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Show UTAH'S FIRST MINE, j With the blowing lu of tho Males f tic smelter near Mllford a promised event of tho Immediate future and tho corresponding increaso of development devel-opment and extraction work In tho ' mines near by, Deaver county ought to j bo indulging In something of a boom 1 on its own account before long. Let I, It come! As one who Is' in a position to testify to tho merits of that section ' from resldenco and observation, I rc- peat, without the fear of successful I and tho belief in any other form of contradiction, let it come! Thero Is nothing too good for Beaver, and all i that sho hath In tho way of posscs- f slons and prosperity, realized and lj prospective, Is but tho merest tithe of ! what Bhe would have If what tho cav erns and fissures a Httlo below be-low tho surface contain could only be exploited and brought within the scrutiny and analy-1 analy-1 tical capacity of that versatile and sometimes uncertain genius, the mln-i mln-i ing export. Thero recently passed away at lit Mlnersvlllc, at a green old age, an ex-1 ex-1 bishop of tho Mormon church who Mm with a few others uncovored tho first HPj precious metals in Utah. His name was Rollins and the deposit which he unearthed for somo time boi-e his M name, though subsequently it became S lenown ns the Lincoln mine, the name H9 having been changed by tho corpora-H; corpora-H; ! tlon which acquired the property H ', about tho time the ilrst Republican H president was Inaugurated. The ores H . extracted by the g""d hi'liop (all blsh-H blsh-H ops are good) and his associates would H . not at that or oven at this tlmo rank H ' very high among tho "precious" pro-Hi pro-Hi ducts of the land, being chiefly lead Hj( and mined for that l-eason. The blue Hf metal could not, in largo quantities at H least, be transported from the cast by H i mule express on profitable terms, and H i as It was needed for many uses be-H be-H j sides the principal one of converting H bad Indians Into good ones and act-H act-H lng as the only extinguisher of wild H beasts' appetites while incidentally Hi, providing food from that source, the H 1 1 necessity for production at homo was H ' 1 nhsoluto and imperative. As time ad-H ad-H vanccd, it was clearly observable that H I tho lead was getting harder and oven H; the unskilled pioneers were not long li in doubt ns to tho cause the percent-li percent-li ago cf what was decidedly (then) a H precious metal silver which the H ores carried was Increasing and soon l tho crudo methods of tho unskilled H " miners would have to glvo way to Hj, ' more advanced means of extraction; not that they could not have contin-H.,: contin-H.,: ; ucd their work with their primitive lu contrivance, but perforating tho skins H t of Indians and their four-footed as-Hi as-Hi sociatcs with missiles worth n dollar H1' ! apieco or' moro was altogether too ex-H ex-H i i pensivo a luxury for thoso early days. H;i This circumstance Anally attracted at-H- tention elsewhere and tho corporation H previously spoken of was tho result. H For a time It did an Immenso busl-H busl-H i ncss. So rich was tho bullion in silver (with a small admixture of gold, which Is an inovitablo associate to H some extent of tho white metal) that (, it paid handsomely to ship- it to Salt H . Lake by wagon and team. Other H' finds' were mado, considerable work H ' was done and a town of no mean pro-I' pro-I' portions sprang Into existenco. The lj , town was lust attaining to tho neccs- sary proportion of badness to be con-I con-I sldored a real mining camp when the I Lincoln sprang a leak cut a living I voln of water and It is thero yet. I'i After more or less spasmodic effort? I to continue tho mine was cloned down H, for a tlmo and son the other proper-It proper-It ties, acting moro sympathetically than I, , through any real necessity I think Ifj I closed down also. A lawyer of that I date named Wells Splcer, whoso 11- brary consisted of one pony volume on torts, which he carried In his pocket, who was one of the main promoters of the corporation and an active worker in Its affairs a lolly good fellow withal, as I distinctly remember bade a sad farowell to his erst promising hopes of a "raise' and Was last seen as a bas relief figure mounted on tho hurricane deck of a ?40 mule, a moving mov-ing plcturo against tho dark background back-ground of tho Beaver mountains and bathed in tho effulgence of the retiring sun as ho himself departed from the view. Tho words of "Lear" suggested themselves as Splcer crossed tho divide di-vide "Thou'llt como no more, never, never, never, never!" And ho nover did. Arizona absorbed him, no doubt for good. The work ho left behind has been taken up variously at different differ-ent times and by different people; tho oixj Is thero yet in great, exasperating abundance, but so is tho water. It Xvill be fixed sometime, and with its fixing if not sooner the adlacent properties prop-erties will again swing into line nnd contribute their quota toward making "Swato Baver" all that nature designed design-ed It to be. S. A. KBNNBR. |