176 



COLORADO. 



gress of the United States should enact a law which 

 established on any commodity one import duty for 

 the city of New York and a different duty for other 

 cities, or one duty for one firm and another duty for 

 another firm, no matter how slight the difference, the 

 people would resort to arms, ir need be, rather than 

 submit ; yet such has been the condition of railway 

 affairs in Colorado for years. The right to discrimi- 

 nate is boldly claimed and has been wantonly exer- 

 cised. In certain mining districts $8 per ton is 

 charged freight on silver ore to Denver by the car- 

 load, and the shipper loads the cars, and this is 

 claimed to be the lowest possible rate at which silver 

 ore can be transported to Denver at a profit, and this 

 is a rate which compels the bulk of the ore of an 

 ordinary silver mine across the range "to go over 

 the dump," as not paying shipping expenses. At 

 the same time the same railway company mines its 

 own coal at its own expense, loads its cars, ships it 

 15 miles to its own coke ovens, unloads and cokes 

 the coal, reloads, and then transports the coke over 

 the same mountain range and route it transports the 

 silver ore, and sells the coke at Denver at $5 per ton. 

 Even in the most favored mining regions there are 

 many mineral deposits unworked, and some entire 

 counties in Colorado, possessed of abundant, varied, 

 and valuable mineral resources, are undeveloped sim- 

 ply because the rates of railroad transportation are 

 prohibitory. . . . 



I therefore recommend to the ninth General As- 

 sembly the following : 



1. 'The repeal of the present law providing for a 

 railway commission. 



2. A new act for a railway commission, with 3 com- 

 missioners empowered to hear and determine com- 

 plaints without recourse to the courts, and to revise 

 the rates of the carriage of passengers and freight. 



3. That the system of pooling as now in force 

 among the railways of the btate be made illegal. 



4. That the issuing by any railroad company of any 

 pass or free ticket to, or the acceptance of or travel- 

 ing upon such pass or free ticket by, any State, dis- 

 trict, county, or municipal official be made a penal 

 offense. 



The total mileage of railroads at the beginning 

 of the year was 4,422. Contracts were let in 

 June for an extension of the Missouri Pacific 

 from Pueblo to Durango, 450 miles, shortening 

 the journey between those points by about 300 

 miles. This line is expected ultimately to reach 

 the Pacific coast. 



Preparations have been made at Denver for 

 the building of the Denver, Salt Lake and San 

 Francisco road. Two routes will probably be 

 surveyed and their advantages compared before 

 a decision is made. 



Work has begun on the Cripple Creek Rail- 

 road, and it is hoped that it will be ready to 

 carry freight by the 1st of April. It will be 22 

 miles long, will run from Cripple creek to the 

 Santa Fe junction at Florissant, connect with 

 the local mines by spurs, and will cost $600,000. 



On the Colorado Midland road a tunnel has 

 just been completed between Busk and Ivanhoe 

 which cost $1,000,000, and which substitutes 2 

 miles of track for 10, and gives certain transit 

 for freight and passengers every day of the year 

 over the highest mountain range on its line. The 

 work has progressed steadily for 3 years and 10 

 days, with twenty hours to the day, and the tun- 

 nel is 10,800 feet above sea level. 



Mining. The report of the director of the 

 mint shows that Colorado is first among the 

 mining States and Territories in the amount 

 and value of output. In 1892 the silver product 

 had fallen off in each of the producing States 



and Territories except Colorado and Montana. 

 In the last named the increase was 1,000.000 

 ounces over the preceding year, while in Colo- 

 rado the increase was 3,000,000 ounces. Under 

 the division of the report relative to the distri- 

 bution of silver products of the United States 

 for 1892, as to the sources of the production, it 

 is shown that Colorado produces 10.500,000 fine 

 ounces from milling ores, 12,500,000 from lead 

 ore, and 1,000,000 from copper ore, making a 

 total of 24,000,000 ounces. The report further 

 shows that the aggregate product of gold and 

 silver reported from Colorado was as follows: 

 Gold, 267,950 fine ounces, valued at $5.539.021 ; 

 silver, 24,347,017 fine ounces, valued at $31,478,- 

 927; making a total of $37,017,993. 



The bill that passed Congress, suspending for 

 the year 1893 the law requiring that $100 worth 

 of labor or improvements be placed on each 

 claim located until the patent has been issued 

 for it, on pain of forfeiture of the claim, does 

 not meet with unmixed approval. It is regarded 

 as of more value to speculators than to miners 

 and resident prospectors. The latter class had 

 nearly completed their annual work before the 

 passage of the bill, Nov. 3. The miners usually 

 receive considerable wages for work done for 

 nonresident prospectors. Moreover, it is by the 

 present clause of forfeiture by neglect to work 

 out the assessment that unworked claims come 

 into the possession of industrious men who push 

 them forward to production. By the provisions 

 of the bill, the surface of a district might be so 

 tied up that no development need be carried 

 forward. 



The uncertainty regarding the silver market 

 occasioned great distress in silver-mining dis- 

 tricts ; but many of the camps that were closed 

 in the summer resumed operations late in the 

 year, some of them, if not all, meeting the emer- 

 gency by reducing wages and securing reduc- 

 tions in expenses of transfer, freight charges, 

 etc. In all instances where the resumption has 

 occurred it has been on agreement between work- 

 men and mine owners that as soon as the price 

 of silver goes up the wages are to be restored. 



Meantime the gold camps are gaining. The 

 vast increase in the output of the mines shows 

 that a large percentage of the men thrown out 

 of employment in the silver mines are now em- 

 ployed in digging the yellow metal ; while in all 

 the auriferous districts prospecting is going on 

 extensively, new strikes are being made, and 

 work on old properties is being resumed. 



The gold output of Cripple Creek for the year 

 will, according to estimates, amount to $5,000,- 

 000. Gold has been discovered near Hahn's 

 Peak, in Routt County. 



The Golden Fleece, near Lake City, which 

 was struck two years ago, turns out to be one of 

 the greatest tellurium mines in the world. Thus 

 far the ores have yielded about equal values in 

 silver and gold. 



A new camp, on Bear creek, in San Juan 

 County, attracted many prospectors in the sum- 

 mer. The creek is one of the head streams of 

 the Rio Grande. The new gold find is in the 

 basin at timber line, in which this creek heads. 



Across the range, on the San Juan side, several 

 rich veins of gray copper have been located. The 

 ore is all dry smelting. 



