TWENTY-NINTH ANNUAL MEETING. 125 
point at the middle of the outcrop and thence north. This mill was operated for 
nearly 12 years, when the firm unfortunately failed. The mill property and the 
gypsum grant of 50 rods of outcrop and 20 rods back in the hill, came into the 
hands of Mr. Sweetland, a business man of Blue Rapids. It was leased to several 
parties; and the mill was run till the year 1889, when flood caused considerable 
damage, resulting in the abandoment of the mill. 
Mr. Hayden, of New York, in 1887, bought the remaining portion of the old 
reservation and the adjoining Robinson farm. Fowler Bros. bought the farm 
back of the Sweetland 20-rods limit. 
The earlier mining was done by stripping the cover of dirt and shales, and 
the rock was hauled in wagons to the mills. Later it was brought down the river 
in flat-boats drawn by a small steam tug. 
In 1887 the Fowlers formed the Blue Rapids Plaster Company and built a 
one and one-half story frame mill, of one-kettle capacity, on the west side of the 
river, at the edge of the town. The present entry to the mine is 15 feet above the 
water level, though the gypsum bed-rock is the bed-rock of the river, which is four 
feet deep at this place. The entry runs east about 350 feet, and the gypsum dips 
west toward the river. Five men are employed at the mine, and the rock is 
hauled out and up an incline to the railroad, where a 25-ton car is loaded in two ° 
days and hauled to the mill. The gypsum occurs as a gray, mottled rock, with 
sugary texture, breaking with irregular fracture. The top consists of white sele- 
nite needles forming satin-spar, with a thickness of 14 to 134 inches. Throughout 
the mine are numerous cutters, in which are found perfect transparent crystals 
of gypsum, usually of small size. 
The Great Western mine is located on the side of a bluff, one mile north of the 
town and 45 feet above the level of the water in the river. It is 214 miles south- 
east of the Fowler mine. The entry runs east of north about 400 feet. In the 
first 200 feet the gypsum is in rounded masses, thick at the middle and running 
out on the sides, with the trend across the entry and parallel with the slope of 
the hill. These appear to be old water-courses. The thickness of the gypsum 
layer is the same as at Fowler Brothers’ mine, 814 feet, and both rest upon a 
limestone floor. The gypsum rock resembles very closely that already described, 
except there is an absence of cutters and crystals. 
On the banks of the Little Blue, two miles west of town, is located the Winter 
mine. The entry runs east, and is in the hill about 900 feet. The rock does not 
differ in appearance from other parts of this area: 
These three places are the only ones in the northern area where the rock is 
used; but it outcrops at a number of other localities, and is struck in the various 
wells to the north, south and west of Blue Rapids; but it appears to be absent 
in the wells to the east. 
Gypsum City AREA. 
In the northern part of the area, six miles southwest of Solomon City, on 
Gypsum creek, is located the-mill of the Crown Plaster Company. The work- 
able stratum of gypsum is five feet, and is covered by 40 feet of shale and gyp- 
sum layers, which are much folded and broken. The entry is 20 feet above the 
water in the creek, and is driven 115 feet east, with two north entries 80 feet in 
length. The upper part of the stratum is similar to the northern gypsum, but 
the lower portion is very compact, and is dotted with elliptical crystals of yellow- 
ish-brown selenite, with the greater length in the direction of the vertical crystal 
axis. The crystals are nearly one inch long and one-half inch wide, and give an 
appearance somewhat of the bird’s-eye limestone of the eastern United States. 
At Hope, 20 miles southeast, is located the only other mine in the rock gyp- 
