278 ISAAC A. HOURWICH 



the carload, telling the shippers that it was a high grade of 

 zinc ore. This led to further shipments of the ore. Aban- 

 doned mines were gradually reopened because of the zinc 

 ore they contained, and at present the zinc product of Missouri 

 is more than eleven times the value of all the zinc ore mined 

 in the eastern states, where zinc mining dates back to 1848, 

 and where the mines were the main source of the domestic 

 zinc supply previous to the development of the Joplin-Galena 

 district. 



The last twenty years in the history of the lead zinc min- 

 ing industry have been a period of change. Twenty years 

 ago with a few exceptions all the mining was done by small 

 companies, mostly unchartered associations of persons living 

 in the immediate neighborhood. Some storekeeper, farmer, 

 or local capitalist furnished the small amount of money needed 

 for tools; and the men who worked in the ground in winter 

 usually engaged in farm work during the summer. The ore 

 was generally raised to the surface by a windlass, and cleaned 

 by hand with a pickawee hammer, or crushed with a bucking 

 iron on a flat stone, or by an itinerant horsepower crusher, 

 and was concentrated by sluicing and hand jigging. The 

 holders of lots sometimes put up crushing and washing ma- 

 chinery on their lots. 



The smelting companies which drew their ore supply 

 from this district had their resident or traveling purchasing 

 agents. Most of the miners were poor and unable to work 

 their diggings to good advantage, or to hold their ore long 

 after it was cleaned. 



The labor was to a considerable extent performed by 

 miners working upon their own account. Men with no capital 

 but their picks and shovels would lease small mining lots 

 and try their luck. The advantages of the leasing system 

 to the landowner and mine operator, as compared with the 

 regular wage system, are further explained in the same article. 

 The miners, working on their own account, with hopes of 

 large ultimate gains, have every inducement to work hard 

 and cheaply, and to follow every clew that working pros- 

 pectors, who, during the season wander from place to place, 



