LEAD AND ZINC ORE. 



BY ISAAC A. HOURWICH. 



[Isaac A. Hourwich, statistician and geologist, born Wilno, Russia, April 27,1800; 

 graduated from the classical gymnasium ; studied at the University of 8t. Peters- 

 burg, Russia, 1877-9; and later at Columbia university; is at present statistical expert 

 in the census bureau of the United States, and has made ext(;nsivc investigations into 

 the condition of the mining industry, especially gold, silver, copper, lead and zinc; 

 has written many articles on these subjects in which he is a recognized authority, and 

 also is author of>The Economics of the Russian Village.] 



The earliest discovery of lead on the American continent 

 is recorded fourteen years after the landing of the first English 

 settlers in Virginia. In 1621 lead deposits were found in 

 the vicinity of Falling creek, near Jamestown. The steady 

 tide of European immigration in the seventeenth and eigh- 

 teenth centuries caused a growing demand for bullets and 

 stimulated further discoveries wherever the settlements of 

 the colonists extended. The French acquainted the north- 

 western Indians v/ith firearms, inducing them to hunt fur 

 bearing animals on a large scale; consequently lead assumed 

 a value in the eyes of the Indians, both for use in making bul- 

 lets for their own weapons and as an article of traffic. To- 

 ward the close of the seventeenth century the Indians living in 

 the region comprising portions of the present states of Wis- 

 consin, Illinois, and Iowa, were melting lead and bartering 

 it with the French traders. In the second half of the eigh- 

 teenth century lead had become of such importance in the 

 trade of the upper Mississippi country that it ser^' ed as cur- 

 rency, the rate of exchange being a peck of corn for a peck of 

 ore. In 1810 Nicholas Boilvin, United States Indian agent at 

 Prairie du Chien, went on foot from Rock Island to the mouth 

 of the Wisconsin, and reported that the Indians of the region 

 had mostly abandoned the chase, except to furnish them- 

 selves with meat, and turned their attention to the manu- 

 facture of lead. 



Previous to the Louisiana purchase nearly all the valuable 

 lead mining lands were within the domains of France and Spain. 

 Soon after these lands had passed under the jurisdiction of 



vol. 6-18 273 



