared gradually diminishing, and, in 1875, the company decided to discontinue work after July of that year, and sell the property as soon as a purchaser could be found. The estate at that time embraced 11,435 acres, not including that set off to the North Cliff, or the 1,100 acres of the North American Mining Company's property.

In 1871, the property was sold to Marshall H. Simpson, of New York, for $100,000, including all the lands in Keweenaw County that the company owned except the North Cliff and North American properties, and, in 1872, a reor­ganization was made under the general laws of the State of Michigan, under the title of the Cliff Copper Company, with a capital stock of $500,000 in 20,000 shares. The mine was placed under the management of Mr. O. A. Farwell, an experienced mining man, in the spring of 1872, and large masses were taken out after the mine had been unwatered. Mr. Farwell continued in charge until his death, June 22, 1881, when Mr. D. D. Brockway was appointed. Work had been nearly suspended at the time of his death. The mine at that time was considered worked out and was near being stripped and abandoned, but finally Mr. Simp­son decided to renew explorations, since which time several levels have been cleaned out and explorations made with the diamond drill, but thus far without gratifying results.

From seventy-five to eighty men are employed. The total product for 1880 was 147,204 pounds; for 1881, 50,­209 pounds; and up to August, 1882, about thirty-eight thousand three hundred and fifty-one pounds. In the years of its yielding large productions, with the copper was taken out considerable native silver. Of that which reached the company it averaged in value from $1,500 a year to $5,300 in one year.

The officers are M. H. Simpson, President; J. W. Blake, Secretary. Office, No. 7 1/2 Beacon street, Boston; Agent, D. D. Brockway.

Clark Mine.--This property was located in 1854 by Prof. Regault, who afterward returned to Paris and recommended it to parties there who made the purchase. July 1, 1857, it was deeded to Ernest Theroulde & Co. by Alonzo Simon Maurice, and work was commenced in 1869.

April 10, 1861, it was again deeded by Felix H. E. Theroulde to Edward A. J. Estivant, the present owner. The estate comprises the original Clark, Montreal and Bell locations.

Two veins were opened with adits and three shafts sunk. These were provided with engines for hoisting and pump­ing, and a stamp-mill was erected and was put into opera­tion in the fall of 1874, producing sixty tons of copper in six months. It was run by water taken from Lake Manganese, which was carried through a fifteen-inch iron pipe a distance of 2,200 feet, affording sufficient power to run sixteen heads of stamps.

There are a number of veins crossing the property which extends north and south of the greenstone, and is thus crossed by the ash bed and amygdaloid formations. One of the shafts had been sunk 300 feet, and explorations made north and south near the greenstone. Some masses were found of five tons' weight, but there was too much dead work to be profitable.

A drift was then opened 600 feet distant, and about forty tons of copper taken out.

After 1878, it was worked one year and a half on the east vein at the foot of the conglomerate, when it gave out after yielding about twenty-five tons of mineral. A shaft was also worked in the ash bed, but, as it did not pay, it was given up. The main vein of the Clark Mine was worked 2,000 feet, and, in the winter of 1881-82, a cross cut was opened from the adit of the old mine in the conglomerate.

Mr. Leon Lauvaux is the resident agent in charge of the property.

On the lands belonging to the Clark Mine is the Manganese Mine, from which about one thousand two hundred tons of fine grade peroxide of manganese was taken out from an open cut seventy-five feet deep, between July and December, 1881, with a little finish work in 1882. The dip of the vein indicates that it extends under the Lake Manganese.

In June, 1881, it was leased to a Pittsburgh company, who have given an option to the Cambria Iron Company.

Mr. Lauvaux is also the representative of various properties belonging to Philadelphia parties, as: The Amygdaloid, to the West of the conglomerate; the Resolute Mine in Section 18, Town 58, Range 29; the Empire (Copper Company) Mine in Sections 11, 12, Town 58, Range 28; the Girard Mine in Section 15, Town 58, Range 28; and of the Vulcan property in Sections 7, 17 and 18, Town 58, Range 27, making about twenty-five thousand acres of land. The Secretary and Treasurer of these companies is Mr. M. H. Hoffman, 333 Walnut street, Philadelphia.

Mr. Lauvaux also represents the Aetna Mine, of which Mr. Barnes A. Hoopes, at 34 Walnut street, Philadelphia, is Secretary and Treasurer.

None of these mines are now working, except, possibly, the Manganese.

The Conglomerate Mining Company has been construct­ed out of the lands which had formerly been set off to the Northwest, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Mendota, New Jersey, Maryland and Wyoming Companies, comprising an estate of 20,000 acres, giving them control of the veins and lands from the mines to and around Lac La Belle. The organi­zation was effected in October, 1880, to be in effect on and after January 1, 1881. The shares were placed at 100,000 and 50,000 shares were paid to the Delaware for its entire property, personal and real. The remaining shares were all subscribed for and $2.50 per share paid in.

When Capt. A. P. Thomas took charge of the Delaware in 1876, he found things in a bad shape. The mine is now working in the conglomerate belt, and the company, by availing themselves of the old opening of the Northwest Mine, and running levels to the new, have opened the mine very rapidly. During the year 1881, it produced 260 tons of copper, and at the present rate of production, will yield, for 1882, 700 tons.

The new organization have also made extensive surface improvements, expending, in 1881, $360,000, and the works entered upon in 1882, which will include the erection of a new stamp-mill at Lac La Belle, docks and other necessary improvements, with seven miles of railroad from the mine to the lake, will call for a like expenditure this year.

The new mill is being built on the latest improved plans, with three of the larger size Ball stamps, with a capacity for crushing 600 tons of rock a day. It will be supplied with Cullom washers and Evans' stone tables.

