From Prospect to Mine (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1910 edition. Excerpt: ...rapidly to the camp. The floating population of the mines, prefer some larger mining camps, as the miner has the hope of getting a job in a neighboring property if no man is needed where he first applies. The supply of labor is a more serious question in an isolated mine. In the development of a new camp a human feeling urges the men to congregate, and a man who is surrounded by other prospectors also at work and opening a mine near by will feel his energy renewed, and he will try harder to succeed than if he were left alone to his own resources. The cost of opening a mine and of operating it depends on numerous factors, which may be grouped in several classes; the nature of the country, the location, the altitude, the absence or the presence of lumber and of water; the distance to the base of supplies; the nature of the vein and the grade of the ore; the metal or the metals which are contained in the vein. The climatic conditions have an important bearing on the facilities or the difficulties to cope with in developing and in operating a mine. The Rocky mountains extend from north to south for two to three thousand miles, and they are the real backbone of the continent. At some places the snowfall is so great as to blockade the trains for months, while at others the lack of water has prevented the mining at a profit of all the ore which cannot be shipped away to a smelter. Large bodies of low-grade ore, which would be mined and concentrated at a great profit, lie untouched because of the lack of water for a concentrating mill. The mines need to have a large supply of timber, which will be used in the shafts, raises, stopes; and they need, in places, some big, heavy timbers of good grade. Water is needed in all cases, where ore is milled...