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Show m ERECT LEAD PLANTJN UTAH Considerable speculation has been occasioned by the chanue of owershlp of the Nevada-Utah company of PI oche. a deal supposedly backed by the Internationa Smelting and Refining interests Cole-Ryan svakate). Should the International be the new owner of this ccmpany. and should the program pro-gram of consolidating many of the big Pioche mines be brought to a successful suc-cessful issue, there are those who see in this step a new era for the silver-lead silver-lead producers ot this western country. At the lime the International smelter smelt-er at Toeele was Htarted. John D. Ryan, president of the company, stated stat-ed that this plant, whllrt a custom copper smelter, would be a custom lead smelter as well, should a sufficient suffi-cient tonnage of lead ores be obtained obtain-ed to justify this action. A few weeks ago. E. P. Mathewson, general manager man-ager of the company, stated that the company was scourlDc: the western country for lead propositions, and that lead stacks would be added to tho Pi-ocho Pi-ocho plant should a good enough tonnage ton-nage of such ores be found Tho tonnage of lead ores in the developed de-veloped camps of the" west are very well nailed down by the smelting companies com-panies already provided with lead furnaces fur-naces There Is just one camp which numerous strong mining engineers have asserted for years past holds nn enormous amount of sllver-lad-zinc ores and that camp is none other but Pioche. P'oche. years ago, was one of the mast famous of Bllver camns of thf west. Two or three years ago the camp enjoyed a small-sized boom, many good-sized mlnlnu deals being pulled off by some good Interests But tho panic happened alont Just in time to nip this boom in the bud. and stneo then the salvation of th- district has been considered the entrance of enp-ltal enp-ltal strong enough to erect mills and a smelter. Recent tests have heen made by the C n?olidated Pioche company on the enormous available low-qrade tonnage of sllver lead-zlnc ores and It U understood under-stood that success has attended the efforts to obtain a silver lead concentrate concen-trate and R spnrnte zinc concentrate which. If true, solves the most difficult diffi-cult problem (hat confronted the mine owners of the camp. There remnins now to erect m'lls contnining the process pro-cess demonstrated correct and a smelter smel-ter to handle the silver-lead concentrates. concen-trates. The question then suggests itself nj to whether or not the smelter would be Installed in Pioche or In Tooele county. It Is agreed that a much more economical Installation can be mndo at Tooele, aud operating expenses would lo much less by addinc lead furnaces to tho Tooele plant than to build a separate reduction works In Pioche itself The first thing to be considered, however, from the Tootle standpoint, Is the question of freight rates fr.m Pioche. Here Is the chance of the Salt Lake Rome to reao the logical reward of the wise installation instal-lation of the Pioche branch line. |