They have in use at the mine two 300-horse-power Rand compressors, equal to running fifty three-inch power drills and doing the work of 800 men. The work of mining, as drilling, hoisting and hammers, are all operated by steam. The principal shaft, No. 2, is now down 760 feet, and the work has been accomplished in less than eighteen months, and the shaft fully equipped. The engine, machinery and piping for air compressors cost $60,000.

The rock-house is built so that the rock can be run in at the top, where it is brought by a locomotive run on a Y track from the shaft-house, and is handled with great facility. The rock-house is supplied with one large and five small Blake crushers and one belt hammer. The rock, after being crushed, is run on a gravity road to the present stamp-mill, and the copper hauled from there to Eagle Harbor by teams. Hansom Holmbo, foreman of rock-house.

In June, 1882, in twenty-eight days, 4,125 tons of rock were stamped, yielding eighty tons of 78 to 80 per cent mineral. They have thirty Cullom washers, five Evans' stone tables and are working forty-eight heads of Gates' stamps, with a fall of sixteen inches. The mill was built in 1862. Its gives employment to thirteen men and eight boys. John Dougherty, foreman copper-washer.

The total number of men employed in the mine and on the surface is about 500.

Capt. Alexander P. Thomas, Superintendent; James Hoatson, Mining Captain; James B. Robert, Clerk; John H. Griggs, Master Mechanic. Henry C. Davis, President; Charles M. Foulke, Secretary and Treasurer, Philadelphia.

The Connecticut worked a vein for several years like the Eagle Harbor Company. In 1864, the property was divided into three half-mile strips, and an attempt was made to organize three working companies. They were denominated Sussex, Middlesex and Essex-the latter the east division next to the Amygdaloid, the Madison lying on the west. The company was the original proprietor of the village of Eagle Harbor. W. Hart Smith, Secretary and Treasurer, No. 4 Exchange Court, New York.

The Copper Falls Mining Company was originally a cotemporary of the Northwestern, and working on the same vein. It takes its name from the falls in the creek in whose bed the vein was first discovered. From the top of the falls to the stream bed below, the vein as seen to double in width, becoming eighteen inches wide at the bottom and small masses of copper were found in the stream below. By a little blasting and digging, considerable copper was found. An adit was driven in on this vein and four shafts, sunk in it. The vein yielded numerous small masses of copper, and one was found at a depth of fifty feet from the surface, weighing seven tons, the largest mass then discovered on the lake. More than a ton of silver in its native and combined states was taken out and sent to Paris. During the first two years' operations, the four shafts going from north to south were put down to a depth, respectively, of 47,208,45 and 83 feet, while the adit had been driven in a distance of 265 feet, and a winze had been sunk sixty-six feet below the level of the adit, and all the shafts had been connected by the proper levels. A good road had been built from the mine to Eagle Harbor, distant two and a half miles, some dwelling-houses built and a mining plant secured.

This work had been done under the auspices of an as­sociation formed October 16, 1845, and known as the Copper Falls Company, who purchased from the Lake Super­ior Company Government Lease No. 9, for the sum of $11,060.97. It had originally been granted to David Henshaw by the War Department, and embraced 4,261.5 acres of land, located on Sections 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and Frac­tional Sections 1, 2, 3 and 10, Town 58 north, Range 31 west, bounded on the north by the lake, on the east by the Eagle Harbor property, on the south by the Dana Win­throp and Northwestern Company's lands and on the west by the lands of the Lake Superior Company. On the south line the land rises to a height of about seven hundred feet above the lake.

In 1848, a special charter was obtained with the members of the association as incorporators, and a reorganization, under the name of the Copper Falls Mining Company, effected, the stock of the association being surrendered, and share for share of the new company issued in its stead. John T. Heard was chosen President, and Horatio Bigelow, Secretary; office in Boston. Work was continued until 1850, but not proving profitable, the agent was directed to discharge his men and quit work.

After the suspension of work, Mr. Samuel W. Hill, who had been connected with the geological survey of the Lake Superior region from the first, was employed to make a thorough examination of the property, and determine, as far as possible, the most promising point for profitable mining. Mr. Hill found six distinct transverse veins, which he named Jacob's Creek vein, the Hill vein, Copper Falls vein, Old Copper Falls vein, Child vein and No. 3—the latter the most easterly one—and, in his subsequent work­ing of the mine, a longitudinal lode, which he denominated the Ash Bed, which runs north 22 degrees west.

In June, 1851, Mr. Hill was engaged as Superintendent of the mine, and work was extensively prosecuted. In ac­cordance with his previous recommendation, the work of opening the Copper Falls vein, half a mile west of the old mine, was commenced, the land cleared, some houses, shops and an office erected. The Hill Mine was opened by a adit started fifty feet above the lake, which it was intended to drive in 6,400, upon which seven shafts were to be sunk —No. 1 to be 2,320 feet from the mouth. The end of the adit to be 700 feet below the surface.

In prosecuting this work, Mr. Hill discovered an important metalliferous vein which had been extensively worked by the ancient miners, as the markings of their numerous pits revealed, some of which, near the Copper Falls Mine, on being opened up, showed that they had been worked seventy feet in length and thirty-seven feet in depth. Charcoal, rotten wood, stone hammers, copper arrow-heads, and other evidences were found in the bottom of the pits, of the presence there, at some period in the shadowy past, long anterior to the historic era, of work­men who came and wrought and departed—whither, who can tell?

On account of the magnitude of the undertaking in opening up the Hill vein, it was deemed advisable to extend the working limits farther south, and accordingly, a quarter section of land was purchased for $8,000.

