Show possibilities of below water level metal mining Is now attracting attention in old camps of nevada by letson balliet E M tybo reville jefferson twin rivers and silver bend belmont were mining an camps with several thousand inhabitants in the and of the last century there were others the bistor history y of these old mining 6 camps is largely legendary replete with tales of adventure tragedy and the greed for wealth fiction writers have embellished the legends 6 with romance but ceolo geologists C ests and minin mining 6 engineers b of today find shafts that were sunk to depths of and feet during an the period of these early activities usually the bottom levels are now under water indicating that pumping or hoisting water had been one of the problems of mining none of the early day mining operations in nevada went much below the water level only on the comstock lode and later at tonopah have the nevada mine operators undertaken to fight water to follow ore to 6 great depths and manhattan development is now facing water problems but let us its return to our story of the earlier mines and try to reconstruct the story of their difficulties as detectives try to reconstruct the story of a crime they see committed early day difficulties and problems ore from these mines was hauled to mills or railroad with ox teams and mules sometimes for as much as miles supplies for mining were hauled the same distance on oil the return trip of the ore wagons deep furrowed ruts of theold the old roads can yet be found in many places where the sweating swe abing teams and swearing teamsters labored to give the he world millions of gold silver and lead ruins of old dry crushing silver mills stamp mills with pan amalgamators and smelters shelters sm elters indicate that the early miners liners tried to eliminate the long haul by milling the ores on the ground or at the nearest spring or water supply at least ast one and probably others of these old mills has a furnace anace lined with firebrick fire brick that was hauled from kansas acty ty missouri to nevada by team I 1 recounting old spanish methods it I 1 is said that old spanish miners around silver peak paymaster and pani panamint m mint int country transported ore to san diego so on pack ani animals mals which helped the padres to bield ulla the e missions in southern california in the old work ln 91 of the padres the rock and ore was broken by building fires alres against the face and throwing water on the heated rocks s for they had no powder or at a t least so little that eco onomy OnY was necessary the old spanish workings are dually ally shallow tunnels but the fortune hunters of the and 70 s usually sunk shafts and curiously enough nearly all of them stopped at depths of to feet the bottom levels of which are now flooded we naturally ask ourselves does this mean that the ore was merely a surface deposit that went no deeper or lid did the miners face difficulties they could not overcome under tinder the then existing conditions hoisted with two inch hemp rope most of the early mine operators had no wire rope being compelled to use hemp ropes a two inch hemp rope h having a vin 6 about the same strength 6 as half inch wire rope of today even the present day miner care to go much beyond feet with half inch wire rope another difficulty would confront the hemp rope if the mine encountered water which would cause the hemp rope to become so soggy slippery and heavy it would stretch badly when wet if the shaft was an incline hemp rope would have a much shorter life than a wire rope hoisting at that date was done with steam power pine wood and sage sae sa 6 e rush brush being the only fuel available boiler capacities were small steam engines were not developed as they are today and were hogs 6 for steam hoisting drums were often homemade home made reels of enormous size for winding big hemp rope upon imagine the size of a reel that would hold or feet of six inch rope hemp ropes are 1 measured by circumference a six inch hemp rope i being about two inches in diameter wire ropes ar are e measured by diameters stearn steam pumps 60 years ago were not the efficient pumps of today and a foot lift was about the limit one could expect for a steam pump however the evidence points to the fact that many of the early day miners baled the water out with the hoist that too has its limitations how much time can the hoist be tanking water and still have time to hoist enough ore to be profitable latent possibilities of ghost camps with all these things in mind we can but wonder if some two score of these old camps which charles van loan designated as ghost cities may not have even t greater possibilities with modern equipment delving to depths impossible of attainment under early day handicaps stories handed down from the last man to work under tinder g ground round say there was ore in in the bottom in almost every one of these abandoned mines occasionally half hearted attempts have been made to one of these old mines but the finance supplied for the purpose was so limited that no thorough cleanup of the bottom and exploitation below was possible in none of these attempts has the mud deposited from froin the water and cave ins been cleaned up to say nothing of following the veins to greater depths did I 1 say none I 1 meant none until about four or five years ago ill tell you of one notable exception later only richest ore could be handled some of the dumps on these old mines consisted of ore too low in value to stand the long haul to mill or market at the time the rich ore was sorted out a and nd hauled