XxX INTRODUCTION. 
have been discovered in that region, the only mines now producing being 
the Express mine, at the Leadville horizon, and the Montezuma group on 
Castle Peak, in the Maroon formation and diorite, at about 13,500 feet above 
sea level. The richer deposits near Aspen itself made but little show upon 
the surface. On Smuggler Mountain and along the base of Aspen Mountain 
their outcrops are buried beneath glacial gravels; moreover, the ore contains 
much less iron and manganese than the Leadville deposits, and hence the 
outcrops of the ore bodies are not so readily distinguishable from ordinary 
altered limestone or dolomite. 
Thus in 1881 and 1882 the prospects on the Castle Creek slope of 
Aspen Mountain were considered the more promising, and it was not until 
1884 that the existence of the very rich ore bodies on Spar Ridge was dis- 
closed by the workings of the Emma and Aspen mines. As a.result of the 
excitement consequent upon these discoveries, the town of Ashcroft was 
moved almost bodily to Aspen, many houses having been dragged over 
the 12 miles that separate the two towns. 
DEVELOPMENT. 
For the first six years of its existence the great drawback to the 
development of the district was its inaccessibility. It could be reached 
from existing railroads only by crossing the summits of lofty ranges of 
mountains. The shortest and most generally traveled line of approach 
from the east left the railroad at Granite, 15 miles below Leadville, in the 
valley of the Arkansas, and ascending the Lake Fork, passed Twin Lakes, 
crossed the summit of the Sawatch by Hunter Pass, and descended to 
Independence and thence down the Roaring Fork to Aspen, a distance of 
about 40 miles. A second route, 72 miles in length, leaving the railroad 
at Buena Vista, lower down the Arkansas Valley, crossed the Sawatch by 
Cottonwood Pass or Chalk Creek Pass, each about 11,000 feet high, into 
the valley of Taylor River, and ascending that, crossed Taylor Pass to 
Ashcroft, and thence followed down Castle Creek to Aspen. 
The first shipment of ore from Aspén came from the Spar and Chloride 
mines on Aspen Mountain; the ore was transported on the backs of burros 
or jackasses to Granite or Leadville to be smelted. The cost of such 
transportation was at first from $50 to $100 per ton, but as competition 
increased these rates were reduced, near the time of advent of the railroads, 
to $25 per ton. 