The product for 1852 was 12,651 pounds of refined copper; for 1853, 91,737 pounds. During the latter year, four and a half miles of wagon road had been graded to Eagle Harbor, other companies joining in the work; twenty-seven dwelling-houses, two boarding houses, office, shops, engine-house, boiler-house, a stamp-mill, a saw-mill, etc., had been added to the surface improvements.

In 1854, the ground had been extensively opened up to discover deposits of mass copper; but in this they were disappointed. They had, however, opened up about 11,000 fathoms of ground for stoping, one-half of which was considered sufficiently mineralized for working, but to make it profitable it must be worked on an extensive scale. The number of stamps were doubled, making forty-eight, but they could not dispose of the amount of rock that was ob­tained. Besides, they were not got into working order un­til near the close of the summer of 1855. From a failure to realize as they had expected, the company decided to stop further extension and reduce expenses as far as possible. Mr. Hill was succeeded by William Petherick as agent of the mine. The product for 1854 was 144,269 pounds of ingot. Work which had been previously done on the Owl Creek vein led to the belief that it would prove very pro­ductive, and subsequent operations have sustained the be­lief. The Hill Mine and Copper Falls mines were let on tribute, and the operations of the company were confined to this vein and the Ash Bed.

In 1855, the capital stock of the company having be­come nearly exhausted by assessments, the company was reorganized, with a capital stock of $500,000, in 20,000 shares. The ingot produced that year was about 169,639 pounds. The yield continued to increase from year to year, and that of 1859 doubled upon the yield of the previous year.

In 1861, the company set of 1,200 acres on the west, including the Copper Falls and Hill Mines, and a new company, the Petherick-now the Ash Bed. The company had previously expended $300,000 on these mines, and received 10 per cent on this amount for the property. In that year, one head of Ball's stamp was introduced into the stamp-mill, with satisfactory results.

In 1865, the adit had been driven on the Owl Creek vein 1,500 feet, and in sinking from it to the lower levels to secure ventilation, a rich fissure vein was cut, which greatly augmented the output, increasing the production to over five hundred and thirty-eight tons of ingot cop­per in 1866, and to more than eleven hundred and twenty-eight tons in 1867. This is the only mine north of the greenstone which has ever paid dividends.

An accident occurred in 1874, causing the death of sev­eral men, from the falling in of a large portion of the hanging wall. In 1877, the company was re-organized, and the capital stock increased to $1,000,000. The year following, the stamp-mill was burned, when the company decided to open the mine on a new plan. Up to this time, the total product had been 6,754 tons 1,157 pounds of cop­per.

A deep adit, which had been commenced some years previous at a point fifty feet above the lake, was driven in to the Spencer shaft, and 1,500 feet farther south—a distance of 4,800 feet in all—and is laid with T rail track. It has a descent of four inches in 100 feet, and intersects the shaft about five hundred feet below the surface. The shaft is down 700 feet, but the principal work is done on the adit level and above it in the ash bed.

A new mine is being opened to the east of the present location, which, from present appearances, promises to be a very productive mine.

The water of the adit is utilized in the stamps and wash­ers, with enough taken from Owl Creek to complete the need­ed supply. The loaded cars are drawn to the mouth of the tunnel by mules, and are thence hauled by machinery up the incline into the rock house, where the rock is broken up and dropped into the bins for stamping. The stamp-mill is located half a mile north of the mine, at the mouth of the adit. It was completed December 20, 1880; has two Ball's stamps, twenty-eight Cullom washers, and three Evans' slime-tables, one elevated above the other two, on which the rock from the center of the other tables is washed over, and the deposit from the center is again returned to the other two. By this means the copper is more thoroughly separated, and much of the flour copper, which would otherwise be lost, is now saved.

A well-appointed machine shop has been built just east of the stamp-mill, and connected with rail track with the mine. A new warehouse and several good dwellings have also been erected in the vicinity. Twenty-two men are em­ployed in the stamp-mill, and about one hundred and fifty tons of rock are stamped daily, producing about thirty-five tons of mineral per month. The copper is carried by teams to Eagle Harbor and shipped to Detroit. George Fisher, Superintendent of the Works; Henry Wilmers, Foreman Copper-Washer; Mr. Myers, Superintendent of Rock House.

About two hundred men are employed on the surface and in the mine.

The office is in Boston: David Nevins, Jr., President; John Brooks, Secretary and Treasurer. At the mine: B. F. Emmerson, Agent; William Ludlow, Mining Captain; William Jacka is reported to hold the position of Captain at present; and D. W. Twohy, Assistant Clerk.

The Copper Harbor Mining Company is an organization whose property is located on the east of the Star Mine. It is not being worked.

The Delaware Mining Company was organized in 1863, and 720 acres from the west side of the estate were set off to it, for which 4,000 shares of the Delaware Company were paid to the Pennsylvania Company and divided among its stockholders.

These two companies operated largely, and expended nearly $2,000,000 in mining improvements, while but little actual mining was done, and in 1866 the prop­erties were taken possession of by the bondholders, and the mines placed in charge of Mr. W. H. Spaulding as agent. Two years thereafter, the bonds were purchased by Ed M. Davis, of Philadelphia, who took possession of the property and assumed personal control. In 1876, a new organization was effected, consolidating both companies in one, and the Delaware Copper Mining Company was formed.

Capt. A. P. Thomas, formerly of the Copper Falls Mine, was placed in charge. After putting the shafts in order and doing considerable work without encouraging results, Capt. Thomas decided to reopen the old Stough­tenburgh Mine. A new shaft house was built over the north shaft, and the necessary machinery put in, a new boiler house, rock house, and elevated trestle work for a railroad from the shaft to the rock house, were built, and the levels opened up by east and west drifts.

