10 GEOLOGY AND MIXING INDUSTRY OF LEADVILLE. 



City, rapidly decreased, until within three or four years the thousands had 

 dwindled into hundreds. Kellogg, with tlie restless spirit of the western 

 prospector, wandered away in the early part of the summer into the San 

 Juan region and did not return. Tabor started the solitary store in the 

 place, his wife being at the time the only person of her sex in the camp. 

 When the product of the placers had gradually decreased and the prosperit}' 

 of the camp was at its lowest ebb, he moved across the range to Buckskin 

 Joe, which was then enjoying a fitful prosperity from the rich developments 

 of the Phillips mine ; but returned later, when the discovery of vein gold 

 in the Printer Boy mine revived for a time the waning prosperity of the 

 gulch. 



Development of mines. — In 1861 a ditcli was built from Evans gulch across 

 the head of California gulch, by means of which sluice mining was carried 

 on, but owing to the great cost of supplies, which had to be brought in on 

 the backs of animals, only the very richest gravels could be worked with 

 profit, and at that time little attention was paid to vein deposits. Among 

 the early miners it is probable that few if any suspected the existence of 

 the real mineral wealth that the region contained, although they were much 

 annoyed in their working by worn, iron-stained fragments of heavy rock, 

 which they had to throw out by hand from their sluices, the water not having 

 sufiicient foi'ce to carry them down. 



Report says that in August, 1861, C. M. Rouse and C. H. Cameron, 

 of Madison, Wis., "struck carbonates," of which a small quantity was 

 shipped to George T. Clarke, of Denver ; and that samples which he sent 

 to Chicago yielded b}' assay 164 ounces of silver to the ton. The Washoe 

 Mining Company is said to have been formed on the strength of these dis- 

 coveries, but no work was done upon the claims, whose location, if they 

 really existed, is now unknown. 



In June, 1868, the first gold vein, called the Printer Boy, was discov- 

 ered by Charles J. j\Iullen and Cooper Smith, who were prospecting for J. 

 Marshall Paul, of Philadelphia; and in August the Boston and Philadelphia 

 Gold and Silver Mining Company of Colorado was organized, and a stamp 

 mill was built at Oro, in California gulch, to treat the ore from this vein. A 

 very considerable amount of gold is said to have been obtained from it, 



