Garfield County News | 1955-02-24 | Page 69 | Lonely Isolation is Mesa Miner's Lot

Lonely Isolation Is Mesa Miner's Lot It isn't all "gravy" working la the uranium mines . . there's the loneliness that goes with it. High up on Deaver Mesa, working as superintendent of the rack Rat Mine is William Turner. 24-year-old Navy veteran. He and his wife live together on the mesa, but they must send their young son to live with friends at Gateway, Colo., so he can attend school. Although it Is but 17 miles from their mesa home to Gateway, there is a drop of some 2,000 feet in altitude in that district and the trails are precipitous and dangerous. They try to make the trip every week, but there are cloudbursts in summer and fall and snow in the winter that often prevent them from making the trip. Turner said he and his wife have been marooned on mountain sides for as long as four days because of storms. They have but few visitors, and when they do come It usually is a business visit. There are men working at the mine, but "when they get a chance they take out like a cyclone," says Turner. Because of the remoteness of their location and lack of what people living in towns and cities consider commonplace services, the Turners hunger for reading material, company, and bright lights. "Miners come up here to try this kind of work," he comments, "but they miss the sidewalks and soon leave."