In making these explorations, discoveries were made in the conglomerate belt that have determined the organization of a new company, which will hereafter conduct their mining operations upon the most magnificent scale, and, if money, determination, and thorough and extensive mining can be made to pay, the Conglomerate Mining Company are sure to win.

The Eagle Harbor Mining Company own a large tract of land, some two miles long by one and a half wide, south of Eagle Harbor. It embraces the property formerly owned by the Eagle Harbor and Waterbury. Companies, who worked some of the property, to a limited extent from 1850 to 1854, but without profit.

The Eagle River Mining Company hold lands adjoining the Phoenix, two and a half miles south from Eagle River. It is held by Cleveland parties. A. H. Barney, President; Clinton French, Secretary and Treasurer; Col. Charles Whittlesey, Superintendent.

The Fulton Mining Company hold 3,000 acres of the so-called mineral lands, located on Sections 26, 27, 33, 34, 35, and parts of 22 and 23, Township 57, Range 32. It was originally called the Forsyth Mine, and was opened in 1847. In 1853, the Fulton Mining Company commenced working the old location on the southeast quarter of Sec­tion 33, and opened four shafts, with an adit level on a fis­sure vein eighteen inches wide. Between Shafts 3 and 4, several tons of copper were found in small masses, and the vein yielded considerable silver. They shipped, in 1853, 1,255 pounds of refined copper. The Kearsage Conglomerate and Amygdaloid both cross the northwestern portion of the property.

The Hanover was formed to work an old location on the west half of Section 8, Township 58, Range 28. Two fissure veins were opened, at the expense of $20,000, and the location abandoned.

The Humboldt is also located on the ash bed, in Section 21, Township 58, Range 31. Work was commenced in 1853, and several veins explored, and $100,000 of assess­ments was exhausted without avail.

The Providence, Home and Hope, holding contiguous locations of 240 acres each, were organized in 1863-64, but did very little mining work.

The Iron City Mining Company worked during the same period as the Bluff Mining on Section 14, adjoining the Bluff. Two shafts were sunk, 300 feet apart, and connected by levels. They also sank several exploring shafts on Section 11. These veins proved unproductive, and work was discontinued.

The Madison Mining Company was formed in 1859, by a re-organization of the Summit Mining Company, which was originally organized in 1852-53, owning Sections 19 and 30, Township 58, Range 30. Work was commenced on two veins, distant about two hundred feet. Additions were made to the property until it comprised three sections of land. Work was suspended in 1856; the company re-organized in 1859, and work again commenced in 1863. Up to 1865, $140,000 had been expended to get out five tons of 68 per cent copper. A change of the local administration was made, and Capt. John Uren was engaged as agent. He recommended to open the mine on the east vein, below the twenty-fathoms level. The mine was finally leased for one year to Capt. Uren, on tribute, who took out, in 1866, about forty tons of mass copper. From this time until 1876, it lay idle, when, the stockholders refusing to pay an assessment to liquidate their indebtedness, it was sold, in 1878, at Sheriff's sale, but was redeemed by the company, and, in 1879, was again re-organized, with a capital stock of $1,000,000, divided in 40,000 shares. In September, 1880, work was resumed, under the direction of Capt. Jo­seph Snell, Agent, who has at present only two men work­ing at the mine. It needs capital and push to develop its resources. Charles H. Ward, Boston, Secretary and Treasurer.

The Meadow Mining Company was organized in 1853, under a special charter. Explorations were made in 1851, and, a few years after, some mining was done, and consid­erable copper was taken from the ancient pits, abundant along the transverse fissure veins which cross the property. It is also crossed by the ash bed.

The Mendota Mining Company was a company which commenced mining in the vicinity of Lac La Belle at an early day. The location affords facilities of a very desirable character for mining operations not generally found elsewhere. Here are also found veins of black and gray copper sulphurates and copper pyrites. Previous to 1850, the Lac La Belle Company had driven in a tunnel 400 feet on an eighteen-inch vein of sulphuret of copper, at the foot of the Bohemian Mountain, that rises 864 feet above the beautiful little lake which nestles so cozily near its base. A deep adit was also driven in the same vein 1,000 feet. No further work was done on the location until 1866, when the Mendota Mining Company took up the work and did 308 feet of sinking and 740 feet of drifting. The locations of the veins on which work was done were Section 29, Town 58, Range 32, and Section 29, Range 29. The Mendota Company owned 4,320 acres around Lac La Belle. They expended $100,000 in 1866 in constructing a ship canal from Lac La Belle to Bete Grise Bay, through which large vessels could pass. They received for this, from the United States Government, a grant of 100,000 acres of land in Schoolcraft County.

Lac La Belle is about two and a half miles long, east and west, and from one-half to one mile wide, north and south. It lies on the line of Townships 57 and 58 north, Range 29 west; and the east end is about three-quarters of a mile from the shore of Lake Superior, with which it is connected with a tortuous channel. The waters of the lake are deep and pure, and when once entered it becomes a safe and commodious harbor for the largest vessels. The canal was a direct channel cut due east and west between the lakes, and was so far completed in the fall of 1866 as to allow vessels drawing eleven and a half feet of water to enter. The company was authorized to collect tolls at a rate fixed by the county board of supervisors.

Following this, the village of Mendota was laid out and lots sold to the amount of $13,600, and a few buildings erected. The Pennsylvania and Delaware Companies ex­pended $12,000 in building a road to the lake, and $10,000 more in constructing a dock and warehouse there. The Lac La Belle smelting works invested some $43, 000 more in erecting works at this place.

A railroad company was organized to build a line from the Cliff Mine along the range to Lac La Belle, but on the failure of the mining companies to furnish sufficient product to make business for such a road, it was not con­structed.

