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Show 'Nothine If Not Resilient By Steve Dering Observation and conversation during your visit will make it impossible im-possible to escape the atmosphere of prosperity which presently permeates Park City. Building is booming, new plans are blossoming and it appears that our town is ready to take its place among the country's premier recreation areas. The prosperity is nice but not novel. Park City has known heydays before, wild and flamboyant ones. It also has experienced black days which, in other places, produced ghost towns with lively pasts and no futures. Park City is nothing if not resilient. For more than a hundred years it has alternately ridden the heady tide of fame and fortune and suffered through economic depressions and natural calamities. The town's roots go deep into the surrounding mountains which made Park City the nation's biggest silver mining camp in days gone by. It was silver that lured Col. Connor's prospector-soldiers into the area when they weren't keeping an eye on the Indians and Mormons in the early 1860s. In 1868 three of these soldiers inspected inspec-ted a ridge above Parley's Park, chipped away at an outcropping of metal-bearing quartz and found silver. Whether this was the first Park City strike is disputed. What is not disputed is that the ensuring years produced a silver bonanza that was, and is, mind-boggling. The myriad of tunnels which penetrate our mountains eventually even-tually surrendered more than $400,000,000 in silver and fostered twenty-three millionaires. The Park City Mining District's first claim, the Young American Lode, was filed on December 23, 1868 but it was the Ontario strike in 1872 that really started the silver wheel rolling. Purchased for $27,000 by a group that included in-cluded George Hearst, the Ontario. On-tario. Mine yielded $50,000,000 in deposits. It was in the bowels of the Ontario that the Hearst empire, em-pire, including the famous newspaper chain, was born. As the Ontario proved its worth, numerous new claims, such as the Walker and Buckeye, the Wood-side, Wood-side, the Tenderfoot and the Northland, Nor-thland, began to dot the mining map. Concurrently, shanties and tents dotted the land below. As the mines continued to give, the shanties and tents gave way to log cabins and more substantial board houses. On July 4, 1872, a makeshift flag of flannel and silk was hoisted to declare the existence of Park City, Utah. That same year, a large number num-ber of big ore discoveries were made, further accelerating the town's growth. But the growth MUST Zx, J fi'$mmJ 5? ""'"' '!0' "-WW s a5 v c iif. I 1st tW4 it v. V ' ' - "--t'f'CZi t 'bT -i-V - - .Ajsfcp: 7Z SnnMirt ir,iu'- "V """'r-,t'"' ' , . ,-WHffiBt II , I HQ- was not always harmonious. The mines attracted a volatile mix of nationalities Irish, Cornish, English, Scotch, Chinese and Scandanavians which made paydays at the more than two dozen saloons a hazardous and sometimes fatal occasion. Boasting a population in excess of 5,000 in the early 1880s, Park City's commercial district began to emerge with the addition of telephone service, a new bank, stable, grocery store and general store. Hotels and rooming houses also mushroomed. The mines continued to flouish and on March 8, 1884, Park City was granted a charter incorporation incor-poration despite resistance from the predominately Mormon Utah territorial government. Park City is not without its legendary rags-to-riches stories. Thomas Kearns reportedly came to town with a pack on his back and ten cents in his pockets. After working in the mines and studying the area, he became a partner in the Mayflower Mine, quickly rose to vice president of the Silver King Mining Company, and went on to fortune as a businessman and fame as a United States senator. One of Kearns' partners, Albion Emery, died in 1894, leaving a wealthy ' widow, Mrs. Susanna Emery-Homes (after remarriage) who became Utah's famous Silver Queen. Opulent in her ways and far-ranging in her travels, the Silver Queen made the local silver boom known through the world. The wild times were tamed and the "indiscriminate shootings" were history when the Gay Nineties arrived, finding Park City an established respectable town. Both the people and building populations were expanding expan-ding rapidly when Utah received its statehood in 18. The Great Fire struck on June 19, 1898. It started in the American Hotel and devastated Main Street, razing almost every building. The conflagration left 500 homeless, caused more than a million dollars in property damage and had many outsiders writing Park City's obituary. But the heat of the flames forged a collective character that was stronger than before. The Parkites were more than a match for the catastrophe and the city was soon rebuilt. The mining and the city continued con-tinued to prosper until 1907 when a national depression sent silver prices downward and a cave-in at the Ontario curtailed production. The storm was weathered, however, and conditions improved im-proved the following year, But with some of the smaller mines unable to withstand the economic fluctuations, a trend toward consolidation con-solidation began. In 1919 the Walsh-Pittman Act set the price of silver at a minimum one dollar an ounce, igniting another boom period. Ski jumping on the local mountains also enjoyed a boom at this time with Alf Engen and the Utah Ski Club visiting Park City in 1922. The Twenties were a pleasurable period until Park City, along with the rest of the country, was slapped by the Crash of '29. Silver prices plummeted to 25 cents an ounce and unemployment unem-ployment was rampant. Prices began to rise in 1933 and the city was, once again, on the mend. But prices, and consequently consequen-tly the city's fortunes, continued to fluctuate through the Thirties and into the mid-Forties. It was in 1945 that Park City got its first ski lift. Bob Burns and Otto Ot-to Carpenter opened Snow Park in Deer Valley and a small trickle of "ski bums" was felt. In 1949 the mines were crippled by a prolonged strike and in 1950 prices dropped drastically. Unemployed miners began leaving town and most of the mines ceased operation. Long-established Long-established businesses folded and shuttered windows pockmarked Main Street. As the town's population dwindled dwin-dled to 1,000, the long trend toward consolidation culminated when the Silver King Coalition merged with Park City Mining Company. Depressed but not defeated, the townspeople went about their business, waiting for the next swing of the pendulum. The swmg was slow and came from an unexpected unex-pected direction, but it came. In the late Fifties, Salt Lake City residents discovered a quaint mining town less than an hour from their homes. At first it was a nice place to spend a weekend away from the, summer heat. Then it became a nice place to live, being only a short ride from |