off while the lower grades were thrown away as waste the low grade t rade ores were never broken down and hoisted except where it was necessary to get it out of the way to reach higher grade ores many of the old waste dumps of the early miners have since been hauled away and milled in modern mills which indicates that what was low grade ore left in the mines of sixty years ago might be extremely profitable as high grade mill ore of today ambitious but not very practical promoters have attempted to finance some of these old properties by the stock selling corporation method their failures due to inability to raise sufficient funds and the misdirection mis direction of what funds they did succeed in getting has given these old mines a black eye that they do not deserve illuminating examples of failure one of these ill advised attempts to rejuvenate an old mine consisted of the promoter raising about which he spent in erecting a flotation mill and milling some of the old dumps to prove that the mill would work he did not pump out the old mine nor sink one foot beyond the water level resulting in the mill being forced to shut down for lack of ore with the a total loss the mill stands today as it has stood for 15 years rotting and being carried off for fuel by prospectors of the neighborhood it would be difficult to interest capital on the record of that failure and yet it is possible that if that money had been spent in un watering the mine and following the veins to an additional addition all depth of feet that the mine might produce more ore than the early day miners miners ever had it is difficult to believe that all of these old properties nearly a hundred in number scattered in two score old abandoned ghost cities were merely surface deposits that dial ended at a depth of feet and just below the water line I 1 believe that nevada has a big future in ore production below the water level in the old camps that made history 50 and 60 years ago difficulties on the comstock look at the comstock that was the greatest battlefield the mining world ever knew against water suppose the comstock miners had stopped at the th water level how many millions would yet be in that district A huge drawing of the comstock mines hangs on the wall of a virginia city store carrying 6 the statement that the production of tile the mines of that district totaled up tip to 1886 it has since produced considerable at a much lower price for silver than was paid prior to possibly half of that sum came from below the water level tonopah since 1900 has produced over with 65 cents silver which would be about at the price of silver during the palmy days of the comstock Tono deepest mine when sunk stink below the water level produced millions from the depths goldfield produced in gold but almost ever dollar of it from above the water level old camp metal production returning to the old camps including austin eureka hamilton tuscarora white pine and others it is safe to say that nevadas production of gold silver copper and lead aggregates Z more than two billion more than half of it from above the water levels and all of it except from the comstock and tonopah To practically above the water level if the comstock and tonopah can produce millions from below the water line why is not the same thing possible in other old districts where depth was never explored at this point I 1 wish to inject that as there has not been one billion minutes pass since the birth of christ the rec rod of nevadas mineral production exceeds two dollars a minute since the birth of christ mostly from above the water level to illustrate the logic of this article we have but to call attention to the history of the tybo mines several puny attempts were made to finance them one attempt tempt Lt resulted in the expenditure of several hundred thousand dollars but without gaining any additional depth the tonopah belmont was offered the ane property but turned it down after examination the tonopah mining it down in of the Corn company pany turned spite recommendations of naw W H blackburn and ultimately mr blackburn res resigned i agneu from the tonopah mining company to interest san francisco capital in the property work not talk is what counts without blowing of fanfares fan fares nor buying of automobiles or trucks mr blackburn extended the electric power line to the property pumped it out cleaned up the lower levels and followed the veins feet deeper than the b greatest rea test depth ever reached by the early operators the result is that he has proven the ore was not a surface deposit but that the veins extend to depth and he has now opened up ore enough to be assured that the mine will be a greater producer than it ever was the same people that backed mr blackburns blackburnn Black burns judg ment have taken his further advice and have option cd the reville mines which have had a similar history to tybo so great is the importance of the tybo development that talk in financial circles has begun to plan a railroad from the union pacific line near las vegas to tybo and reville for the purpose of giving the district a direct outlet to the utah smelters shelters sm elters for its ores probably many of the old camps would be just as good as tybo if they had the same intelligent and competent exploitation ex p loi tation nevada has much in future from deep mining and there is lots of money ready to jump at that kind of development but not in home made stock companies with unknown and untried promoters who have elected themselves to the offices for the purpose of handling the capitalists money |