From a failure to complete the canal properly, and the want of piers at Bete Grise Bay, the channel has filled with sand, and must be dredged out before the lake can be used as a shipping point or as a harbor. With the increased shipping on Lake Superior, the need of a good harbor in this vicinity is often severely felt, there being none now between Portage Entry and Copper Harbor. Some of the appropriations of Congress might be profitably applied here in the interests of the commerce of the upper lakes.

The Medora Mining Company was another organization controlled by the Pittsburgh & Boston Company. It was first organized under a special charter in 1851; the property comprising 320 acres of land, being the east half of Section 17, Town 58 north, Range 29 west, and is immediately south of the greenstone.

The available funds of the company were exhausted in the prosecution of unsuccessful work, and after a few years, the stockholders failing to respond to the calls for further assessments, the work came to a standstill. In 1860, the assets f the company passed into the hands of the Pittsburgh & Boston Company, who determined to prove further the value of the property, and explorations were commenced under the supervision of Mr. John Slawson, the agent of the Cliff Mine.

The mine had been sunk on a fissure vein, and was found to have amygdaloid floors, similar to those in the Cliff Mine, and with a view to determine their value he sunk two shafts east and west of the lode, forty-seven feet apart, and connected them with a drift, and what he believed was paying ground was discovered, but work was not followed up.

In 1864, by transfers of stock and a reorganization of the company, $20,000 was realized, and an assessment of $1 a share was made, to which only a portion of the stock­holders responded. It was found necessary to raise a large sum to put in a stamp mill before the ground could be thoroughly tested. This the company decided not to do, and work was suspended.

The property is owned by Dr. Hussey and his associates. Its officers were Thomas M. Howe, President; James M. Cooper, Secretary and Treasurer.

The Northwestern Mining Company purchased of the old Lake Superior Company 1,600 acres of land, located on Sections 24, 25, 26, 35 and 36, Town 58 north, Range 31 west, and the organization of the Northwestern Mining Company was effected, and work commenced, in 1845, south of the greenstone, on a fissure vein on the west half of Section 24, under the direction of Mr. Slawson, agent of the Cliff Mine.

The proprietors were Messrs. Howe, Hussey, Cooper & Moorhead, of Pittsburgh, and H. W. Walker, of Detroit-the same gentlemen who controlled the Pittsburgh & Boston Company. It was reorganized, in 1848, as the Northwestern Mining Company of Detroit, with a capital stock of $300, 000, with the office in Pittsburgh.

The vein had been previously opened, showing a good width, with a promise of being productive. Sixty men were employed, an adit driven to the greenstone, a distance of 1,250 feet, four shafts sunk, and considerable general work done. In 1852, a stamp-mill with twelve heads was put in, a hoisting and machinery were supplied to No. 4 shaft. A saw-mill was also erected to furnish the lumber for this and adjacent mines. A pumping engine was also put in at an expense of $6,000.

In October, 1852, the first shipment of 13,836 pounds of mineral, which yielded 8,622 of refined copper. Of this 10,568 pounds were barrel work and 3,268 pounds mass copper. In 1853, the yield was 61,165 pounds of mineral, giving a return of 44,166 pounds ingot. In 1854, it yield­ed 77,375 pounds of stamp copper, 43,594 pounds of barrel work, and ninety-nine masses=129,794 pounds-a total of 250,763 pounds. That year 1,776 bushels of potatoes, 400 bushels of turnips and twenty tons of hay were raised on the farm, and several thousand feet of lumber produced. Twenty-four houses in all were built upon the location.

With all its production, assessment after assessment was made, until $228,000 of its capital stock had been exhausted-only $72,000 still remained. After exploring to strike the central vein, which was continued through this property, and, finding its continuation unproductive, and being unwilling to resort to still further assessments, the company suspended operations in January, 1865, and the buildings and surface improvements have fallen into decay, representing Goldsmith's "deserted village."

The Native Copper Company, on Section 10, Town 58, Range 30, adjoining the Delaware, worked a vein crossing the ash bed in 1852, and, for awhile thereafter, in a limited way, without success.

The New York & Michigan Mining Company opened a mine in 1846, on the southwest quarter Section 12, Town 58, Range 28, which was again worked in 1852-53. The mine was opened to a depth of 150 feet on a vein twenty inches wide. They shipped, in 1852, 1,800 pounds of. cop­per.

The North American Mining Company was organized under a special charter in 1848, with a capital stock of $300,000, divided into 6,000 shares. The charter was so amended in 1851 as to increase the shares to 10,000, without changing the capital stock. The office was in Pittsburgh, Penn. Thomas Bakewell, President; Waterman Palmer, Secretary and Treasurer.

The estate comprised 2,400 acres of land, and the orig­inal mine was opened on the east half Section 2, Town 57, Range 32. A mine had been opened on this property in 1846, in a fissure vein under the south bluff of the green­stone. The vein has a bearing of fifty-eight degrees west, and is not on the line of the Cliff and other productive lodes, and is irregular and variable in width, and, though worked to a depth of 415 feet, failed to be remunerative. Two hundred thousand dollars was expended in four years, and 446,000 pounds of refined copper produced.

In 1852, work was transferred to the northeast quarter Section 1, adjoining the Cliff on the south, where the property is crossed by the Cliff vein.

