14 



MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS. 



MICHIGAN COPPER 



MINE HISTORY 



Stretching- from the southern mainland well 

 t"uard the north shore of Lake Superior is the 

 gigantic thumb of land, known as the Kewee- 

 na\v peninsula. This comparatively small area 

 contains one of the richest repositories of min- 

 eral wealth known to man, and from it have 

 been taken incalculable treasures in copper and 

 silver. The date of its exploitation by white 

 men is comparatively modern the first actual 

 mining of importance having been begun dur- 

 ing the middle of the past century; but more 

 than ]00 years ago attempts were made to 

 open copper mines on the banks of the Onton- 

 agon river, not far distant from the properties 

 now known as the Michigan and Victoria 

 mines. 



Worked Ages Ago. 



To the Jesuit Fathers of the seventeenth 

 century the world is indebted for the first 

 knowledge of the mineral wealth of the dis- 

 trict. Yet ancient as seem the exploratory 

 voyage of Marquette, La Salle, Allouez, Mes- 

 nard and Du Luth, the copper wines of Lake 

 Superior had been worked in ages so far pre- 

 ceding them that forest trees requiring cen- 

 turies to gain their maturity had grown from 

 seedlings upon the ancient workings, flour- 

 ished for other centuries as monarchs of the 

 forest, and, dying from old age, had been suc- 

 ceeded by generations of other forests. To 

 fix even an approximate date for the era in 

 which the Lake Superior copper mines were 

 worked by that strange, prehistoric race 

 known vaguely as the Mound Builders, is a 

 task that has foiled the keenest research of the 

 trained archaeologist. 



The first knowledge given Europeans of the 

 existence of native copper on the far-distant 

 shores of Lake Superior was conveyed in the 

 book published by one La Garde, at Paris, in 

 1636. The work contained a narration of jour- 

 neys taken among the Indians of the new 

 world by the author. Pere Claude Allouez 

 was the second missionary to view the coun- 

 try now known as the Lake copper district, 

 and he pushed his journey further, reaching 

 La Pointe, on Chequamagon bay, founding 

 there in 1665 the Jesuit mission which is still 

 in existence. Following Allouez came Fathers 

 James Marquette and Claude D'Albion, who 

 founded the mission at La Sault de Sainte 

 Marie. 



First Development in 1771. 



To one Capt. Jonathan Carver is due the 

 credit of stimulating the first attempt to de- 

 velop the copper wealth of Lake Superior. He 

 met with many strange adventures in the 

 course of a three years' journey, beginning at 

 Green Bay in 1765, and comprising a return 

 trip, during which he coasted along the south- 

 ern shore of Lake Superior, and found native 

 copper at the mouth of the Ontonagon river. 

 The captain's tales of marvelous mineral 

 wealth led to the formation of a copper min- 

 ing company in London, organized to exploit 

 the copper of the Ontonagon district, to which 

 a party was sent armed with royal letters 

 patent and all other things needful to coax 

 the ruddy metal from its primal bed. The 

 "miners" worked during the winter of 1771-2 

 on an adit driven from the Ontonagon river 

 just above high water level. With the spring 

 thaw the clay through which the tunnel was 

 driven collapsed, filling the adit and discour- 

 aging the workmen so that the project was 

 abandoned. As the tunnel would have had to 

 pass through red sandstone for about a mile 

 before reaching the copper formation, the wis- 

 dom of abandoning the enterprise at so early 

 a stage is full apparent at this later date. 



During the unsettled period between the 

 war of Independence and that of 1812, little 

 was heard of the copper treasures of Lake 

 Superior. The voyagers of the Hudson Bay 

 Company traversed the district frequently, but 



they were after furs and copper had no attrac- 

 tion for them. 



Real History Dates From 1830. 



The history of modern copper mining in 

 Michigan really dates from 18:i(). for it was in 

 that year that Dr. Douglass Houghton first 

 visited Lake Superior, in company with Gen. 

 Lewis' Cass. In the early years of the century, 

 Ohio and Michigan both claimed the few hun- 

 dred square miles now comprising Lucas coun- 

 ty, Ohio, in which is located the thriving city 

 of Toledo. Ohio was the older and more pow- 

 erful commonwealth; hence the disputed ter- 

 ritory was awarded that state. As a recom- 

 pense to the aggrieved residents of Michigan. 

 who had perhaps the best claim to the terri- 

 tory in dispute, 'the IS, 000-mile tract of land 

 now comprising the upper peninsula of Mich- 

 igan was generously donated to that state by 

 the federal government. The people of Michi- 

 gan protested bitterly claiming that the dis- 

 trict was worthless. However, they finally 

 accepted it and it is now the richest portion 

 of the state. 



In the following year Dr. Houghton returned 

 with the Schoolcraft expedition, sent by the 

 general government to determine the source 

 of the Mississippi river. He succeeded in se- 

 curing a small appropriation from the legisla- 

 ture for a geological survey. The initial work 

 of the survey was successfully performed un- 

 der adverse conditions, and the first report to 

 the legislature was not made until 1841, when 

 Dr. Houghton was able to lay before the citi- 

 zens of the state indisputable evidence of the 

 great mineral wealth existing in that region. 



In 1842 the Chippewa Indians ceded some 

 and the surveying of the ground fair oppor- 

 30,00 square miles of their lands to the United 

 practical miners nor geologists. With 1846 

 Lake Superior. With the acquisition of title 

 tunity was given for the exploitation of the 

 mineral resources of the new country. David 

 Henshaw, of Boston, secretary of war, was an 

 enthusiastic believer in the future of the Lake 

 district, and it was through his personal solid 

 tation that the first capital was invested in 

 copper mining in 1842, since which date Bos- 

 ton money has almost invariably opened every 

 new copper mine in the district. 



