COPPER DEPOSITS IN ARIZONA 



WITH A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE MINING OPERATIONS IN THAT REGION 

 AND SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE COPPER QUEEN MINING COMPANY 



By James Douglas 



Dr. James Douglas of the Copper Queen Consolidated Mining Company, who has such large 

 field knowledge regarding the copper deposits of Arizona is a great benefactor of the American Museum 

 and has shown his interest in the institution not only in financing but also in providing data and giving 

 personal supervision to the construction of the most elaborate mine model in any of the world's museums 

 This model has been completed recently after three years of work on the part of experts and is on exhi 

 bition in the hall of geology. The detailed description of the model, written by Dr. E. O. Hovey, 

 has been necessarily deferred until the next issue of the Journ.vl. — The Editor. 



UP to the year 1845 the production 

 of copper in the United States 

 came from the Appalachian 

 Range. Comparatively small quantities 

 were mined in North Carolina, Virginia, 

 and Vermont. Subsequent to that date 

 the statistics of production illustrate 

 the shifting of the geographical centers 

 of most active mining. In 1856 Michi- 

 gan's proportion stood at ninety-one 

 per cent of the total; by 1869 it had 

 risen to ninety-five per cent, but in 

 1882 it dropped to sixty-two per cent; 

 and since then it has steadily declined 

 until now it occupies third place in the 

 country's list of producing states — 

 the first being Arizona, with thirty-three 

 per cent of the total, second Montana, 

 with twenty-three per cent, and Michi- 

 gan third, with twelve per cent. 



The sudden decline in the preeminence 

 of the Lake Region of Michigan marks 

 the entrance of the Rocky Mountain 

 Region into the arena of the copper in- 

 dustry through the building of the trans- 

 continental railroads. It was not until 

 the Union and Central Pacific gave an 

 outlet to the Butte mines over a long 

 wagon haul to Corinne and until the 

 Southern Pacific had reached Benson, 

 Arizona, that these two prominent re- 

 gions appeared almost simultaneously in 

 the Statistical Tables as producers. The 



first furnaces erected in Butte, at the 

 Williams branch of the x-Vrgo Smelting 

 Works, were the first shippers of rich 

 argentiferous copper matte and the com- 

 mencement of the steady flow of copper 

 by rail from Arizona was in the fall of 

 1880. Previous to that, as early as the 

 sixties, copper ore had been shipped 

 from the Planet Mines via the Colorado 

 River to California, and thence reshipped 

 to England ; but years before the South- 

 ern Pacific had traversed the territory 

 of Arizona, Captain Wade, well known 

 more than half a century ago as an 

 enterprising steamboat man on the 

 Lakes, had organized the Detroit Copper 

 Company in the Clifton District of 

 Arizona, but death forestalled his min- 

 ing operations. 



About the same time, in 1872, Messrs. 

 Freudenthal and Leszynsky, a firm of 

 merchants doing business on the Rio 

 Grande, entered on a successful copper 

 enterprise at Clifton under difficulties 

 and dangers that would have deterred 

 any but frontiersmen. The nearest 

 railway station was about seven hundred 

 miles distant in Kansas. Thither the 

 bullion had to be transported by wagon, 

 but as the smelters were also active 

 importers, the bullion gave them return 

 loads for some of their empty teams. 

 Before 1874 they are reported to have 



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