In the first level, forty feet below the surface of the rock, numerous masses of copper were found, one of which weighed nearly two hundred tons, being forty feet long, twenty feet wide and two feet thick-at this time the largest mass of copper ever discovered. In this stope, in the first level, 300 tons of copper were obtained, and the hopes of the company were raised to the highest degree of expect­ancy, which future operations failed to realize; for, how­ever so earnestly the work was prosecuted, no other like de­posits were found. As the levels were pushed south, the ground grew poorer and failed to pay for working. A crisis was reached in 1858. Their funds and capital stock had been exhausted; they must find rich productive ground or stop operations. At first it was thought to re-organize and raise a fund on the stock of the new organization, but Capt. W. E. Dickinson, the Superintendent, advised a dis­continuance of work, and that the mine be let on tribute, and all work on company account was thereafter discontinued.

As we have before mentioned, the property was sold in 1860 to the old Cliff Company for $100,100. Explorations made by the Cliff Company with the diamond drill failed to discover profitable deposits, and, after it was abandoned by the tributers, who paid to the company about $15,000 a year tribute while working, the mine, all work ceased thereon.

The North Cliff, as we have seen, was an offshoot from the Cliff. C. G. Hussey was its first President, and Thomas M. Howe the first Secretary and Treasurer, with the office in Pittsburgh, Penn. The organization was made for the purpose of more rapidly developing the extensive tract of min­eral lands owned by the original Pittsburgh & Boston Company. Mr. S. W. Hill, who had examined the prop­erty carefully, reported favorably, and a consolidation was made with the Swanscott Mining Company, the North Cliff property was conveyed to the Swanscott Company, and by a special act of the Legislature the name was changed to the North Cliff Mining Company. The majority of the stock in both companies was held by the same parties.

Work was commenced that year and continued until 1861, when the endowment fund had been exhausted with­out obtaining profitable results, when the work came to a standstill. In 1863, the rise of copper stimulated to fur­ther exertion, and an assessment of 50 cents a share was called in, and work again commenced under the direction of Mr. James Watson as Superintendent.

An open cut and adit 1,700 feet in length was made, and driven to connect with an inclined shaft sunk in the ash bed at the south end. Three hundred feet farther south, No. 4 Shaft was sunk 135 feet to the adit level; and 965 feet north of this No. 3 Shaft was put down to the fourth level. These, with short shafts, winzes, drifts and stopes, failed to bring to light any rich deposits; the low grade rock obtained at that time not being profitable to work with the machinery at hand, the work was abandoned and the property deserted.

Later it has been sold for taxes, and the company have allowed their title to become extinguished by the courts.

It is now owned by John Senter at Eagle River, and Mr. Hill has been at work opening up a rich vein, which appears to be a continuation of the old Cliff vein, with a view to having the property again mined.

The Northwest Copper Company grew out of the North­west Copper Mining Association formed in 1847, which held 4,320 acres of land, comprising Sections 13, 14, 15, 24, and Half-Sections 10, 11, 12, 23, 25 and Quarter-Sec­tion 26, Town 58 north, Range 30 west, lying south of the greenstone. The office was in Philadelphia: William Pettit, President, and James G. Clark, Secretary and Treasurer. For two years, limited mining operations were car­ried on, on Section 15, when it was deemed best to effect an organization with sufficient capital to prosecute the work with increased vigor.

Under a special charter granted March 9, 1849, the Northwest Mining Company was organized, and, the 15th of May following, the stock of the new company was sub­stituted for that of the old. Associated with the officers above named as corporators in the new company were Horace Greeley, Oliver Johnson, George H. Thompson and Charles Schaffer, all of New York. The capital stock was $200,000, divided into 1,000 shares. James G. Clark was its first President and Horace Greeley is said to have been its second President.

Three mines were opened on transverse fissure veins, south of the greenstone, called the Stoughtenburgh, Hogan and Kelley. The Stoughtenburgh vein was opened with four shafts and an adit. Considerable work was done and quite a number of masses were taken out, weighing from a few hundred pounds to eleven tons. They were generally found outside the lode, but adjacent to it and isolated from other deposits of copper.

The lode had an average width of twelve inches, and, like the Cliff, was crossed by a series of amygdaloid floors, from which the most of the stamp rock was obtained. The first stamp-mill was put up in 1849-50, and run by water, but proving incapable of doing the work, another was put up in 1852, and run by steam. It was the first mill of the kind on the lake. The mine produced in ingot copper, in 1849, 34,322 pounds, 195,020 pounds in 1850, and 393,199 pounds in 1851, on which was realized, for the three years, $94,819.83, while the expenditures for the same period. were $172,183.96. An agent was sent to London to negotiate the sale of the mine, but the English parties would not purchase the entire interest, desiring the present owners to still operate it, which they declined, and the negotiations came to an end.

Being strongly urged by the agent, Mr. H. H. Beecher, to increase their operations and facilities for stamping, in 1859 a new stamp-mill was erected on the bank of the Montreal River, forty-eight head of Wayne stamps put in, a double-track, gravity railroad 1,200 feet long built, con­necting the mill with the mine, which, having a grade of ninety-four feet, enabled the descending loaded cars to draw up the empty ones.

The company had laid out the village of Wyoming (now locally called Hell Town) and sold the lots. Seventy-seven houses were erected, and all that was needed to make a thriving mining town was a productive dividend paying mine, by which it was connected by common interests.

At the close of 1859, the capital stock was exhausted, the excess of liabilities amounted to $130,000, the interest on their bonds was unpaid and financial ruin stared them in the face. A meeting of the stockholders was called and it was resolved to rerganize under the general mining laws, with a capital stock of $500,000, divided into 20,000 shares, the Northwest to sell all its estate, personal and real, in consideration of the new company assuming its liabilities, and the Pennsylvania Company was formed.

The Phoenix Copper Company is the outgrowth of the old Lake Superior Copper Company, one of the pioneer en­terprises of the copper region, the originators of which were among the first to take out permits from the War De­partment, after the extinguishment of the Indian title, in 1843. The Trustees of this organization, which so early secured leases of seven three-mile square locations in Keweenaw County, were David Henshaw and Samuel Will­iams, of Boston; D. G. Jones, of Detroit; and Col. Charles H. Gratiot, who had recently been engaged in the lead mines of Missouri.