In 1844, Dr. Houghton was engaged by the 

 government to combine a linear survey of the 

 lands on the southern shore of Lake Superior 

 with the geological and topographical survey 

 then in progress for the state. This permitted 

 the opening of mines. Great progress had 

 been made in this work when Dr. Houghton 

 met with an untimely end, in October, 1845. 



The First Explorations. 



From the explorations of the first three 

 years but few mines resulted. That such 

 proved the case is not at all surprising, for 

 the men who inaugurated the modern era of 



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 there came an era of saner development, and 

 the first real mines of the district were opened. 

 Men of scientific attainments were sent to the 

 district and the vanguard of the great host of 

 Cornish miners, which has reached American 

 shores in a never ending procession for more 

 than fifty years, arrived to supplement with 

 their practical knowledge the theories of the 

 men who were skilled in book-lore. In 1846 

 the Cliff mine was first opened, and this prop- 

 erty, now being reopened by the Tamarack 

 Co., is unquestionably the oldest in the district 

 as a mine, although cursory scratching of the 

 ground was done at several other points where 

 real mines were opened in later years. 



First Real Mine. 



Although the first real mine was opened 

 near the northern end of the Kevveenaw pen- 

 insula, the desultory work of the early pros- 

 pectors soon after bore fruit in the Ontonagon 

 district, where the Minnesota was the first and 

 largest of the mines ever opened there. The 

 middle stretch of the copper range, wherein 

 are now located all of the largest and most 

 profitable mines of the Lake Superior copper 



district, was the last of the three Michigan 

 fields to be opened. The early explorers spent 

 considerable time and labor in the central dis- 

 trict, but with small results, and abandoned 

 it in disgust. They were looking for fissure 

 veins and mass mines, whereas Houghton 

 county is exceptionally rich in strong stamp 

 lodes, and remarkably deficient in the fissure 

 veins, which are both numerous and produc- 

 tive in Ontonagon and Keweenaw counties on 

 either side. The Minnesota mine was opened 

 on a contact vein, and was regarded with sus- 

 picion by the "experienced" men of that day 

 for that very reason, it being then held that 

 only the true fissure veins would pay to work. 

 Xo further dividend-paying properties were 

 developed until 1801, when the National, an - 

 Ontonagon county property adjoining the 

 .Minnesota, paid its first dividend. In 1862 

 the Pewabic, now a portion of the Quincy, 

 made its first division of profits, thus being the 

 first Houghton county mine to enter the ranks 

 of the dividend payers. It was followed a few 

 months later, in 1863, by the Franklin and 

 Quincy mines, its immediate neighbors on 

 either side, and both have made handsome rec- 

 ords of profits since that date. In 180'J the 

 Central mine, in Keweenaw county, began 

 dividing profits. In 1869 came the Hecla, and 

 in the following years the Calumet, the two 

 being consolidated, to form the peerless Calu- 

 met & Hccla, in 1871. Accessions to the list 

 of dividend-paying lake copper properties have 

 been made gradually since then. Evening 

 Journal, Hancock. 



FOREST SAVING A NECESSITY. 



Robert F. Cameron writes to the editor of 

 the Muskegon Chronicle as follows: 



"I read with very much of interest a very 

 timely article in a recent issue of your valu- 

 able paper entitled 'The Scarcity of Hard- 

 wood a Cause for Alarm.' It is a startling 

 fact that our own wastefulness in previous 

 years is in part responsible for the threatened 

 famine of tomorrow. The cry for forest pres- 

 ervation is a justifiable one. In spite of the 

 fact that this has been called the age of con- 

 crete, yet our yearly consumption of timber 

 U very large. 



"Only a few months ago a prominent lum- 

 berman issued a call for a tract of white pine 

 only to be met with the response that there 

 is no white pine left in this country, and we 

 must look to Mexico and to British Colum- 

 bia to supply us with a timber who.-e supply 

 we thought inexhaustible. As your article in- 

 timates the hardwood situation is fully as 

 critical. 



"A large manufacturer lias been scouring 

 the country in vain for the kind of white oak 

 lie used to obtain. It is true that in the Ap- 

 palachian mountains are large quantities of 

 choice oak, but it is also true that not a little 

 of that timber is so situated that the COM of 

 lumbering is too excessive to be incurred ex- 

 cept as a last resort. Today Arkansas and 

 parts of Mississippi and Louisiana and Texas 

 are furnishing the best of accessible hard- 

 woods. 



"This very scarcity has greatly affected 

 prices. A writer in a recent magazine says: 

 'There is nothing in this country growing in 

 value by leaps and bounds like timber prop- 

 er! ies. It is increasing in value at a greater 

 rate than any other public utility. The most 

 conservative estimators in the lumber busi- 

 ness say that stumpage will double in value 

 in from three to five years. As an investment, 

 therefore scarcely anything can be considered 

 saler and yet more sure to bring large re- 

 turns.' 



"A property whose value is at all times 

 real and tangible and which is not dependent 

 upon the manipulations of the stock market 

 nor upon the solvency of banks offers the best 

 encouragement for conservative investment. 

 And yet the present situation emphasizes 

 nothing more forcibly than the necessity of 

 regulation by law to put under guard our 

 great forest preserves that they may not fall 

 victim to land and timber plunderers." 