Dr. C. T. Jackson was employed to examine this location, and reported several veins on the property, and, on his recommendation, work was commenced in the east bank of Eagle River, near the center of the line between Sec­tions 19 and 30, Township 58 north, Range 31 west, at first under his direction, afterward under the direction of Col. Gratiot, who was working fifteen men. In August, 1845, a stamp-mill, which had been purchased at Detroit, was put into operation. This was the first stamp-mill on Lake Superior, and, as is usual in first attempts, before the real necessities in the case are understood, it proved unsuccess­ful. This proved a serious drawback to the operations, although work was prosecuted with vigor, and, in 1845-46, an estimated product of 550 tons of mineral was taken out.

The main shaft had been sunk on a pocket of copper and silver, which was soon exhausted, and, in an effort to recover the vein, a tunnel was run under the river, at a depth of ninety feet from the top of the shaft, in which a crevice, filled with gravel and accumulations that showed the evident action of water, and, in a deeper hole, made by the current of this old stream, mingled with other deposits, were found about eighteen thousand pounds of copper, and an amount of silver-how much of the latter was never known, as it was largely appropriated by the miners; one piece, however, weighing eight and two-thirds pounds—one of the largest ever discovered in the copper region—came into the possession of the company, and is now in possession of the Philadelphia mint.

During the year 1846, a shaft was sunk about ninety feet in the vein found in this ancient stream-bed, which completed the work at this point. Mr. C. C. Douglas, the agent, and the men who were suspected of appropriating the silver, were discharged, and a Mr. Coryell appointed as agent, who, after the failure of a Mr. Taylor, of Detroit, to erect a stamp-mill that would do the work required, being the second attempt in that direction already made, changed his base to the south of the greenstone, stimulated thereto by the great success of the Cliff.

The original estate comprised about forty thousand acres. This was reduced by the sale of 5,500 acres, on  which they realized $33, 000, renewing the lease on the balance for three years, not having the funds to purchase it at the $2.50 per acre, as, by a late law of Congress, they were permitted to do.

After expending $105,833.40, they resolved to sell out to a new organization, and the entire assets of the Lake Superior Copper Company were turned over to the Phoenix Copper Company, which had been organized for that purpose under a special charter, March 16, 1849, with a capital stock of $300,000. The shares were placed at $100 each, but in 1851 the charter was amended, making the shares $30 each. The incorporators were Joseph W. Ward, Richard Pitts and Benjamin Graves. The Board of Di­rectors were A. W. Spencer, J. W. W ard, Mark Healy, B. W. Balch, all of Boston; Simon Mandlebaum, of Eagle River; A. W. Spencer, President; Horatio Bigelow, Secretary and Treasurer.

No less than five distinct veins were known to exist on the property, but of their practical value, or what other veins might exist, but little was known. The five veins were called, respectively, Phoenix, East Phoenix, Armstrong and Ward, in Section 19; and the Robbins Vein, south of the greenstone.

From 1850 to 1853, the work was in charge of Simon Mandlebaum as agent. In work done in some ancient pits in the New Phoenix, at a depth of ten feet, 1,200 pounds of copper were taken out, and, in driving a 900-foot adit on the vein, a mass of copper weighing 2,390 pounds was obtained. In 1851, thirteen tons of 60 per cent copper were shipped.

During these years, no persistent work was done in any one locality; shafts were sunk to a depth of forty, fifty or seventy-five feet, a little drifting done, and then abandoned. Adits were carried indiscriminately from 150 to 900 feet in places, and then abandoned.

In June, 1853, the work was placed in charge of Mr. S. W. Hill, who was instructed to examine the property, which then consisted of 1,701 acres, geologically, and to determine the most favorable points for operations.

In 1855, work was commenced on the ash bed, and the product, for three years, was raised from 10,847 pounds to 65,800 pounds. As there was not sufficient water at that point in Eagle River to run the necessary number of stamps to make the work profitable, a steam engine-the heaviest then on the lake—was put in, and a new stamp-mill, with forty-eight heads of Wagner's stamps, was erected, and twenty-five to thirty tons of refined copper was yearly produced.

In 1863, work was commenced on the Phoenix and Robbins Vein, south of the greenstone. In 1865, the capital stock had been exhausted by assessments, and it became necessary to reorganize, in order to make more demands for funds to prosecute the work. That year, 244,158 pounds of ingot copper were produced, which sold at an av­erage of 29 1/2 cents per pound. In 1866-67, the vein pinched in, and the product only reached 130 tons ingot. In 1869, it again widened, and yielded 400 tons, increasing, in 1870, to 500 tons ingot, and, in 1871, 1,310,350 refined copper.

In 1872, Frank G. White was appointed agent. The product that year was 728,359 pounds refined copper, which sold at 34.71 cents per pound. The total assessments up to this time had been $817,500.

In 1873, a large amount of sinking and drifting was done, but the product only reached 521,081 pounds of refined copper. An explosion of dualine killed Capt. John Hoatson and five men. Capt. Ed Parnell succeeded as Mining Captain.

In 1874, a surplus of $25,000 above the working ex­penses was earned. An inclined shaft was sunk on the Robbins Vein, 1,300 feet on the incline; a new engine, hoisting machinery and shaft house added; 1,398,440 pounds of refined copper were produced.

In 1875, besides the 960 tons of copper, there was also obtained 4,732 ounces of silver. A profit of $75,000 was made that year; and the year following, more ground was opened, and a surplus of $107,186 was earned, from which a dividend of $1 per share was paid-its first and only div­idend.

The company now owns 2,477 acres, and are arranging to work on the ash bed, where an adit ninety feet above the lake is being sunk 2,300 feet to intersect an old shaft at the second level, 150 feet below the surface. A stamp-mill will be built on the north for the use of this mine.

In 1882, they added to the old mining plant a Norwalk compressor and five Rand drills. The vein has improved in character, and the production of copper is increasing. In order to get out the masses and stamp rock, they are, however, obliged to raise about four pounds of rock to get one pound for the stamp-mill. They are stamp­ing about one thousand tons a month, and raising daily from 150 to 175 tons of rock. The production is mostly mass copper. The production for 1882 will approximate 500 tons. One mass of some 22,000 to 23,000 pounds was cut up and shipped at Eagle River the last of July. The mineral raised averages 76 per cent.

They are now working at a depth of 1,200 feet; the longest level is 1,400 feet; the bottom level is 500 feet, and still extending in both directions.

The product for 1880 was 290 tons ingot; for 1881, 303 1/2 tons; and for six months in 1882, was 165 tons 185 pounds, with a fair prospect of reaching to 450 or 500 tons this year.

Mr. M. A. Delano, who so ably succeeded Mr. White some eight years since, is local agent. William P. Hunt, President; William C. Coffin, Secretary—office, No. 8 Olive street, Boston; and Richard Bawden, Mining Cap­tain. The capital is divided into 40,000 shares of $25 each.

The Pittsburgh & Boston Company obtained early a lease of three square miles of a Mr. Raymond, which in­cluded Copper Harbor. Work was commenced by these gentlemen in 1814 on Hogg's Point under the direction of Charles Avery, the President of the Association, John Hays, agent. This was the first mining shaft sunk on the lake, and some bowlders only were found. This work was soon abandoned, and operations commenced on the vein on the opposite side of the harbor, near the site of old Fort Wilkins, where a deposit of black oxide of copper was found. This deposit was discovered December 5, 1844. Two shafts were sunk about 100 feet apart, and about forty tons of the metal were obtained and sold for $4, 500. The main shaft was carried down a distance of 120 feet and levels driven each way on the vein without finding any more ore, and the mine was abandoned. It is probable, however, that some day the diamond drill, or its competitor, will reveal in that vicinity a large body of rich mineral deposit.

Pennsylvania Mining Company was formed in Novem­ber, 1861, with the office in Philadelphia; Joseph G. Henszey, President; S. M. Day, Secretary and Treasurer.

The lands comprised 2,880 acres of mineral land, to which was shortly added by purchase 6,000 acres of timber land.

Mr. S. W. Hill was engaged as agent, and mines were on what was called Eagle vein, Branch vein and the Trot­ter vein, and the underground workings were made to conform with those of the Cliff and Central.

A new stamp-mill was built, the largest then on the lake, and furnished with the most approved appliances. A saw mill and other buildings were erected, a road built to Lac La Belle, new engines put in, and other surface improve­ments to the extent of $126,000 in all, and no copper had been produced.

The Seneca Mining Company owned 3,240 acres of land at the southern extremity of the greenstone ridge, near the south line of Keweenaw County, embracing Sections 20, 21, half of 22 and 23, and Sections 28, 29 and 32, Town 57, Range 32.

Some work was done on the northeast quarter of Section 32 about 1866 or 1867, in the Kearsarge conglomerate, lying south of the Calumet conglomerate, and between it and the Kearsarge amygdaloid, near the head-waters of the Trap River. In 1880, work was renewed under the direction of Capt. Daniels, agent of the Osceola Mining Company, with a view to thoroughly testing the lode.

In March, 1880, it was decided to organize a new com­pany, and 800 acres were set off from the Seneca estate, and the Ahmuk Company was organized, with Joseph W. Clark, President; A. S. Bigelow, Secretary and Treasurer. Office, 198 Devonshire street, Boston.

The St. Clair Mining Company owns 138 acres adjoin­ing the Phoenix on the west and the Eagle River Company on the east. The mine is opened on a fissure vein about ten inches wide. The shafts are sunk on the southern slope of the greenstone, and the rock is trammed to the stamp mill at the foot of the bluff.

The company was originally formed in 1863 and the mine was worked to the depth of 300 feet. In 1872, the stamp-mill was built with twelve heads of stamps. During the panic about that time, work was suspended and the property went into the hands of the creditors, who held it until 1879-80, when they organized a new company, with $1,000,000 capital, and assessed 37 cents a share to com­mence work. Twenty-five men are now employed working on the fourth level, producing from seventy-five to a hundred tons of mineral a year. It is being worked in a small way for development. The capital stock is $1,000,000, divided into 40,000 shares. Officers—J. H. Tuttle, President; John Brooks, Secretary and Treasurer; M. A. Delano, Agent; James D. Stevens, Mining Captain.

The Star Mining Company is one of the oldest com­panies located on the Point that still preserves its organi­zation. It is located on the east half of Section 9, Town 58, Range 28, and was opened in 1851 on a fissure vein south of the greenstone. Two shafts were sunk and work continued until 1857. No. 1 Shaft was put down 300 feet and $70,000 expended. It was re-opened in 1864, and a small amount of copper taken out.

The Winthrop, adjoining the Central on the west, expended $90,000 in 1852 without any very encouraging re­sult. They operated on a fissure on the southwest quarter Section 23, and west half Section 26, Town 58, Range 30.

Statistical | Mines & Miners
Copper Harbor | Eagle Harbor  | Eagle River | Delaware | Copper Falls | Central | Phoenix | Allouez | Ahmeek (Ahmuk)

  

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